What's in the works: Computing for the new year and beyond
Jennifer Triverio
Just as sure as the new year brings champagne and noisemakers, so, too, come the hints of new technologies on the horizon, all intended to make home computing more convenient, speedy and powerful. Only time will tell if the new ideas will flower or slip quietly into the attic next to the Betamax; what is certain is that the computer industry has ambitious plans for the future. Here's a sneak preview of what's in store.
Super storage. Standard 3 1/2-inch floppy disks are convenient, but many of today's computer files are just too big for the disks' 1.44-MB capacity. Now, Sony and Fujifilm have developed a format they call the High-Capacity Floppy Disk (HiFD), which offers a 200-MB storage capacity and a 3.6-MB/sec data-transfer rate. Better yet, HiFD drives will still be able to read and write to today's existing 3 1/2-inch floppy disks. Expect these high-capacity drives--which are vying with other devices, including Zip drives, to become the next standard--to turn up in new computers in the spring.
Processor power. Katmai, a volcano in Alaska, inspired the appropriately explosive code name for a new chip waiting in the wings at Intel. Due to be released sometime in 1998, the Katmai, or MMX2, processor is designed to improve 3D graphics dramatically. While MMX technology uses a set of 57 instructions that let Pentium and Pentium II CPUs handle complex video and audio information, MMX2 adds many more instructions, thereby boosting the processors' 3D-rendering capabilities.
Mega-memory. Scheduled to be introduced in 1999, the Direct Rambus interface is designed to close the gap between the gains in microprocessor speeds--which double every 18 months or so--and the lack of change in memory speeds, which have been plodding along at the same pace for years. The high-speed memory interface works with DRAM (dynamic random access memory) and improves overall system performance by accelerating the rate at which data travels from the memory to the processor. Currently, computers communicate with memory at a speed of approximately 66 MHz; the Direct Rambus interface boosts that rate to a whopping 800 MHz. Intel and memory manufacturers such as Samsung and Mitsubishi have already endorsed the tantalizing new technology.
Dynamic DVD. Although it's been just a few months since DVD-ROM drives first appeared in computer stores, developers are already hard at work designing the next generation of the devices. Pioneer Electronics is looking a bit farther ahead--the year 2000--for the introduction of its hottest DVD technology yet, which will be able to store a whopping 15 GB of data on one side of a disc. By contrast, today's DVD-ROMs hold a comparatively paltry 4.7 GB of data per side. The increase is necessary to play movies on high-definition TV (HDTV), which is expected to be the home-entertainment standard of the future.
The Pioneer technology will use a blue laser to read data from the disc, rather than the red laser that's currently used in CD and DVD devices; the higher-powered laser can be more tightly focused, enabling it to read the super-compressed data on the 15-GB discs. |
