<My modem already compresses the data to about 2x on average. Are you implying that with a PIII on my end that this will improve? How much?>
Who knows? Perhaps what the guy meant was a 2x to 10x compression over no compression at all.
By the way, modem compression is lossless (it better be!), which doesn't achieve the same compression ratios as lossy.
<But note that images are already highly compress with Jpeg format, clips with .rm and audio with MP3, so there is likely little left here too.>
I don't think they're talking about all Internet traffic. I think they are talking about real-time video and audio. With processing power, you can take a person's voice or camera video in real-time, compress it, then send it down the wires (or wireless medium) to the other end where the data stream is decoded. Currently, with MP3, RealMedia, I think you have to pre-record the audio or video, then compress the recorded data. This methods of compression itself is too slow to be accomplished in real-time.
But Intel is saying the Pentium III enables methods of real-time video compression, allowing for smoother video-conferencing. You can bet that technology like this will be incorporated in Intel's own Create-and-Share home video-conferencing package.
I don't know if Intel can extend this to just general data, since all this sort of compression is lossy. Sure, a lot of the stuff we download over the Internet is already compressed, either by Zip, JPEG, or modem, but I'm sure there is still a sizable percentage of traffic that isn't compressed yet, and perhaps Intel will want to focus on that while we all wait for the next leap in bandwidth.
Tenchusatsu |
