Re: What companies are still using old technology

[nospam@geniegate.com (Jamie)]

In <eu3fua$vkf$1@Kil-nws-1.UCIS.Dal.Ca>,
ak621@chebucto.ns.ca (Richard Bonner) mentions:
>Jamie wrote:
>***   Over time. That would be true. I remember a newspaper article here a
>few years ago (Mail Star? Globe & Mail?) about power consumption and how
>it was recommended that terminals and any non-essential computer be shut
>down at night if they were not needed until the next day. It listed power
>savings for a typical business setup, and over a year, they could be
>substantial. (Not mentioned was the advantage of regular reboots, but the
>article was about power and its costs.)

Problem in that situation is hardware replacement costs.

Overheating is a killer, but, an even bigger killer is thermal expansion,
contraction and hard drive spinup/down.

I'd feel a bit more comfortable about that if the machine had no drive
though. In a "no hard drive" situation, you could probably "fix" a
terminal that's had extensive powerup/down by pushing the chips back in
their sockets. (hot/cold makes them want to "crawl up") 

I've seen this with older WYSE terminals for example. (newer ones solder
the chips straight in, no path for upgrade but more reliable)

>   Regardless, the boatload of 486s could be made to be fairly power
>efficient, especially if there were client/server setups. 486s also had
>power management by then and would power down monitors and hard drives
>after so many minutes. Still, I agree with your point.

Indeed, 486's don't need CPU fans either. :-) Graphics on a 486 can be a
bit painful. You'd almost have to repackage it with a shiny new case,
charge $200 for it and call it something else. (486 might not be the
best choice for power savings and graphics though)

How about a "hybrid computer" :-)

Jamie
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