Just another brainwave regarding my last post: Since the IC market is suffering from performance oversupply at this point, chipmakers will fortunately embrace this 4th axis.
Why? Because the market now demands it. For a long time, consumers just wanted faster chips, efficiency be damned. This is why Intel was such a big backer of multimedia with their WebOutfitter program and digital cameras back in the mid-’90s; multimedia require computers with beefy microprocessors.
Now, the desktop computer market is experiencing a lull. My mom has a Duron 800, and she’s perfectly happy with it. The market has reached performance oversupply. Now the IC manufacturers will have to increase system efficiency in their attempts to differentiate their products from each other, as well as to gain traction in the one value market that is still growing: embedded portable devices. Now you can see why Intel is touting Centrino’s power saving and wireless features and canning their MHz nomenclature.
Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.
– Albert Einstein