HOUSTON BUSINESS REVIEW

COST-EFFECTIVE IT: Hot Information Technology Summer 2005
By Richard Sonnier

Houston Business Show Commentator Richard Sonnier, of the Information Technology Services firm Nimble Services, provides weekly information on our show about information technology issues. Mr. Sonnier can be reached at 281.445.4800 x 250 or via email.

This week I will highlight some of the hot new information technology as the summer of 2005 draws to a close.

Storage

First, there was the megabyte floppy disk and then the multi-megabyte hard disk. Today, new PC routinely offer a 100-200 gigabyte disk drive. This is probably more space than you can used for business; but it is good for making digital movies. You want more space. Have no fear, Hitachi is offering a 500 gigabyte disk drive this year; and will ship a 1 terabyte (1000 gigabyte) drive by 2007. If you can wait until 2007, several vendors have combined multiple disk drives in a single package with the magic 1 terabyte of space.

As for replacing the aging 1 megabyte floppy disk, you can pick a new 1 gigabyte key chain drive. These drives are really flash memory in a key chain size package with a USB plug. You can plug them into most PC's, and they show up as another disk drive. You can copy 1000 floppies to one of these. Some companies are giving away smaller capacity models as sales promotions so you may get one for free.

The Quad Core PC

With the great success of the dual core CPU's in 2005, Intel announced its plan to make quad core CPU's. Within six months, I expect the majority of new PC's have dual core CPU's. Only at the low end will single core PC remain. In 2 to 3 years, the dual core systems will give way to the quad cores.

Monitors

The CRT monitor died this summer. The LCD flat screen has completely taken over the PC monitor marketplace. For ordinary business and home use, the LCD's are very sleek and take up less space. However, the very best monitors for high-end graphics and art are still the CRT's because large LCD's are very, very expensive and tend to suffer resolution and color problems.

Networking

Like disk drives, network capacity keeps growing and growing. In 2005, gigabit ethernet has become the standard for new networks or network upgrades. At the low end, gigabit network switches are selling for less than $50 per port; and most PC's come with gigabit ethernet by default. Within 12 months, it will be difficult to buy fast ethernet devices.

Next week, I will discuss current trends in software.