The Upgrade Trap

Every time new Macs are released, it’s easy to forget that we are dealing with some serious horsepower. Apart from that, they’re shiny, sexy, and cool.

Today’s computer users have never had more speed, more storage and raw power at their disposal; that is until 30 seconds after you leave the store with your new purchase. You know the story; the specs double and the price halves.

Moore’s Law aside, you would think that we would be able to do incredible things using the tools that we have.

And we do - we make movies, create animations, render 3d environments, rip DVDs, alter digital images; things that we would not have dreamed about even a few short years ago.

Not all of us do these CPU intensive tasks and certainly those power users that do, don’t do so all of the time. Most of us write text documents, make spreadsheets, send email, surf the web, watch movies and listen to music. And how much computing power do you need for that?

Not much actually. There seems to be a ground swell to stop the upgrade madness and make good use of “obsolete” computers. Have a search on the web and you’ll see what I mean. Lots of people are getting really great milage out of old computers. Some people are still able to do all that they need to do using System 7. How many of you were disappointed that classic support was officially dropped with change to the Intel processor?

Who says that these computers are obsolete anyway? You guessed it; mainly it’s the manufacturers of new computers - the very people that stand to lose millions of dollars if we decide not to upgrade but rather hang on to ol’ faithful.

There are times when you are forced to upgrade your computer - for example if a critical, must-have application is upgraded and no longer runs on your existing hardware or if you can’t replace a faulty part. In this case you have little choice.

For the rest of us, apart from techno-lust, is there any good reason to upgrade our hardware? Why are we doing it? Do we really have to? Let’s look in the mirror here - what’s the oldest Mac that you’re making use of?

I’m passionate about this because I deal mainly with schools - most of whom don’t have surplus cash to throw around. I am nearly driven to tears when I find that a school has been sold a “solution” for several thousand dollars when something a fraction of the cost would have met their needs. What could they have done with the money they didn’t spend?

Computers are tools and no matter what we are told, those tools don’t teach. Teaching is done by flesh and blood, human teachers - not computers. Just how new does a tool need to be? Schools that understand this focus their money towards things that will help teachers before they spend the money on technology.

As the saying goes “When all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail.”

Time to look in the mirror again. What projects or tasks are you doing on your Mac that might be done better leaving the computer out of the equation? Before starting a new project, do you even stop to consider that there might be a better way of doing what you’re about to do - and it might mean turning the computer off?

I caught myself trying to start up my laptop last year, to type a list. I was frustrated because the battery power was low and I couldn’t find the power adaptor; I spent 5 minutes looking for it before I regained my senses and grabbed a pencil and paper. 2 minutes later my list was done.

CNet recently drew attention to this very thing. Paradoxically, the fastest technology can slow us down.

The folks at Passionate Users picked up some quotes from the recent SXSW conference, some of which is in the same sort of thread.

I’m not trying to be a Luddite or reminisce about the good ol’ days. It just seems to me that everywhere we turn today the answer seems to be “technology” but no one really knows what the question was.

Think twice next time you reach for the mouse.