Out of Space

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Tue, 09 Aug 2016 17:39:23 -0400, Paul Smith wrote:
>On Tue, 2016-08-09 at 23:22 +0200, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
>> If the development is done on the latest hardware the result
>> much likely will have requirements like "64-bit dual-core or better
>> x86 CPU with SSE3 support"
>> -https://www.bitwig.com/en/support/faq.html , let alone desktop
>> environments such as GNOME, that need faster 3D support than Google
>> Earth does.  
>
>Er... I don't want to say people should be forced to upgrade for no
>good reason.  However, I don't think needing SSE3 to run well can
>really be considered requiring "the latest and greatest hardware"!
>
>SSE3 was released on Intel Prescott Pentium 4 CPUs in early 2004, and
>was available on AMD systems in early 2005 on Athlon 64.  That's about
>12 years ago... that doesn't seem like an outrageous requirement to me.
> If you really want to use such specialized systems I recommend that
>you switch to a more specialized Linux distribution that caters to
>older and lower-powered systems: they are definitely out there, for
>exactly these situations!  That's what makes Linux great: it can cater
>to the entire range of users needs.  But, not necessarily with the
>exact same distribution!
>
>My desktop at home uses a Q9300 Intel Core2 Quad (2.5GHz), which was
>released in 2008, and I run the very latest Ubuntu GNOME on it and it
>works absolutely fine.

I'm an Arch Linux user, I only use Ubuntu, too, to help inexperienced
users with Linux real-time audio. On the Ubuntu Studio devel mailing
list people even wish to get 32-bit support as long as possible.

The way computers, whiteware, entertainment gear is wasted nowadays
can't continue that much longer. The reason that "rare earth elements"
are named _rare_ earth elements, is that they are _rare_. One
day they need to be completely recycled and part of a recycling process
is repairing and keeping old hardware as well as writing software for
"old" hardware. Consuming the way a minority of humans, those from the
rich countries, is doing it now, could only continue a few decades, if
at all. If you don't have children and assuming you only care about
yourself, you could continue, if not, consider to think over this
attitude. 

I don't think that many people bought SSE3 capable CPUs 12 years ago. I
guess even my CPU isn't that old.

Regards,
Ralf