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| IBM's RAMAC, the first computer with a hard-disk. Worth $160K. From IBM Museum. |
Update: Prices on SSD, or memory harddisks, will fall from US$ 1.60 to below one dollar in 2012, according to IDC. This, combined with the price increase for traditional harddisks after the flooding in Thailand, could increase the speed of the shift from spinning disks to solid state memory.
The Innovators Dilemma of Clayton Christensen, has been a bit frightening for me, ever since Horace Dediu, @asymco, told me about it when we met in Helsinki last year. But as I call myself a General Ledger Visionary, I'm also a bit restrictive to read opinions too close to my ideas. I'm actually afraid of loosing some naivety...
But, times passes and there have been some much written and talked about about Clay Christensen, since Steve Jobs revealed that "The Innovators Dilemma" was the only book worth mentioning. So I finally just had to read it! I did, and what a book! I'm breathless reading it through during my free times in the Christmas family camp we're having at our home.
Clay took me through many industries which experienced technological breakthrough that changed their world. He focus on two industries, hard-disk and excavator. Hard-disk is a natural interest for me as and IT professional, but the excavator business was, surpringly, fascinating.
Since I'm recently got and SSD drive by changing to Macbook Air 2010, I've benn surprised of my high satisfaction of the Air in comparison to the Windows portables I used before - even if the earlier laptops had a lot better specifications than the Air. For me this has been a paradox in itself. That an portable with poor technical specification gives me way better satisfaction that the powerful machines I used earlier. I really didn't get it!
I've tried to formulate this paradox to family members, and based on that experience, here are my take on it.
My main reference for my observation is my Apple Macbook Air 2010 13" and my wife's HP nx7400 2005, which also was the my PC up to 2009, albeit with more RAM and HD.The Air has 1.86 MHz Core Duo, 2 Gb RAM 128GB SSD, 64 Gb memory card and 13" screen.The HP has 1.93 Celeron Duo, 2 Gb RAM and 80 Gb hard-disk and 15" screen. Clay informs that the common size for 2005 was 350 Gb (after the HP I happened to have an Acer - 2009 and an white Apple Macbook - 2010). The HP and the Air have very similar specifications, if you don't count on the SSD, they at least seems so. But the user experience of the two are quite different. The Air has stellar performance, the HP is a drag.
The need for storage did increase all the years from 1983 to 2011, all to 1 Tb. It decreased brutally with the Air in June 2011, and even more when iCloud arrived. I've dropped a lot of programs, and haven't moved all my data from my earlier PCs. Still, my Air is a bit to small. I still doesn't have room for my non-iTunes music. But I've considered to change from the 500 Gb HD I used as backup to a 64 Gb Memory card.
Some elements on the recent status on hard-disks as I observe it:
- iCloud removes the need to have all your backups, mail, music, video, photos and app-documents on your Mac. In that way iCloud brake the yearly increase of hard-disk, by reducing the data storage. It is expected that this will continue for video, films and series.
- Versioning of datafiles, is another storage saver. When you can reverse to earlier versions in documents, spreadsheets and presentations, there is no need to store the versions as different files.
- Syncronization is so practical, that I've started removing apps not using the iCloud.
- Lastly, I've to add that Apple just bought a SSD controller company. They have delivered the means to extend the life of SSDs.
The Back to the Mac initiative, where Apple took the best from the iPad and iPhone back to the Mac, has infact reduced my personal storage need from 1 Tb to 194 Gb, ie 80%.
This make the standard Air a valid alternate for me. And that’s also the case for a lot of others. The Air is currently Apple's best selling portable ever.
I would propose the hypothesis:
Apple, by reducing their customer need for storage on their PCs, have paved the road for the SSD as the most desirable choice for storage on portables.
I do think this is planned for. And further his points to that Apple may be using their disruption knowledge to orchestrate new disruptive technologies.
And while Clay Christensen made us see the disruption unfold in the past,
we can now watch Apple making repeated disruptions live!
