Reducing Boot-Up Time Brings on Nostalgia

In their New York Times article, Matt Richtel and Ashlee Vance cite the impatience of contemporary computer users as the force driving manufacturers to reduce the boot-up times of their PCs. Making users wait for their PC to boot up has always been a usability issue so this problem cannot be solved soon enough. However, Richtel and Vance also point out that ever decreasing profit margins and ever increasing competition now drive manufacturers to seek out usability benefits as their competitive advantages. For example, Hewlett-Packard aim to build a PC that boots-up in only 30 seconds. Hewlett-Packard’s goal is only 29 seconds slower than the 1-second boot-up time of the average home computer in 1982. Progress is a wonderful thing.