Rupert Goodwins' Diary

Friday 17/05/2002

A bad day to be flying anywhere, as an overnight software upgrade to the UK air traffic control system results in the thing being stuck in night mode and unable to cope with daytime traffic. Delays quickly climb to flight level four hours, only dropping back later in the day.

One person doubly suffering from this is Crucial Technology's roving mistress of mondo memory marketing, Liz Anderson. A Scots lass, she had to fly into London for a quick round of interviews and then scoot back to the bonny banks and braes. That was all out the window -- but in a sea of cancelled meetings, she popped ashore on Isle d'ZDNet UK. Which was nice.

So, Ms Crucial, what's happening to memory prices? "I don't know. My boss doesn't know. Nobody knows." Fair enough. Rambus? "Nobody wants it. We'd sell it if they did." Exciting new memory technologies? "Way down the line yet." So it's DDR-RAM all the way for the foreseeable future -- that and every-expanding Compact Flash cards.

Which is reassuring, if slightly dull. But on the plus point, we talked about plenty of interesting ways to test what's currently floating around -- so watch this space for better ways to stuff your slots. Unlike, alas, UK ATC.

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