--Effectu Staff 

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FCC to Investigate Comcast Bit Torrent Filtering

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Prediction 1:

 The Wii will become the most successful console out of the current three. It's success will probably revitalize Nintendo and by the end of 2007, there'll be a plethora of wonderful games for it.

What really happened: Wii sales have taken off, and it's still hard to find a Wii.  Games have also gotten better, and theres a pretty good selection today.  Theres also a bunch of other, highly anticipated games yet to come out, like Super Smash Bros.

Prediction 2:

Although the PS3 will see limited success, the Blu-Ray format will loose the Hi Def war, and will be what the UMD disc is to the PSP. Why? Because HD DVD is much cheaper, and the PS3 will likely not see a price reduction until the next holiday season. Blu-ray players will come down in price, but still be costlier than their HD DVD rivals.  This, combined with Blu-ray's extra DRM will discourage most of the enthusiast market that already believes that HD DVD picture quality is better.

What really happened:Well, Blu Ray is still going strong, and the PS3 has seen sales increase since they cut prices and introduced the 20 and 60 Gig models.  As for the hi def war, its still a stalemate.  Both sides are claiming they've won, but it does seem that Blu Ray's sells are being bolstered by the PS3.

Prediction 3:

AMD's upcoming CPU's will take back the performance crown.  Combinded with AMD's new R600 Crossfire solution, the duo will be the system of choice for gamers around the world.

What really happened: Well, AMD's new line of CPUs is good, but they're hard to find.  AMD seriously botched their release, and they're still pretty rare to come by.  We'll still have to wait and see how things progress.

Prediction 4:

Microsoft, under mounting pressure from consumers and professionals, will cripple Vista's built in DRM features until it is only a shadow of it's previous self. 

What really happened: Well, Microsoft hasn't crippled Vista's DRM features, but Vista has been a complete dud.  Sales are very low, and most of the machines running Vista are those that came preinstalled with it.

Prediction 5: 

Both Hi Def DVD formats will be hacked to the extent that tech savvy consumers will be able to make back ups of their legally purchased discs before the end of the year.  This doesn't help Blu-ray very much(see prediction #2). 

What really happened: Well, both Hi Def formats have been hacked, although BD+ has proved to be unhackable so far, but I believe it's only a matter of time until BD+ is defeated.

Prediction 6: 

Steve Job's does not announce a touch screen video iPod.  A iPhone, however; will be announced(this is the only one I hope I'm wrong about).

What really happened: Well, I was wrong. Kinda.  The iPhone was released, and it has proved immensely popular, and is a unanimous vote for the best consumer phone available.  I even got one.  The touch screen video iPod is also available.  The iPod touch, which is essentially an iPhone without the phone.  

Prediction 7: 

Plasma TVs will continue down the path toward extinction as larger LCDs get less and less expensive.

What really happened: Plasmas are still around, and they're still the purveyors of te big screen market; but LCDs are getting larger.  Plasmas will still be the choice for people who want a large screen with the best video quality, since DLP is still hindered by viewing angle.

Well, since we've seen how well we fared for 07, let's take a look at some predictions for 08.

Predictions for 08:

Predictions for 2008:

Prediction 1: Google and Apple will rule the cell phone market.  Google came out with andriod, and even though its been criticized by developers, its still pretty promising.  Apple of course has their iPhone, and it's been doing very well, and with the SDK coming out, we think that the iPhone will only get better as 3rd party apps will finally be legal.

Prediction 2: The 700Mhz band will be completely free, ushering in a new class of mobile devices.  With Google getting in the game, its almost assured that the 700Mhz band will be free, which will open up possibilities for consumers and allow for innovation.

Prediction 3: The first OLED laptops will make their appearance.  Well, this isn't a given, but more of a hope.  OLED laptops provide much better batter life, and much better screens.Sony just introduced their first OLED screen in Japan.  Hopefully, we'll start seeing some more screens.

Prediction 4: Battery life for laptops will finally break the 5hr mark. No laptop that I know of can hit the 5hr mark (although there may be an ultralight that something that can), and hopefully, with some recents development in battery technology, we'll start seeing better battery lives.

Prediction 5: THe Hi Def format war will continue to rage on, with no clear cut winner emerging in 2008. I'm not sure that the hi def war will ever end, and I don't see anything in the cards that gives HD DVD or Blu Ray a definite advantage. We'll just have to see how this works out.

Prediction 6: SSD hard drives will continue to get larger and cheaper, eroding convential hard drive's market share. We've already seen laptops with SSD drives, and they've proven to be very fast, giving better read and write thoughput as well as faster seek times.  Since they're more reliable than conventional hard drives, I can only see one way for this technology to go: up.

Prediction 7: Parallel programming techniques will not catch up parallelization in hardware. I'm hoping I'm wrong here, but so far, I've seen no indication that this will change.  As CPUs become more parallel, and more and more cores get piled on, I don't see this changing either.

Prediction 8: Windows Vista will continue to be a bomb and Microsoft's market share will dwindle as more people flock to Apple and Linux. Unless Windows 8 comes out next year (the odds of which are 1 Google: 1),there's no way Windows can gain market share.  With KDE 4 being released soon, Linux newcomers will have a nice GUI, comparable to OS X and Vista.  Unless Windows can pull a rabbit out of their hat, I can't see them gaining any market share.

Prediction 9: Google and Apple will continue to expand into different markets, meeting success as they bring innovation into markets where stagnation is the norm. Apple and Google seem to thrive where other companies have failed.  They've introduced products that have been available for years that blow the competition away, and very rarely counter a credible threat.  It'll be interesting to see what products they come out with next year.