When your time is wasted by the goddamn machine.

For instance:

Why does it seem like, the larger the server, the longer the various boot diagnostics seem to take. Don't "they" know that the larger the server, the more important it is that it come back ASAP! One Dell server that we have in our data center takes 3-4 minutes to run through diags. No, you can't look away and read a book or something else pleasurable; you're doing maintenance and have to hit keys as soon as the POST is done.

Classic case in point. In the early 1980s, my Apple ][ booted up in something like 12 seconds. Most consumer PCs nowadays boot up in 5-8 minutes. Sheesh. I will say that APM (which provides standby and wake-up)is one of my favorite technologies. Yeah, baby, yeah! Power on in 10 seconds -- just like my Apple!

Microsoft crap: Repent, reboot, and reload. More has been written about this than could probably fit on E2. I can still remember the PC Magazine cover back when NT 4 had just been released. The headline? Never Reboot Again! Yeah, right. I love hyperbole, don't you? Win2K doesn't do away with it, either. You could fuel a small industrial nation with the wasted GNP.

More as I think of it...feel free to add.

What a fascinating loop of logic technology has created for us...

Our computers always seem to run slow, so technology is improving at an exponential rate, ensuring that there are always newer and faster machines. The faster our computers are, the more we want to be able to do with them, so we create new software and applications to take advantage of the increased power. Naturally, these new applications cause our new computers to run slow.

...making us want even faster computers....