Andrew Robb

work

IT

The world of electronics seems fixated on the IBM PC architecture. It's eight-bit predecessors would delay only long enough for the power supply to stabilise and then start running their operating system from ROM. A fraction of a second later and you would see an OK prompt or similar. This could happen faster than the analog TV could lock on to the signal.

Since the IBM PC, everything needs a BIOS to load another operating system loader, which then loads the operating system, which then loads drivers and applications before we can do anything useful. But then we have most systems just going to standby rather than turning off. We still have to go through the BIOS to come out of standby.

We cannot entirely blame the digital world for this creeping paralysis of arbitrary delays. In the 1990s, some analogue TVs started to silence the sound for a second or two after changing channel. All these delays were only possible with increasingly complicated controls. I suspect delays were introduced as a ploy to make the process look more complicated and so more valuable.

If this carries on, soldiers will have to accept that it takes four seconds after releasing the safety catch before they can pull the trigger. Meanwhile, the chap with the 50-year-old Kalashnokov is already on his second magazine.