OnLive takes cloud computing to the next level

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PhaseDMA
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OnLive takes cloud computing to the next level

Post by PhaseDMA »

So I'm sure most if not all of you guys have heard about the OnLive service. If not you pretty much play games from the cloud instead of from your own computer. Bascially the largest advantage to this is the cloud is doing all the horse power while your computer only has to do something along the lines of streaming video and sending commands (I'm pretty sure it's a bit more complicated, but not nearly as complicated as running a GPU intense game). The other advantage is OnLive actually has a game console they sell for probably want amounts to pennies of profit (if not a loss) and they have iOS and Android apps (both with tablet versions) and maybe even a Windows Phone app.

Anyways... So the game portion of this company seems to work very well. I have only tried it once because I'm not into playing games on the computer, but it seemed quite compelling. So today I was reading a article on The Verge and read about something they call "OnLive Desktop". I guess I wasn't paying that much attention because I thought it was a remote desktop app... While I guess in the strictest sense it is, but I thought it would be my own desktop.

Instead it is a default Windows 7 desktop with Microsoft Office installed. This is where cloud computing is going - Everything is going to be in the cloud. Not just what you store, but your entire computer experience. It's kind of funny because we are kind of going back to where we started - Dumb Terminals. And while I'm not sure I want to see the lack of ability to buy a fast computer and the programs on my own I do think that this is great.

Here is the example. I for one can't afford a great top of the line computer. What I can afford is a dumb terminal and a $30 a month subscription fee (which after paying $20 a month for my laptop is pretty trivial). So I can start using Photoshop and do all these intense CPU cycle things and not have to worry about paying lots of money for the same horsepower.

Now you might go - There is no way you can edit a massive PSD file and transfer it back and forth as you would need to do in order to edit it. Well the solution to this is simple. OnLive provides a free 2 GBs of storage, and you can pay for more. So the file is already where it needs to be in order to quickly edit it.

Now here is the thing. Is OnLive Desktop where it needs to be yet? No. However I don't think they have yet put in the same amount of effort as they have for their games. Not because they don't plan on doing this, but rather because the Desktop stage of this for them is very much in the early stages (hell so is the games part). 2 years ago I would have said that this is absurd and not possible. However today while it still needs a lot of polishing I feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I could see a day where large displays are made and Android is installed on those displays with OnLive or some other companies app that does the same thing. They would be dirt cheap, and do everything your computer can do today, and probably much much more.

Here is a link to the Android Market where you can install the app - https://market.android.com/details?id=c ... top&rdot=1
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