How does grid computing compare to its intellectual ancestor, metacomputing? Let's find out!

Power? UP!
A typical PC today is as powerful as a giant supercomputer was ten years ago. Today's PCs are shipped with over 100 Gigabytes of memory, as much as entire computer centres could muster at the beginning of the 1990s.

Speed? TURBO!
ADSL links from people's homes to the Internet typically have speeds well in excess of the 56kbits/sec that was state-of-the-art for connectivity between major supercomputer centres in 1985.

And when power and speed are combined?
The PC clusters that form today's computing grids were unimaginable just a decade ago. Plus, the Gigabit/sec wide-area networks that link these clusters are more than 1000x faster than what was available in 1990s. Such grid computing provides scientists with faster, more efficient ways of working in worldwide teams.

What will computing be like in 2020?
Who can say? Computing has been changing at a rapid pace, keeping up or even breaking Moore's law. If this keeps happening, what will people from 2020 will say about grid computing?