Every 27 days we replace our entire outer layer of skin. Every 10 years we have replaced all the cells in our bodies. Even though we are the same person, we contain none of the original cells.

My first PC lasted almost fifteen years, at least in theory. I upgraded different components from time to time, until eventually everything including the case had been changed. Somewhere in there, there was probably a screw from the original machine. For several of those years I would leave the case open with no screws: I was changing things so often that screws were inconvenient.

In the last four years I haven’t touched any of my home machines. I no longer need to participate in the upgrade race, because I have enough power to do what I need. Let’s face it: almost everything I need to do as a consumer, I do via a Web browser. And that means that as long as someone upgrades servers out there, somewhere in the cloud of data centers, I don’t need to upgrade my “client” at home.

My work situation is slightly different, but even there I see a significant slowdown in the upgrade cycle. Laptops that were purchased three years ago are still more than capable of running applications. In fact, if I do run out of a resource, it is usually the hard drive, not the CPU. Storage growth is a problem, but CPU performance is not.

This reliance on remote servers and their processing power is gradually expanding beyond PCs. With many new gadgets such as phones, PDAs and tablets, much of the “experience” is dependent on remote server processing and almost ubiquitous network connectivity.

The burden of processing is in many ways being shifted to the data centers. In the long run, will this trend lead to an even greater acceleration of server purchasing and upgrades?

There are four ways IT departments can respond to escalating upgrade requirements for their servers. First, IT can implement a rolling refresh cycle that coordinates purchasing with de-provisioning of old systems. Second, IT can lease equipment for a fixed period (say, two years) with planned refreshes as part of the lease. Thirdly, a company can lease entire racks of equipment from a hosting provider with an agreement that includes equipment SLAs and refreshes. Finally, some companies might find “data center in a box” solutions suitable - this means buying or leasing a shipping container that contains a mini data center.