Google's rumored "GDrive," a service that would enable users to access their PCs from any Internet connection, could kill off the desktop computer, Britain's Observer newspaper reports.
The GDrive, unconfirmed by Google and long rumored, may finally launch this year, with some tech news sites calling it the "most anticipated Google product so far."
The Google drive would shift away from Microsoft Window's operating system, in favor of "cloud computing," where storage and processing is done in data centers. Users would no longer have to rely on their computers' powerful hard drives.
Home and businesses have already been turning toward Web-based services, such as e-mail — including popular services Hotmail and Gmail — and photo storage, such as Flickr and Picasa.
Users would no longer have to worry about their hard drives crashing, since data would be saved on the Web, and can be accessed from any machine.
With the GDrive, a PC would be a device acting as a portal to the Web, enabling users to think of their computer as software rather than hardware.
Google refused to confirm the GDrive, but acknowledged the growing demand for cloud computing.
"There's a clear direction ... away from people thinking, 'This is my PC, this is my hard drive,' to 'This is how I interact with information, this is how I interact with the web,'" Dave Armstrong, head of product and marketing for Google Enterprise, told the Observer.
The GDrive, unconfirmed by Google and long rumored, may finally launch this year, with some tech news sites calling it the "most anticipated Google product so far."
The Google drive would shift away from Microsoft Window's operating system, in favor of "cloud computing," where storage and processing is done in data centers. Users would no longer have to rely on their computers' powerful hard drives.
Home and businesses have already been turning toward Web-based services, such as e-mail — including popular services Hotmail and Gmail — and photo storage, such as Flickr and Picasa.
Users would no longer have to worry about their hard drives crashing, since data would be saved on the Web, and can be accessed from any machine.
With the GDrive, a PC would be a device acting as a portal to the Web, enabling users to think of their computer as software rather than hardware.
Google refused to confirm the GDrive, but acknowledged the growing demand for cloud computing.
"There's a clear direction ... away from people thinking, 'This is my PC, this is my hard drive,' to 'This is how I interact with information, this is how I interact with the web,'" Dave Armstrong, head of product and marketing for Google Enterprise, told the Observer.
