did T3 break your image of skynet?

[Filan Fyretracker]

so im late with this, but with the DVD coming up its worth while. in T3 we find out that Skynet wasnt a massive mainframe but it was a program released onto the internet. now my image of skynet was some huge evil looking mainframe with lots of some form of Terminator bots around it and automated weapons. infact at the end i was hoping for skynet to have been what was in the bunker.

[Taln Hess]

Originally yes, I would have thought of it being a larger mainframe... but as times have changed and technology has changed so has the movies. I think what they ended up doing works really well given the way technology has evolved since the first movie.

[Josh]

Yeah... massive mainframes no longer exist. Supercomputers of today are things exactly like what Skynet was in T3.

If they'd had some 1980's mainframe sitting in a room, it would be pretty stupid by today's standards.

[Bota]

I'm more disappointed that they blame the fall of mankind on the internet.
The original skynet was also to control the nuclear arsenal, convenient that they put a bunch of robots around it to help it gain control.

[crappertay]

Originally posted by Bota
I'm more disappointed that they blame the fall of mankind on the internet.


Well, according to Paramount Classics, it will be...

[Gary Destruction]

Skynet is software in Terminator 3, but it runs on a supercomputer. If you remember, once Skynet is given control, someone says that the system is running at 160 Teraflops/second.

But the nuclear war initiated by Skynet actually forces Skynet to pick a place to download itself on a permanent basis. With all other computer systems destroyed and CRS no doubt not surviving the nuclear attack, Skynet would have to download itself to a secure location. From there, it would order the machines to maintain and upgrade its hardware.

You can't have software without hardware and it is very possible for Skynet to have been on a mainframe in parts 1 and 2. It probably would've just had the machines upgrade and maintain its hardware to that of a supercomputer. So either way, as part of Skynet's survival, it's going to be an advanced, rapidly evolving supercomputer.

Here's a picture of IBM's ASCII White supercomputer used for ironically, simulated nuclear testing.
http://www.llnl.gov/asci/images/white_on_floor2.jpg
http://www.llnl.gov/asci/news/white_news.html

[Matt]

thanks for the info Gary Destruction and welcome to the board.

[maven]

"With all other computer systems destroyed and CRS no doubt not surviving the nuclear attack, Skynet would have to download itself to a secure location."

But you're still implying a single entity which given distribution by the internet is not very likely.
Seeing how most of the traffic is routed by just a handful of root nodes, and these would surely go down during the attack (most of them being in the northern hemisphere) the internet would cease to exist very quickly and parts of skynet would be stranded on systems all over the world.
I guess it either designed itself so that each "piece" works autonomously, or it needs to find a way for all the pieces to contact eachother. (take over a bunch of universities and use a satellite link? Who knows)

Obviously it must also have the ability to rewrite itself into whatever it wants. (most supercomputer software couldn't just run on a desktop, I don't know of a single supercomputer that runs on windows heh).

[Gary Destruction]

Hmm. Maybe it strands itself intentionally to ensure that humans on all continents will be terminated. If it replicates itself it would ensure worldwide distribution. But I'm sure every continent except Antarctica has at least one supercomputer.