Storage Capacity Races Processing Power Races Communications Bandwidth...

Improvements in storage:

The March of Nanotechnology - New York Times: By DAN MITCHELL: Nanotechnology, the science of creating functional systems on the scale of molecules or smaller, could enable engineers to combine the functions of memory chips and disk drives on a device the size of a dime. Besides the instant boot up, systems that are in development today could enable desktop computers to hold 10 terabytes of data (10,000 gigabytes) or more, and future systems may be able to store data for as long as 100 years while eliminating the worry that the storage media will become obsolete, according to ComputerWorld. Some of these systems could be available today if the economics were right. Others will probably take another decade or so.

Researchers at I.B.M are working on several projects involving nanotechnology. One, called Millipede, is at what I.B.M. termed a "very advanced stage." This nanomechanical system is created by etching microscopic indentations -- each one about one-50,000th the size of the period at the end of this sentence -- onto a polymer surface, resulting in the ability to store the equivalent of 25 million printed pages in an area the size of a postage stamp...