Boring PCs Slow PC Industry, Says Gartner

[Guest]

Gartner has, once more, revised the shipment forecast for PCs this year.

Boring PCs Slow PC Industry, Says Gartner : Read more

 

[aznguy0028]

Apparently Gartner never heard about a few little games coming out this year...something called Diablo 3 and Battlefield 3 which will drive crazy numbers of pc upgrades.

 

[NightLight]

well... i think software is to blame too. nobody is pushing the envelope anymore... once you have a core2duo or equivalent, you can run pretty much anything. everyone has 2 to 4 gigs of ram. again, this is enough for any program too run smoothly.

 

[Stardude82]

What's more there has been no big revolution in Netbooks since the Atom came out. My Netbook (with 1GB of RAM) runs 7 as well or better than it ever ran XP.

 

[RazberyBandit]

A "boring PC" is all the average home user needs. Email, web browsing, streaming video, office programs, social shovelware games - all are handled rather well by low-end hardware. Until the time comes where everyone suddenly wants or needs to do something which actually requires cutting-edge tech, the plethora of "boring PCs" on the market will remain.

 

[malphas]

[citation][nom]aznguy0028[/nom]Apparently Gartner never heard about a few little games coming out this year...something called Diablo 3 and Battlefield 3 which will drive crazy numbers of pc upgrades.[/citation]
Only a tiny, tiny minority of people so much as open their case of their PC. Almost all PCs are prebuilt, not custom rigs, and the majority of them are laptops. The vasty majority of PC users do not use them for gaming.

 

[Guest]

[citation][nom]aznguy0028[/nom]Apparently Gartner never heard about a few little games coming out this year...something called Diablo 3 and Battlefield 3 which will drive crazy numbers of pc upgrades.[/citation]

That won't make much of a difference. Both of those games can easily run on any mid range graphics card (which most people who game on their PC already have). Only the niche hardcore PC gamers actually spend the 300+ on the high end ones.

 

[Guest]

NightLight said basically what I would like to say only in a different way. Moores law is dead, non-existant. The processor, video card, hardware in general from a computer isn't doubled in speed in 2 years or 1 year and 6 months even. Few people really need to upgrade, and those who do only need a part switched out (typically the video card). I don't know what this article is trying to imply concerning the idea of a boring pc. Whoever this Gartner is, he sounds like a fool or a liar. If he is trying to imply that computer sales themselves are related to the way a computer case looks I'd laugh in his face.

I am pretty sure most people decide to buy a computer or a new computer because they want something concerning the idea of the computer, not as a mantle to put over their fireplace. I am sure asthetics sways some peoples various purchasing decisions as in this one instead of that one. But I highly doubt anyone is going around saying, I can't find a computer in the color I like so I will buy something else instead.

 

[malphas]

[citation][nom]n58902345[/nom]I don't know what this article is trying to imply concerning the idea of a boring pc.[/citation]
That's why you shouldn't embarassed yourself with your reply. Also, Gartner is not an individual person, and Moore's Law doesn't imply anything about computer speed doubling ever two years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gartner

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law

 

[dalethepcman]

[citation][nom]n58902345[/nom]NightLight said basically what I would like to say only in a different way. Moores law is dead, non-existant. The processor, video card, hardware in general from a computer isn't doubled in speed in 2 years or 1 year and 6 months even.[/citation]

You sir are sadly mistaken. Hard drives, Video cards, CPU's have all increased in speed by leaps and bounds. and will continue to double or more every two years.

Its not that hardware hasn't gotten WAY better (core2duo vs 2nd gen I7, 500mb/sec SSD vs 80mb/sec HDD) Its that WoW, Farmville, and console port'd games have made the PC's requirements stagnant, so there has been no reason to upgrade unless your old system broke.

I am not bragging, I don't own a super powerful machine. I have an i7-920 with 2 gtx 260 video cards and 12GB of ram. For me to push my GPU's and CPU's to their maximum, I have to run 3 xp vm's with Wow in each VM plus once on the host, each on its own screen.

 

[chick0n]

so ... what kind "exciting" PC do you need ? Something like Apple that's either all white or silver and sell for 1000 more ?

 

[kingnoobe]

n5 that's pretty much what the guy said. Boring as in no point of upgrading.

"The much bigger problem is that there are no compelling reasons for replacing PCs that are generally seen as good enough."

And dale you are right, except it doesn't matter about games. Gamers are only a slim margin of pc users.

Until people have a valid reason to buy new computers their not gonna (again for the average person as there are some of us that will upgrade often). If I didn't game i would still be on my old athlon 64 with 2gb of ram. Because it easily runs the internet, email, movies/shows.. Well pretty much anything I need it to do except run games (and it'll even do that to an extent).

 

[captaincharisma]

boring? PC's are better then they were 6 years ago where they were slow as hell and they all came in the color beige. i remember in 2005 when i bought a pre built computer they snickered at me because i wanted everything in black

 

[JamesSneed]

I like boring PC's. You know the ones that run almost anything without crashing? So boring.

 

[j3ff86]

What's with the Digital Versus image?

 

[JOSHSKORN]

[citation][nom]aznguy0028[/nom]Apparently Gartner never heard about a few little games coming out this year...something called Diablo 3 and Battlefield 3 which will drive crazy numbers of pc upgrades.[/citation]
You forgot Crysis 2 and Modern Warfare 3. I had to upgrade my computer to play Crysis 2.

 

[sykozis]

[citation][nom]captaincharisma[/nom]boring? PC's are better then they were 6 years ago where they were slow as hell and they all came in the color beige. i remember in 2005 when i bought a pre built computer they snickered at me because i wanted everything in black[/citation]
It's been more than a decade since "they all came in the color beige"... In fact, by 2005, the majority of prebuilts on the market were in black, black/grey or black/silver cases unless you were buying a Compaq or Emachine who were both using off-white cases.

 

[aznguy0028]

[citation][nom]malphas[/nom]Only a tiny, tiny minority of people so much as open their case of their PC. Almost all PCs are prebuilt, not custom rigs, and the majority of them are laptops. The vasty majority of PC users do not use them for gaming.[/citation]
Agreed. That is why i said "upgrades" and not total outright new pc's. Things such as more ram, change of video cards, new hard drives, blue ray drives, etc are bought all the time to add into a pc.

 

[cloakster]

[citation][nom]JOSHSKORN[/nom]You forgot Crysis 2 and Modern Warfare 3. I had to upgrade my computer to play Crysis 2.[/citation]

This right here is the problem, MW3 being considered a game that will stress your PC. hahaha, yea right

Battlefield 3 will hopefully bring a lot more people back to PC gaming

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

It's funny how an average user has NO IDEA about what he actually needs from his computer and how (and for how much money) it can achieve that. Therefore, for the last 3 years the media tells us what we want. First, it was cloud computing, that SUDDENLY became "the future of computing", and it just so happened that no one has ever asked for such a thing. Now it's this - totally, PCs are boring, let's all get a whole bunch of fancy-looking useless underpowered devices each doing a different thing... wait, I thought a single PC can do all those things? Why must I... ah, I almost forgot - tablets are killing the PC market, because you can already custom-build them, install any OS, tweak them, upgrade them, they can run Crysis... wait, what do you mean they're meant for "casual gaming and entertainment"? Why are they killing the PC market, then?

Because it's not the tablets, it's the stupid users who don't need anything more from their computer than a tablet can do. Though, in that case a tablet is still a poor choice - similarly priced netbook will be much better.

To "kill" PC market you need to shut down Intel, nVidia, AMD and a bunch of other companies and shift all the PC gaming to consoles. Sounds realistic to you? No? My point.

 

[southernshark]

The PC needs to change. It is boring. It needs new functionality.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

Such as?

 

[wannaturnuptheheat]

[citation][nom]southernshark[/nom]The PC needs to change. It is boring. It needs new functionality.[/citation]

I have yet to see a PC that can walk my dog for me.

Make it happen, manufacturers!

 

[wannaturnuptheheat]

[citation][nom]JOSHSKORN[/nom]You forgot Crysis 2 and Modern Warfare 3. I had to upgrade my computer to play Crysis 2.[/citation]

How old is your computer, exactly, mate?

Because I have friends with old-school rigs hosting 9000-series Geforces (9800GT and thereabouts), able to run Crysis 2 at full HD resolutions with max settings.

Like the person above said, PC is being overly saturated with low-spec titles, compared to how cheap components are these days. I think part of the issue is the owner loyalty; no one wants to admit that the $1000 best-bang-for-the-buck rig they built (or bought prebuilt) 3 years ago is no longer a viable system. The price of upgrading is just too high, so they adhere to what they have, thus causing developers to make sure not to go all-out with the game design lest they upset someone's applecart.

 

[Guest]

[citation][nom]dalethepcman[/nom]You sir are sadly mistaken. Hard drives, Video cards, CPU's have all increased in speed by leaps and bounds. and will continue to double or more every two years.Its not that hardware hasn't gotten WAY better (core2duo vs 2nd gen I7, 500mb/sec SSD vs 80mb/sec HDD) Its that WoW, Farmville, and console port'd games have made the PC's requirements stagnant, so there has been no reason to upgrade unless your old system broke.I am not bragging, I don't own a super powerful machine. I have an i7-920 with 2 gtx 260 video cards and 12GB of ram. For me to push my GPU's and CPU's to their maximum, I have to run 3 xp vm's with Wow in each VM plus once on the host, each on its own screen.[/citation]

I hate to break it to you, but that's a high end "super powerful" rig, by most peoples standards. By most people, I mean normal people who aren't "hard core."