Face-Off: Does HP's PC Business Affect Us Enthusiasts?

[amk-aka-Phantom]

amk-aka-phantom, you've brought up a lot of great points, so I'll touch base upon them.

1. Building your own PC and cost
The Windows tax is what kills you. If you're building from scratch, you're looking at $100 just for the OEM license. Celeron 450 2.2ghz is $40. 2GB for $15. 500gb hdd for $40. LGA775 mobo for $50. DVD burner $20. Keyboard/mouse $15. $50 for the case and 250W supply. That's $330 before cost of Newegg's per-item shipping and then you have the labor of putting it together and then you don't have the luxury of a one-year warranty. If I was building a PC for someone, I could do it for a few bucks less than HP, or I could just send them to HP and not have to deal with being their tech support guy for life...

3. Re: Office on ARM.
The mistake that everyone had was thinking that Google was just a search engine. Or how the iPad would just be a big iPhone. Remember that ARM was engineered as a desktop CPU for Acorn "back in the day." I'm saying stuff like Office on a ARM-powered notebook and desktop. If it had honest-to-goodness 100% Microsoft Office support, I think you'd see a lot more casual users skipping the PC buying experience.

5. The PSU form factor is not beneficial for modern system cooling. That's why we had stuff like motherboards that are rotated 90 degrees or the old Lian Li PC-V line which tried to use the PSU fan to cool HDDs (but would only work for a front-flow design as opposed to a top/down).

I'm going to say that you just don't know what's possible, system-cooling wise, if we weren't tied down the legacy form factor.

1. Cloud computing.
Do you use Gmail, Hotmail or Yahoo? Remember it's the average consumer that we're talking about.

2. Tablets/smartphones
You keep assuming that ARM = tablet/smartphones. I see the big companies looking to cut costs by giving "average users" poor performing hardware that seems to do what they need. You can complain about Apple dumbing down the public, but sadly, that's the public that exists today.

3. PCs will keep getting faster and faster. There's no question about that. But our software isn't keeping up and average users aren't seeing tangible differences between fast/slow CPUs. There was a time when a faster CPU actually meant that your web pages loaded faster. That was thanks to bad browsers, crazy table based layouts, and the state of hardware at the time. Average home user is still happy with a Core 2 Duo. When tablets reach Core 2 Duo performance, will they care that the Ivy Bridge CPUs are super fast? Not unless there are applications that convince them to do so. Outside of games and digital imaging/video, I'm not sure what CPU-intensive or GPU-intensive tasks exist for normal users.

"Just like they said, if a person already has a 2-year-old PC and it can do everything s/he needs, there will be no upgrade, and it makes sense."

Exactly. And the danger/concern is that with today's software/hardware, the upgrade cycle will be even slower. Maybe it'll be like a car. With Windows 8 being more efficient than Windows 7, do you think consumers will be able to do "everything s/he needs" with an i5-2500K in 2015?

Then, while this is true, do you think the *R&D costs* for next-generation GPUs and CPUs are going down or going up? What about R&D costs for better motherboards?

If the PC mainstream market slows down, that's less R&D play money for the companies making enthusiast products. That's what I'm worried about, and that's why the HP future concerns me.

1) If you're building a low-end system, you don't need Windows 7. Use XP or Linux.

2) I meant tablets, yes. If ARM is in the laptop or in the desktop, it's no different than the current form-factor, so it doesn't deserve to be mentioned.

3) PSU form-factor doesn't prevent efficient cooling, as long as it's on the bottom of the case. BTW, I don't understand what's with the PSU being on the bottom being a "feature" for enthusiasts. Is it REALLY that hard? Yet it makes things so much easier. What different PSU form-factor do you have in mind? So far, I don't see anything different possible, if you look at what's inside of a PSU (big capacitors, coils, etc.) You could probably make it longer horizontally and shorter vertically, but I don't see a benefit in that.

4) When I talk cloud computing, I mean BS like "online storage", "streamed games" and so on. I do use Gmail, it's an e-mail, it can't be done offline. Storage can be. We use Google Calendar and Docs at work, but I don't need it at home.

5) "If the PC mainstream market slows down, that's less R&D play money for the companies making enthusiast products. That's what I'm worried about, and that's why the HP future concerns me." - I'm worried about that, too, I mentioned that in one of my previous comments (about Asus mobos in HP PCs).

6) Of course common users don't have any software that needs faster hardware. They also don't need a shift from the existing platform, but that's just my opinion. However, hi-end market is STILL profitable, especially if they'd ADVERTISE it, for once. Also, it's not THAT hard to support it. You'll still have a demand for workstations CPUS and GPUs, and that alone is enough to support development and research, and of course PC gaming isn't dead, either.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

A $220 Core i5-2500K, which can easily be overclocked 1 GHz+ (and includes Quick Sync) matched or exceeded much of the LGA 1366-based lineup, including the Extreme Edition parts when you're talking about gaming situations. This is why those $1000 parts don't receive recommendations in our monthly Best Graphics/CPU For The Money columns.

Sandy Bridge-based parts could easily command a higher price. Now you're going to see AMD forced to price its next generation of CPUs against those parts, though, rather than the expensive Bloomfield and Gulftown models (remember that those $1000 SKUs came out before and of the second-gen Core parts). The good news is that this will turn out better for enthusiasts...but it didn't have to end up that way.

I'd be happy to provide links if you've missed any of the benchmarks we've published!

All the best,
Chris

Article paragraph in question:

Intel still charges $1000 for its top-end enthusiast CPU…because it can. AMD would charge $1000 as well, if it had something competitive. The only reason we pay so much less for processors today is because AMD slots in between price point in Intel's lineup where it can offer competitive performance. Frankly, I think that if Intel wanted to charge more for its Sandy Bridge-based chips, it could (come on—$220 -2500Ks blow away even more expensive models in Intel's own LGA 1366-based lineup). But it's so afraid of getting burnt on anti-competitive practices that it pulls the bar down.

I said:

This is another bunch of self-contradicting BS. First, he mentions i7-980/990X, then suddenly jumps to SB... And how is Intel keeping prices low just because they're afraid of "getting burnt on anti-competitive practices"?! They're doing it because otherwise nobody would buy Sandy Bridge, that's all!

You misunderstood me. I know that current Sandy Bridges match or exceed LGA 1366; that's why I have SB.

What I meant is that the article said that Intel is pricing Sandy Bridge lower out of being "afraid of getting burnt on anti-competitive practices". That is somewhat unclear, because how would Intel pricing their CPU higher be "anti-competitive practice"? It would be just stupid, since then a lot of people would easily jump to Phenoms. And of course I called it self-contradicting because they first mention 980/990X (which are targeted at...?) and then jump to Sandy Bridge, where the best CPU is currently priced at $330 or so.

 

[cangelini]

I don't have any evidence to suggest why Intel priced its Sandy Bridge-based parts where it did. However, I'm still of the opinion that, with an architecture capable of outperform the still-flagship, it *could* be charging significantly more for its higher-end parts than the $330-ish that a -2600K sells for.

Given how dual-core Core i3 and Pentium parts have trickled down to compete evenly against dual-, triple-, and quad-core Athlon IIs, I'm merely surmising that Intel was looking to compete fairly against an AMD stack that was already very compressed by Lynnfield- and Clarkdale-based parts in the generation prior.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

I don't have any evidence to suggest why Intel priced its Sandy Bridge-based parts where it did. However, I'm still of the opinion that, with an architecture capable of outperform the still-flagship, it *could* be charging significantly more for its higher-end parts than the $330-ish that a -2600K sells for.

Given how dual-core Core i3 and Pentium parts have trickled down to compete evenly against dual-, triple-, and quad-core Athlon IIs, I'm merely surmising that Intel was looking to compete fairly against an AMD stack that was already very compressed by Lynnfield- and Clarkdale-based parts in the generation prior.

Actually, this *is* surprising... I remember older non-extreme i7s being priced quite high and prices getting more and more rip-off just for another 0.2 GHz added. i7-950 is still more than a 2500K ($250 vs. $220). Could it be that Intel is playing nice for once?

 

[cangelini]

Ah, but why would they just play nice? It's business, after all, and business is war. Now you see where I was going with that. ;-)

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

Ah, but why would they just play nice? It's business, after all, and business is war. Now you see where I was going with that. ;-)

Maybe I do, but the wording there is really confusing. I first thought that you're referring to Intel's monopolist tricks... but even after I understood what you meant, I still felt like it's all mixed up in one pile (Extreme, Sandy Bridge, Intel afraid of getting burned on something...) and so I commented on it.

And I still think that Intel priced SB well... any higher than that and many people would switch to Phenoms.

 

[marraco]

The Windows tax is what kills you. If you're building from scratch, you're looking at $100 just for the OEM license. Celeron 450 2.2ghz is $40. 2GB for $15. 500gb hdd for $40. LGA775 mobo for $50. DVD burner $20. Keyboard/mouse $15. $50 for the case and 250W supply. That's $330 before cost of Newegg's per-item shipping and then you have the labor of putting it together and then you don't have the luxury of a one-year warranty. If I was building a PC for someone, I could do it for a few bucks less than HP, or I could just send them to HP and not have to deal with being their tech support guy for life...

I've been building PCs since the 80286 era and even then, I was going enthusiast grade by running an NEC V20 instead of Intel's chip. I was overclocking when it meant desoldering and resoldering a new crystal on the motherboard. In those days, it didn't matter if you were building a high-end system or a low-end system, it was always considerably cheaper to build than it was to buy. The gains we can make by eating up the cost of labor, warranty/support, and not having to make a profit are offset by the ability of these companies to buy components in such bulk that their per-unit cost is cheaper than what we can get from Newegg which is the closest thing we have to getting "bulk rate" discounts.

1- Wait a moment. The market today is the world. You are speaking about a specific country, but what decides the existence of PC is the whole.
The Economist expected China market to surpass USA in 2019 (and that with an expected USA growth larger than it is having, and Chinese lower). The IMF put it just in 2016:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/12/save_date
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380486/The-Age-America-ends-2016-IMF-predicts-year-Chinas-economy-surpass-US.html

China is already the main market for commodities, heavy machinery, and cars. Is just matter of time until is the main market for computers (and may be already).

I live on a developing country, and there is no way that an HP PC price is cheaper than a PC assembled on a PC store. Not even near. It's between 50% and 100% more expensive, and everything, from support to reliability is worse than a retail made PC.
HP being the “number one” PC manufacturer on USA is not that important, because it only counts some PCs made by some companies. It does not count PCs assembled in retail stores.
Retail stores assemble the bulk of PCs on the entire world. You cannot say that is just an enthusiast/niche market. It’s the main market. HP and Dell are on the niche markets.

Retail stores are the main market. Intel/AMD lives from it. They design processors, chipsets, for it. HP is just a small percentage of all the processors sold by those companies. Intel/AMD is the PC, not Dell, Apple or HP.


2- Even a windows OEM license can legally be transferred to a new computer, as long as you stop using it on the older PC, which is what you do if you take your PC to a PC store and ask for an upgrade. That’s because an OEM license can’t block you from repairing your computer with new parts.
On the more obscure other side, pirated copies rule the developing world. Blame the 300$ windows on countries where that price means stop eating for 3 months.

2. I appreciate that you understand the importance of HP subsidizing enthusiast manufacturers. ASUS started off building circuit boards for Dell before they started building whole motherboards for Dell before they started building "just about everything." ASUS and Asetek are probably the two most obvious ones imho.

If HP is sold, it does not mean that will stop buying Asus motherboards. If stops buying Asus motherboards, it does not mean the end of Asus. If Asus go bankrupt, we still have Gigabyte, MSI, and a mountain of manufacturers.

3- You still can’t reasonably compose a Word document or an Excel worksheet on any ARM device.

4- Ergonomics. Look at those pictures:

This is deadly serious. Not just an opinion. It haves years of scientific studies behind. This is how computers are lighter on your health.

Not so long in the future, health insurance companies will be crippled by laptop/mobile devices caused diseases.
You should not have the screen pasted to the keyboard. It causes lots of diseases. They take some years to develop, but it means that suddenly, health costs will rocket. Then insurance companies will raise prices or refuse to cover people with laptop/netbooks. Touch screens are also problematic.

"Just like they said, if a person already has a 2-year-old PC and it can do everything s/he needs, there will be no upgrade, and it makes sense."

Exactly. And the danger/concern is that with today's software/hardware, the upgrade cycle will be even slower. Maybe it'll be like a car. With Windows 8 being more efficient than Windows 7, do you think consumers will be able to do "everything s/he needs" with an i5-2500K in 2015?

So, why the end user will keep buying non PC hardware?
Most arguments “against PC” are valid for any device, PC or non PC.

The decade 2010-2020 is expected to be very hard for USA/Europe, thanks to Bush/Bernake "stimulus", useless wars expected to cost 3 trillion, quantitative easing, etc. Companies like HP see little growth on midterm, so they are retiring to a safe place and piling cash.
PC or not PC is not the core issue. Somebody said “It’s the economy, <fill in the blank>!” but he was ignored.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

If HP is sold, it does not mean that will stop buying Asus motherboards. If stops buying Asus motherboards, it does not mean the end of Asus. If Asus go bankrupt, we still have Gigabyte, MSI, and a mountain of manufacturers.

Yeah. But what worries me is the general trend. What if ALL mainstream manufacturers bug out?

And, honestly, Asus quitting PC business will be bad enough. Although I doubt they'd do it, they have nothing else.

Lol'd on these pics but please... let's keep the economy out of it. The real cause it the users' lack of computer literacy. Can't even reinstall Windows on their own.

 

[marraco]

If HP is sold, it does not mean that will stop buying Asus motherboards. If stops buying Asus motherboards, it does not mean the end of Asus. If Asus go bankrupt, we still have Gigabyte, MSI, and a mountain of manufacturers.

Yeah. But what worries me is the general trend. What if ALL mainstream manufacturers bug out?

And, honestly, Asus quitting PC business will be bad enough. Although I doubt they'd do it, they have nothing else.

Lol'd on these pics but please... let's keep the economy out of it. The real cause it the users' lack of computer literacy. Can't even reinstall Windows on their own.

I still think that you don't get it. The bulk of mainstream manufacturers does not depend on HP/Dell/Apple. The general user never was capable of reinstall Windows on his own, and never needed it. That's because everywhere in the world you have a computer store some blocks far from your house.

This is the worldwide PC store:

The masses go to those places, and ask for a computer. They sell AMD, Intel, ATI, nVidia, Asus, Asrock, Gigabyte. They assemble a computer from parts. The common user don't need to know anything. Sellers do all.

Cities all around the world have squares and squares of retail store. Not a single HP. Nothing from Dell. Not a word from Apple.
Those stores are not on Wall Street stocks. So they are not accounted on “Top ten PC manufacturers”. But they are the real thing. This is where money is made.

A PC made on your next block local store is far, far, far better than any HP.

- It’s cheaper.
- Generally it haves better quality. Just open any HP or Dell case, and you find lots of cheap garbage.
- Is not full of unnecessary garbage software, promotions, trials, and bloatware.
- If you have any issue, you go to the next door store and have it solved very fast. HP takes many days, or weeks to fix it. I even know of an IBM computer from which IBM “support” took a month to remove a virus. It’s all bureaucracy.
- You deal with the ones in charge face to face. You are nothing for HP; just a number.
- Easy to upgrade. Cheap to upgrade. Reasonably compatible with everything. Full of choices.
- Better guarantee. I said better guarantee? Yes, I said that. Asus makes the guarantee. Retail stores transfer the guarantee to you. They deal with Asus/Samsung/Intel (generally they deal with a city’s bulk importer/dealer). You don’t deal with Asus; You go to the store, and your PC is fixed the next day.
HP gives you the middle finger after the first year, unless you pay a “Warrant extension”, whose cost is far more expensive than the parts broken. And since big companies have the custom of using non standard hardware (strange BIOS, form factors, memory connectors, power sources, etc), you generally can’t fix your hardware without Big Company Warrant Support. A Dell motherboard was fried when I plugged an industry standard power source. Then I learnt that Dell inverted two power source cables, for NO REASON.

Of course, all that means that Big Companies loose market. They earn it. But that does not mean anything for the PC market.

They don’t matter.

I saw some trademark PCs -on retail stores- years ago. They sucked, and now are gone. I'm happy with that.

 

[Cazalan]

HP is committing suicide by these statements. The margins are eroding but they just made it worse. Go in a Best Buy today and the computer section is a cluster F.

Too many models, too many options, not enough clear differentiation. A benefit at one time but as upgrade cycles wane the PC manufacturers need to take a queue from Apple. Offer fewer products with greater performance gaps. They'll get some economies of scale back by offering fewer builds.

I'm not really concerned with the motherboard makers. Their role is becoming less and less. It will be just CPU and slots in a generation or two. The NB is already gone and the SB will quickly follow.

Within 3 years you won't even need memory slots on the motherboards. It will be fully embedded in the CPU for the consumer market. CPU's are literally going 3D (stacked die - search "3D IC").

 

[legacy7955]

[citation][nom]marraco[/nom]1- Somebody said “It’s the economy, !” but he was ignored.[/citation]


That was me actually.

This is far and away some of the BEST EVER feedback in a news comment section at Tom's.

Marcus, you ought to have Tom's consider adding folks like Macrraco,
amk-aka-phantom, and cangelini as contributors to the news section, heck they actually deserved to be paid a little if you ask me. Perhaps Tom's could add a new feature called featured comment contributors.

Seriously I have never read a better in depth discussion anywhere on the web about this topic than here, and it is guy like I mentioned above that deserve the credit!

It is true even IF yo udon't like HP and don't buy their products enthusiasts NEED companines like HP, Dell, Lenovo, ect to keep the funds necessary coming into the research and development coffers so that along with the pedestrian level of hardware the cutting edge stuff and also be developed.

That is one of the reasons I have no disrespect for the ordinary PC user, they are doing us a favor by keeping the funding up and the overall costs down for us all. We NEED HP PSG to continue, I hope they do and they thrive, it belefits us all in the end.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

@marraco: I know all that, and don't support "branded" machines at all. BTW, don't generalize, in my country we don't have many of these stores even in big cities. And the stuff you said about warranties makes total sense.

Too many models, too many options, not enough clear differentiation. A benefit at one time but as upgrade cycles wane the PC manufacturers need to take a queue from Apple. Offer fewer products with greater performance gaps. They'll get some economies of scale back by offering fewer builds.

I'm not really concerned with the motherboard makers. Their role is becoming less and less. It will be just CPU and slots in a generation or two. The NB is already gone and the SB will quickly follow.

Cool story bro, but taking cue from Apple is the LAST thing we want the hardware manufacturers to do. I'm very happy with the current situation (although the prices could always drop, lol) and I'll be pissed if RAM gets integrated into the CPU. DO NOT offer us "fewer" products. If you can't choose, go get a Mac and don't bother us, because we can.

Marcus, you ought to have Tom's consider adding folks like marraco, amk-aka-phantom, and cangelini as contributors to the news section, heck they actually deserved to be paid a little if you ask me. Perhaps Tom's could add a new feature called featured comment contributors.

Lol, thanks... but I believe cangelini is Worldwide Editor-in-Chief, so he probably gets paid anyway. As for me, feel free to pay me if you feel like

 

[phartindust]

[citation][nom]mayankleoboy1[/nom]who is alan dang?[/citation]



Some say he howls at the moon on cold November nights, and that he has a fondness for rabbit stew. All we know is................HE"S CALLED THE STIG!

 

[cats_Paw]

I belive what they say simply wont work that way. Most people see the best game out there now on a big ass hdtv with a monster rig powering it and thinks, "this is awsome".
Most of the enthusiasts are gaming freaks as well, that love to see exactly how powerfull their system is, etc. Now most people might say that, with time, a pad will run games like metro 2033 perfectly, and there will even be some sort of "small portable controller" to play it,

But! by then there will be games that will look so much better on a fully formed desktop pc that they will remind us of games that we could play on practicly any mobile phone nowdays (How about doom 1 for example).

That beeing said, its companies that will be decidng where it all goes.
The reason behind this, is that companies that make hardware are going to be defining the "next generation" or "next level" when it comes to technology and waht it can archive.

Most companies have launched a "quest" of some sort to get into the PAD area, not noticing that, the way it is, it has basic limitations due to its size, that, untill flexible screens or hologram/laser based pictures is bassicly blocked.
You can play many games on a pad, but there are many that are simply out of its range.

This beeing said, and considering that in todays sociaty multiplayer and PvP have become the next step, pad users will be probably anihilated by desktop users, and this might even be also true for laptop users.

The reasons for owning a Pc, a laptop, a Pad, a smartphone, unless required for a job to be performed, are basicly toys, and people buy them for enjoyment.
The thing is, games or even video and audio is moving forward constantly and we buy the new computers becouse we like waht we see. There are still hundreds of games that can be runed on the cheapest 2-core absed cpu and a 5-generation old GPU.
At those times games usually had better storylines, took much longer to end and a few qualities that todays games skip "hollywood-movie style".

Yet we dont go to a store and buy a 4 year old game unless we simply loed it. Instead we are waiting for the new game that will come out, or for the price to drop on a certain product.

Yes, there is a way to "kill the PC-Desktop franchise", but it requires far more risk than keeping it alive.
Think of laptops lasting 20 days on a single batery charge, or a holographic monitor, the size of a phone, and controled by your hand in the air.
At this pont, its possible pcs would die out, but i kinda doubt that this technology will be availabe to us in the next 20 years at an affordable price, while companies can still sell us laptops wiht a 2 hour battery life (and its been some years since then).

i am sort of an enthusiast (means i dont have the money to be one), and while i do not hate the idea of a pre build system, i see a lot op potential for a company to lose an enourmous amount of money by building set systems.
The reason is, its already hard for companies to set prices on individual components due to the particular differences of each one it rivals with.
If that would happen in a computer... well we would have hugely overpriced enthusiast systems that would have to be "sold" before making the next generation of those.

For those who dont know or remmber, many companies tried this approach, including HP if i remmber well.

They were called something like White Shark or XPS something. They were priced from about 9k Euros up. Now i dont know about you guys but if i had 9k to spend, id use 3k and have another 6 for the next 2 builds id make?

So as you can see, i dont see the enthusiast market going down, .

 

[cats_Paw]

Most of the people dont realize that Intel found a gold spot on the sandy bridge for a very simple reason:

The i-core when ti frst came out was supposed to be the 775 socket follow up. However, many people like me stayed on the 775. The reason is that, except for people who have a decent ammount of money, a change from a 775 to a 1366 was not worth it.
After the 1366 versions started looing sales, the cheaper, yet very good chips came out to lure the 775 who didnt upgrade to spend th money on the 1155 socket. For a while i was tempted, but then i realized i had only 1 reason for it : it would be cool.
I can still play any game, decent enought. This way intel managed to sneak in a full generation and clean the factories for the next production line.

Intel=Smart.

 

[Cazalan]

amk-aka-phantom:
Cool story bro, but taking cue from Apple is the LAST thing we want the hardware manufacturers to do. I'm very happy with the current situation (although the prices could always drop, lol) and I'll be pissed if RAM gets integrated into the CPU. DO NOT offer us "fewer" products. If you can't choose, go get a Mac and don't bother us, because we can.

It's going to happen for the power savings. You can spend 30-40 Watts just in the DDR interface. CPU's will run much cooler and overclock higher if they don't have to drive that power hungry DDR3. There will probably still be expansion RAM but 8GB embedded RAM will satisfy most needs.

You can't fight integration it's a natural progression. There used to be 3D only video cards (3DFX). Then there were 2D/3D video cards. Now they're integrated with the CPU. Memory controller was in the North Bridge, now it's integrated in the CPU. Every level of integration brings costs down and speeds up.

 

[slicedtoad]

longest two pages of comments ever.

 

[AidanJC]

[citation][nom]demonhorde665[/nom]cheers TO THAT , dumbesta rticle ehader i've seen on tom's todateNO real enthusiast buys name brand , they build thier own period. pfft , alien ware, lenovo HP just pffft only a wanna be enthusiast would bther with any of these[/citation]

Oh wow, A little grammatical error can make you sound like such a weird person.

 

[bwcbwc]

Uhh, HP didn't say anything about selling/spinning off their servers (enterprise HW) business. They are spinning off Personal Systems Group: their consumer/retail business. So HP is not "exiting the PC business". They are exiting the consumer business and going enterprise a la IBM. Of course IBM was a bit more prescient and got out of the consumer PC business about 10 years ago.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

Most of the people dont realize that Intel found a gold spot on the sandy bridge for a very simple reason:

The i-core when ti frst came out was supposed to be the 775 socket follow up. However, many people like me stayed on the 775. The reason is that, except for people who have a decent ammount of money, a change from a 775 to a 1366 was not worth it.
After the 1366 versions started looing sales, the cheaper, yet very good chips came out to lure the 775 who didnt upgrade to spend th money on the 1155 socket. For a while i was tempted, but then i realized i had only 1 reason for it : it would be cool.
I can still play any game, decent enought. This way intel managed to sneak in a full generation and clean the factories for the next production line.

Intel=Smart.

This is a really good summary of what Intel's done. Respect. Indeed, Core 2 Quad people didn't *really* need an upgrade to LGA 1366... they still don't need it for LGA 1155, but it's much more tempting now. For $220, you get a CPU that pwns nearly everything else on the market... tempting enough?

But in the end, the customers only benefited from it. Think of it: we have overkill CPUs for cheap on the market, dual-core i3s pwn quad-core Phenoms, Ivy Bridge is coming soon, and our Sandy Bridges will last us for a long time, just like Core 2 Quads did for their owners. This is the magic of high-end stuff: get the best (not necessarily the most expensive), and you're set for years. Every single one of my friends who said 4 years ago "nah, C2Q is too expensive... we go Pentium or C2D..." now can't run anything maxed out, and all who got C2Qs... well, again, they think about upgrading, but they don't REALLY need it

 

[AlanDang]

bwcbwc, the Personal Systems Division doesn't do the "big iron" servers, but they do all of the workstations including the Z line and the mid-level servers such as the Proliants. The Integrity and SuperDome aredifferent. So it's not just consumer HP Pavilions.

 

[legacy7955]

Indeed there are a LOT of workplaces I have been in that use the HP consumer style of PC and not just a few of them either.

 

[RazberyBandit]

If HP-Samsung actually happens, and Samsung is able to decrease the cost of manufacturing even further, then enthusiasts lose. The cost of components from Newegg and a Windows 7 software license would be more than buying a pre-fab machine from Best Buy.

That would only be true if Samsung were to also maintain the same profit margins, which we know they wouldn't. They'd exploit their internal cost advantage to the fullest by continuing to price their PCs in line with their competitor pricing, just as HP did. That or perhaps even raise their prices, thus increasing their profit margin even further.

A competitive manufacturer won't always pass internal cost reductions to the consumer. Unless forced to reduce retail pricing by a competitive undercut or super-competitive market, expect any corporation to milk as much profit margin out of their products as possible. (A-la Apple.) Any further internal cost reductions means they'll simply start making a greater profit.

 

[southernshark]

It seemed like this article was really grasping for straws when it came to positioning HP as an innovator and a company which had pushed the envelope of the PC....

HP is not an innovator.

 

[x Heavy]

HP is like the mother in law sucking Oxygen while smoking in the far room of your home as you wait for her to pass on.

I am surprised our Iraqi military tanks and trucks did not carry the HP logo on them due to the paint applied to them. Ugh.