Is There Still Hope Left in the Future of the PC?

Status
Not open for further replies.

modinn

Distinguished
Dec 28, 2010
11
0
18,510
Because some people are buying a tablet instead of buying a product that they already own? PC's won't die. Tablets are a fad, just like 3-D movies have been in the past.
 

Engima

Distinguished
Jul 17, 2011
711
0
19,060
I don't think the PC will ever die away since there will always be advocates for it, such as when people started fearing that printed media (newspapers, books, magazines) would go extinct because of e-readers. I'll always use PC till the day I end.
 

eklipz330

Distinguished
Jul 7, 2008
3,034
19
20,795
although those products offer a lot, it's not nearly as powerful or useful enough as a PC as of now. just can't beat a pc when it comes to sheer power, but it loses in portability
 

garborg

Distinguished
Dec 29, 2008
25
0
18,530
You should have revised your title before publishing, not mid article. Thanks for continuing the fear mongering BS. Grats ratings! Now STFU.
 

hardcore_gamer

Distinguished
Mar 27, 2010
540
0
18,980
Tablets are taking the market share of notebooks and netbooks.For applications demanding large processing/graphics power you still need a desktop PC. PCs are here to stay
 

koga73

Distinguished
Jan 23, 2008
405
0
18,780
you cant do with a tablet what you can with a pc... and until that day comes I cant say the pc will ever become extinct.
 

oxxfatelostxxo

Distinguished
Aug 17, 2007
157
0
18,710
over time pc sales will dwindle down to almost nothing, as time goes on tablets and labtops are more and more capable of delivering what people want on a performance note.
While they will never fully catch up to pc's, only truly hardcore gamers or servers will need them at some point.
 
For the PC's basic form factor to have not changed much other than style is not a valid criticism, any more than it is for the automobile and the bicycle: two form factors that have changed very little but simply work.
I want to see a smartphone/iPod type device that, normally extremely downclocked to save power and lower temperature, when plugged into a docking station, interfaces with standard PC components and ramps up into a fully capable desktop PC. Then you'll have a device that adapts its form to the functions it is performing. Such a device could have intermediate steps as well, including the large tablet or laptop form factors, with power usage and performance again commensurate to the functions to be performed.
 
Interesting article.

I haven't paid much attention to iPads, tablets, netbooks, and mobile devices for several reasons. First, I use a desktop pc with a large 30 inch monitor to create. Second, my eyes are not as good as they used to be. Third, when I am out and about having a good time, the last thing I want to do is to waste time with a hand-held device.
 

davewolfgang

Distinguished
Aug 30, 2010
454
0
18,860
1980's - The desktop PC is dead because the dumb client/server architecture.

1990's - The desktop PC is dead because laptops.

2000's - The desktop PC is dead because tables are the new "thing".

2010's - The desktop PC is dead because.......??!???!??!?!?!!??

......

2280's - The desktop PC is dead because......???

;)
 
G

Guest

Guest
The PC will die when someone invents a better input system for office workers than the current combination of desk, chair, keyboard and screen. Is that imminent? I thought not.
 

dgingeri

Distinguished
I'll tell you what I see for the future (10 years from now) of PCs:

Standard work PC: stick with laptops, they'll become more powerful and have more run time on batteries, but generally be the same. Laptop processors and video cards will still lag behind desktops by 30-40% on the top end, probably in perpetuity. For the most part, it probably won't gain the features that desktops will because they just don't make sense for mobile use. Some low end workers will be stuck with low end desktops that will stay much like the computers of today.

Technical work PC: desktops will gain several functions: voice recognition (real, usable, voice recognition, not the near useless stuff we have now), tablet connections, 'local' and remote cloud storage, and fast SSD local storage. For one, voice recognition is the interface for the future. It will allow engineers to make modifications much more easily, programmers to generate code 10 times as fast, and scientists to enter logs and maintain records of experiments. It will change all technical work. (Think Tony Stark in Iron Man.) Tablets will become attached accessories to technical desktops for the same reason. More easy access to information, and more screens for access to more information at once. Those of us who can handle it will probably have multiple screens and tablets for various aspects of designs. (I couldn't count the number of times I've had half a dozen or more interface screens for various servers monitoring activity and trying to make things work together right. I could actually make use of a dozen screens without tapping out my attention.) Most storage has already gone to file servers at work these days, but I forsee having future versions of Windows, or whatever OS we wind up with at that point, defaulting to LAN storage. In addition, servers these days already have distributed storage, which I see getting far more distributed for faster access to people in multiple locations. What we see as "cloud" storage right now will just be the way things work in business 10 years from now. These machines will certainly go toward the way gaming PCs are right now: main storage will be fast SSDs, probably to the point where PC cases will not even have hard drive bays, but the motherboards will have multiple mSATA slots for local storage.

Gaming PCs will probably be much like technical work PCs, as they are today, with lesser capabilities in certain areas, but more in others.

Typical home user systems: probably low end PCs and tablets with a file server in most basements. I already have this, and I'm certain it will push into other homes, starting with relatives of do-it-yourselfers like me. I'm going to be building a server for both my parents and my older sister and her family in the next year or so. Users will store local copies of high bandwidth necessary items, like streaming movies in high def, because the internet won't be able to keep up. I believe certain industries will make apps for home servers so that movies, music, and TV will be streamed to their local server by subscription during off-peak hours, and become available at a designated time and date according to what the studio sets. They'll probably even use peer-to-peer standards like Bit Torrent to do it. Then people will use their TVs with ARM processors and Linux based OSs to watch the shows and movies when they feel like it, probably through a pay-per-view system or possibly with a monthly subscription. This would be advantageous for both home viewers and studios because the studios will know exactly what is popular, no longer relying on rating systems that are approximations at best, and viewers can get the content they want without being bombarded by garbage they don't want. Apple will probably start this trend with others coming in later, unfortunately. Microsoft has a real chance to take leadership in this area, but I doubt they'll get their heads out of their butts long enough to see it until Apple has a majority of the market.
 

modinn

Distinguished
Dec 28, 2010
11
0
18,510
[citation][nom]oxxfatelostxxo[/nom]over time pc sales will dwindle down to almost nothing, as time goes on tablets and labtops are more and more capable of delivering what people want on a performance note.While they will never fully catch up to pc's, only truly hardcore gamers or servers will need them at some point.[/citation]

Tell that to the people in the late 90's who thought 1 Gigabyte in a Hard Drive was unnecessary and no one would ever be able to fill it up entirely. I'd venture to say most of them changed that perception quickly in the 21st Century.

Hardware will always be pushed further and Moore's Law will follow the trend. As will the hardware requirements for software. Don't think that today's software will be the same software used in about 10 years time.

From a consumer aspect, yes tablets and mobile PC's will dominate over the coming years. But from a business aspect, the Personal Computer is here to stay and allows for more productivity than a Tablet or Laptop could ever produce (see OS Domain Control).

Technology will push further and companies will continue to buy the best hardware they can afford so that they can produce the best and fastest products that are physically possible with the techonology at hand.

If we limit ourselves to the performance of Tablets and Notebooks, where would we be? After all, the hardware in these machines were in top-of-the-line PCs at least a year ago (if not more). Tablet, Notebook, and Console owners should be thankful for what the PC community does for the Electronics industry.


 
I'd said previously, Im waiting for someone with the balls to throw away all the current standards for desktops / towers, and start from scratch.

The first step is taking an i7-2600k at 4.5ghz, 16gb ram, gtx 570/amd 6970+ level graphics, and squeeze it all into something the size if mini-itx, w/o any compromises as far as cooling, power, power consumption, and upgrade ability.

No more locked anything. No more new socket designs over and over. Figure out how to make a socket that has more available features / resources than you currently can utilize. Examine in close detail the evolution of your sockets, and try to determine future needs of processors.

Everyone that buys a computer knows it's been outdated since it hit the retail shelves. Change that. Name any other industry that allows that stigma to continue unchecked. Even if you only fool the sheep in the short-term, it'll help you make it a reality.

Obviously, prices have to drop. Hmm, I would like to play games in full detail at 1080p (ex. crysis 2). Well... I'm on a budget, so I'll go with a game console. baamm.. u just lost (a lot).

How much is enough? There's different ways to make money. There's the guy that sells a bottle of sparkling wine for $100, and there's the guy that sells his for $100 for a box of 8-10-12 bottles. They're both most likely pretty well off if they've made a good product and MARKETED it properly. Example: Car Salesman "Would you be interested in this $30k car?" Customer "Well, I heard its already considered old." Salesman "Yeah well that's pretty normal, they're actually outdated by the time they get shipped around to all the sales lots. It's just the way it is."

ummm (Windows, Intel, AMD, nVidia based) PC 4 Life. Live long and prosper.
 

cyprod

Distinguished
Sep 26, 2006
127
0
18,680
what's up with all the click-bate articles from wolfgang? No, apple isn't invincible. No, the PC isn't going anywhere. Seriously, how much apple stock does this guy own? Until somebody can produce a product which has the ease of use and portability of the modern portable devices and the functionality and productive usability of a PC, the PC won't be going anywhere.
 

hangfirew8

Distinguished
Jun 19, 2009
108
0
18,680
Corporate IT likes desktops, because they are easier to chain to the desk and less desirable to steal. Yes, laptops have Kensington locks, but can still be stripped with a screwdriver, while a PC requires the lock tab at the back to be cut.

Desktops do not lock the IT department into a cloud, web 2.0, thin client, etc. solution, but can do them all, as well as their own local apps. That versatility is unmatched.

Wired ethernet is easier to secure.

Programmers, even web, cloud, and mobile programmers, still need big monitors and real keyboards, as do graphics designers and engineers and CAD operators.

The PC (call it workstation of whatever) is here to stay, it will just be a smaller slice of the pie, instead of the whole pie.
 
G

Guest

Guest
Probably 80% of users are just consumers of content with the occasional entry in Email, chat or social network. I think the PC will morph into the family home nerve center. Will it lose user ship, you bet. Dead, well...not
 

sunflier

Distinguished
Jul 16, 2009
480
0
18,780
My Gaming Center is my little piece of heaven on earth. When I want to get away from reality and slip into the world of a good FPS that's where you'll find me.

There's no smartphone or pad-anything or tablet that can push a game like Crysis(2), Gears of War(X), BF2 (soon 3), Call of Duty(X) MW(X) and Black ops, and so on and so on, like the horsepower of an AMD/Intel/nvidia driven rig. And even if they could the 4" - 10" screen is too damn small anyways.
 
[citation][nom]cyprod[/nom]what's up with all the click-bate articles from wolfgang? No, apple isn't invincible. No, the PC isn't going anywhere. Seriously, how much apple stock does this guy own? Until somebody can produce a product which has the ease of use and portability of the modern portable devices and the functionality and productive usability of a PC, the PC won't be going anywhere.[/citation]

Wolfgang is the only writer that appears on Tom's you can identify 100% of the time, simply by reading the title. I'm not saying its good or bad. They could identify him as a blogger, but that becomes obvious when reading them. Try to look at them from that perspective, as I believe it his intent.
 

superguyincognito

Distinguished
Apr 13, 2011
3
0
18,510
"Let's be serious, with the exception of faster processors, form factor experiments and different colors, the PC is essentially the same it was in 1975 when Bill Gates had the vision of making a PC mainstream. "

That's a criminally ignorant claim. Bill Gates? Google "Xerox Alto" and "Xerox PARC."
 

lamorpa

Distinguished
Apr 30, 2008
1,195
0
19,280
Maybe things could have been made more clear if the headline was, "Is There a Possibility of Still Having Hope to be Left into the Future of the PC for Users?"
 
Status
Not open for further replies.