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The Desktop -- Time to Start Saying Goodbye?
Posted by
Zonk
on Fri Jul 20, 2007 01:40 PM
from the still-looking-for-a-headware-implant dept.
from the still-looking-for-a-headware-implant dept.
Lucas123 writes "Robert Scheier at Computerworld writes that while worldwide PC shipments are expected to grow 12.2% this year, portable PC volumes are expected to grow 28% and will make up more than half of all PC shipments in the U.S. this quarter. Notebooks will dominate the worldwide PC marketplace by 2010. 'One researcher predicts it will be five to seven years before only the "die-hard" desktop users are left.'"
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Mobile: IT's Love-Hate Relationship With Laptops 497 comments
Ian Lamont writes "Are laptops really as great as they're cracked up to be? We love their portability, and we've been charting the steady rise of laptop sales for years. Yet while many of us depend on them for work, our IT departments view them with mixed feelings. IT managers point to wi-fi configuration, complicated authentication procedures, and eight other issues as making their jobs a lot harder. What else is missing from the list of laptop limitations? What would you like to see in the next generation of laptop computers?"
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You can have my desktop (Score:5, Funny)
Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
The prediction overlooks far too many inconveniences that technology hasn't yet resolved.
The need to regularly plug in the laptop. Poor battery lifetime and recharge cycle performance (but see ultracapacitors [ideaspike.com] for the impending doom of the battery industry.) The need to plug in various I/O devices (hard drives, scanners, various others for various needs.) The wearing out of laptop clamshell hinges. The low quality of laptop keyboards as compared to the awesome stand-alone keyboards available. The need for mice and drawing pads. The limited screen size of a laptop (you can of course make an ultra-large screen laptop, but then it doesn't fit in your lap very well.) The room inside a desktop for various hardware add-ons, such as PCI bus hardware, or highly accelerated graphics engines. Room for multiple drives.
A few of these things - such as connectivity, which will probably go entirely wireless - will resolve themselves as technology advances. Most will not. So as an IMHO, but one with a lot of data behind it, I call nonsense on the entire proposition.
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand my friend is not a computer power user; she only uses her laptop on the desk or in her lap on the couch. I think a lot of laptops being sold are merely desktop replacements. There is no reason for someone who only wants to do email/web/schoolwork to buy a full on desktop computer. I would bet money that most laptops being sold today are going to people who are not transporting them very far.
While my brother uses an iPhone and my friend uses a laptop I don't think I will give up my desktop anytime soon. Although i own a nice laptop i never use it, it sits in my closet. My desktop has a 21" CRT, 3 hard drives, and a real mouse and kayboard with a huge mouse pad (for gaming). I have played several video games competitively (you might have heard of the WoW guild was in) and a laptop just wouldn't have worked. Now that I don't play any video games anymore i still like my desktop. The huge screen is good for browsing and the mouse is much more accurate than a touch pad.
The article mentioned that die hard desktop users will always be on the desktop. That is of course correct but I think there are many benefits to doing normal stuff on a desktop too.
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
These days I work in government, and we install a lot of specialty/niche software (have to go through RFP and bidding process, etc), and it AMAZES me how crappy and outdated this stuff is. Microsoft Office? OpenOffice? Any Adobe product? All are polished beyond belief compared to this stuff, and these programs we pay anywhere from $100k to $1m for. The latest one (a $300k purchase) is literally a 10-15 year old application written in Visual Basic. Nothing about it is intuitive. You search through these mile long menus to find this vaguely named option that you just have to know is there, only to bring up yet another unintuitive screen with a lot of non-descriptive labels. And then these things require INSANE workarounds to install on a system, and often crash just as often as first draft open source project. Of course if I were to find an open source program that did this same thing it wouldn't get a second look, because it's "unsupported", and the pay-product is "enterprise grade software" (which means it's expensive, but doesn't reflect in any way how well it works). It's my complete belief that once you get past the $5-10k price range, the price and quality of a software product are inversely proportional.
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
How does it happen?
1. Every "senior" decision maker is a relic, or is emulating a relic to get ahead.
2. Specs can be laid out YEARS in advance, turning a good application prototype into a slurry of good ideas melded to meet forgotten and often uninformed requirements.
3. Any interface difficulty can be addressed through enough training! But the truth is planned training is often the first thing cut from budgets.
4. Aesthetics and interface design are considered "premium" functionality, because most dev hauses have poor testing strategies (which are separate from QA). Just getting the product stable can be a major challenge.
Or so my experience suggests...
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason laptops are starting to outsell desktops is simply that the cost premium has all but disappeared. So people tend to prefer the mobility (even if they don't always use it) over the ability to add internal drives or peripherals (which they certainly never use).
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
ve never seen a clamshell hinge wear out, though I'm sure it's possible.
Are you kidding? Every laptop I've ever owned has had hinges that got weaker over the years. On my backup laptop, had to replace one of the hinges two years ago because it sheared off (while on vacation in Italy). The other hinge has a weak clutch, so at significant angles, the screen falls open or shut on its own. I really should replace it, but I can't easily justify dropping another $50 on a backup laptop built back in 2000.
Now that's a load of horse hockey. (Score:5, Interesting)
If I were to sell my MacBook Pro to get the latest model (gaining me an upgrade from an ATI X1600 128mb to an nVidia 8600M 256mb, a newer chipset, a 2.4Ghz CPU from a 2.16Ghz CPU, and an LED backlit display), it would cost more than a recent desktop upgrade I did. This desktop upgrade was roughly $800, and got me a 2.4Ghz AMD X2 CPU (vs. a 2.0Ghz X2), a 256mb nVidia 8600GTS (vs a 128mb 6800), 4gb of RAM (vs 2gb of RAM), and a much better motherboard (an Asus M2N-Sli deluxe).
The thing is, I got to keep all the old parts of my computer as well (allowing me to trickle them down to other machines) -- unlike the laptop situation, where I have to roll along the money by selling the old one to pay the majority of the difference on the new one.
My entire desktop setup, with 24" monitor, 5.1 speakers, and a local storage of 1tb of HD space cost $500 less than my MacBook Pro (which has a much smaller monitor, crappier video card, 1/5th the HD space, slower CPU, less RAM, etc). MacBook Pros, given their specs, are within $200 of similarly equipped Dell and other name-brand laptops. No-name laptops tend to have the kind of parts I wouldn't buy (Via Unichrome chipsets, for example), so aren't in consideration.
The funny thing is that a 17 or 20" laptop has an even larger price premium -- I could easily have a 30" monitor with my setup for the same price as one of those laptops.
Name for me 1 laptop that I could buy for less than $800 CAD that would let me play Oblivion at 1920x1200 45fps with all the settings turned up. My desktop rig can do that.
This price premium you speak of seems alive and well to me!
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
But at this point...that's not really an answer I don't think, at least to anyone that does have higher powered requirements. At this point, it is still hard to do much to upgrade a laptop, which you can easily do with a desktop. Also, at this point,
Re:You can have my desktop (Score:5, Interesting)
And the increased speed and reach of modern networking means that the benefit of being able to undock your computer and take it home with you is decreasing. I mean, why spend umpteen dollars on a laptop plus two docking stations and peripherals, and go through all the constant hassle of docking and undocking, and also face a significantly increased risk of a single theft completely depriving you of a computer and all your data -- when you could spend less, get two desktops and a smartphone, and keep your files synchronised over the internet?
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:You can have my desktop (Score:4, Funny)
I can barely see the print on most laptop screens (even the biggest ones) and I've looked!
My laptop is 11 years old and has been used rarely if at all.
I have three desktops, all built by me from parts obtained from Fry's, Ebay and pulls.
I don't like laptops (grimace)!
I HATE laptops (cough)
Piss on laptops!
Stomp on laptops!
Chew on laptops?
It's almost time for my afernoon pills.
Parent
Why would desktops disappear?? (Score:5, Informative)
There are many cool and exciting new uses for laptops/PDAs/tablets, but desktops have many uses as well. For example, most computer users have a desk at home or work where they get a lot of work done: there's no need to have that computer be mobile, and desktops are CHEAPER and MORE UPGRADABLE and MORE RELIABLE.
Upgradibility in particular is a huge issue for power users and hardware enthusiasts:
By contrast, with my laptop, it takes maybe 5 minutes to replace the hard drive, and I have to mess with a bunch of fiddly little screws. To replace the RAM or optical drive I have to remove several panels and it probably takes 10-15 minutes. Replacing a MiniPCI wifi card is a huge pain and probably takes at least half an hour. And everything else simply can't be upgraded.
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Re:You can have my desktop (Score:4, Informative)
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2 words for the desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:2 words for the desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems to me that the only people who will stay firmly in the "desktop" category are people who by definition don't need the mobility. They are the people running computer labs, servers, and office computing systems. I expect even the high-end professional users to migrate to laptops except when laptops don't offer enough raw performance at any cost.
The interesting thing to note is that, from a technological perspective, desktop vs. laptop doesn't matter anyways. So much of the desktop market it migrating to iMac-like all-in-ones and other small enclosures that they will pretty much all be using laptop chips, too.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Price-wise,
Ah, I see. (Score:4, Insightful)
Different kind of monster (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a different tool for a different job kind of thing, the summary makes it seem simpler than that.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I do think part of it is space. Computers have never really fit into home decor. Laptops allow "normal people" to get out there computer and do work then put it away.
Ever live in an old building that once had an icebox-- I'll bet they said that about refrigerators once. No doubt Radios, TVs and automobiles as well...
okay, goodbye desktop. (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess we can bury the desktop along with the mainframes which have "disappeared".
Ain't going to happen. Laptops have charged into the fray because they've finally become price and performance competitive. They're not desktops, and they're not the same things.
Ten years ago I owned 2 desktops, and 1 laptop. Today I own 4 laptops and 3 desktops. They're all heavily used, but for home use doing heavy duty, big screen, heads down coding and computer work, it's always going to be the desktop that makes the most sense.
The percentages may change as laptops finally "emerge", but desktops, IMO, will stay.
Re:okay, goodbye desktop. (Score:5, Insightful)
I do coding on a laptop, but I hook it up to an external 23" screen. The bonus is that I can use my laptop's screen to show my email and IMs so I'm switching between windows less frequently. And if I have to do coding from some other location, I've got my workstation with me.
The real advantage that desktops have, for me, is that they're upgradeable and have a higher top end. You can throw a couple more drives in them and use sophisticated cooling techniques to get really fast processors, so you're right that they'll always have their place.
But for the vast majority of people a laptop is a great solution. Some friends of mine bought a laptop and a wireless router and are thrilled to be able to actually sit in their living room or bedroom and be on their computer, rather than going upstairs and sitting alone in a room without a TV. As usual, this is the kind of technology decision that's not cut and dried. But the trend of laptops over desktops is there.
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Guess I'll be one of them "die hard" desktop users (Score:5, Insightful)
Inevitable, but sad (Score:5, Insightful)
But even in my own experience, I find myself looking more at the ads for the latest laptop, rather than reading the specs on the motherboards.
I do have fond memories of browsing computer shopper (back when it was large format and over 1 inch thick).
Desktops still have their place (Score:5, Insightful)
So, 2010 would be (Score:5, Funny)
Computer Labs (and ilk)? (Score:4, Interesting)
Though it would be neat to see a system of renting out laptops with that sort of software. The logistics of such an approach aren't something I'd want to manage, personally though.
Another thought is the extent to which external monitors (and keyboards) will be used. Dell does have that rather new "laptop" model with the 19" screen that can act like a separate monitor. The keyboard detaches and uses bluetooth.
Almost there... (Score:5, Interesting)
Once I see and read the reviews of the next OS X it may be time to make that jump to all laptop.
Die-Hard (Score:3, Informative)
I'm not sure I agree. I have two desktops at home as well as my laptop. I am a gamer, and when I play I use my workstation. It has better graphics, more memory, better sound, and bigger hard drives. Also, because I build my own systems, I do not have to pay what I do for a laptop. I also do not have to pay it all at once. I am in a constant upgrade cycle using towers that I originally purchased around 2002. Because I do not have to replace everything at once, it is less of a financial burden to keep the machine up to near cutting edge.
OK, maybe I am just one of those "die-hard" desktop users.
Quite doubtful (Score:5, Informative)
2. Upgrades. Upgrading a laptop means currently that you have to throw out the old one and buy a new one. This, too, could be seen as a minor problem, with the Joe Average User buying a new computer every few years rather than doing midlife upgrades and laptops that come across as "barebones" with interchangeable parts.
3. Vendor lock-in. Even if upgrading is possible, you often need very specific Dell/IBM/Toshiba-only parts that fit only in this brand of laptop, often also only in this series (anyone who ever wanted to up their ram in the IBM notebooks knows what I'm talking about). This is unlikely to change, since companies DO want you to be locked in. I highly doubt they'll agree to a standard.
4. Heat. The most advanced and fastest CPUs and even more GPUs produce an incredible amount of waste heat that a notebook cannot sensibly get rid of. Usually you do get a "notebook" version of those chips, but they are usually either slower or a generation behind, when more advanced production processes allow the same speed with less heat.
5. Displays. Notebooks are supposed to be small, displays can't be large enough. Unless we find a way to "fold" displays, people who want more than a 17" display will not enjoy the notebook experience. Either that or they'll grumble when they get to haul around a notebook that can house a 20" display...
5. Space. Notebooks only have so much space, unless you increase their size to inane proportions. This is most noticable for HDDs, which are hard if not impossible to upgrade, and even current notebooks hardly come with more than 200GB of storage space, something that is allright for travels, but I doubt it would make them popular with people who have a need for a lot of storage.
6. Defects. When a part of the notebook fails, you have to send it in for repairs. No user serviceable parts inside (with most models at least). When the graphics card in the desktop fails, rip it out and replace it.
The list goes on. While notebook use will certainly increase over the next years (points 1 and 2 can pretty easily be taken care of, and will), I do not see them as the all powerful replacement of desktops. They might have their place in work environments, especially when mobility is an issue, but in the private sector (and especially amongst hardcore gamers, video/audio junkies and graphics artists) the desktop will most likely survive.
I doubt desktops will go away (Score:5, Insightful)
These same "researchers" predicted that computers would make paper disappear from the office. Today offices deal with more paper than ever because electronic documents just don't do the job.
Laptops are popular with businesses because they can do double duty: plug into a docking station with a fixed monitor and keyboard for desktop use, but allow employees to take it home to do work after hours or on weekends. At the same time, though, those laptops are no end of hassle when dealing with the corporate network. Desktops, being nailed down to just one network, can just be configured and you're set. The laptops have to be able to deal with being on insecure outside networks, and the extra software to handle that is just a nightmare when they're attached to the corporate network. Not to mention that almost all of them currently are infected with several viruses and they're spreading them to the company net. The desktops aren't nearly as much of a problem in this regard. Business likes the cost savings, but a lot of people where I work are opting to keep their desktop boxes and use their own laptops instead of having the company give them a laptop (and take away their nice reliable desktop machine).
Then of course there's gaming. Very few laptops compare well to a desktop box when it comes to gaming performance. Gaming hardware eats too much power and throws off too much heat, and gamers don't like sacrificing performance.
My sense is that desktop PC shipments are dropping not because of any lack of demand for desktops. It's more that most people are satisfied with the box they've got now and are just upgrading components for a couple hundred dollars rather than buying a whole new system, and that people are going to white-box builders locally rather than buying from the big-name vendors. I know I can find higher-spec systems locally for better prices than I can find at Dell or the like. I mean, I built one for my niece earlier this year with hardware the equal of Dell's best gaming box but a cost around that of their mid-range non-gaming boxes. I've had to decline 4 requests to build systems since then, and pointed all 4 to local shops. I'm not surprised to see the big names seeing a drop-off in shipments.
business laptops for all? (Score:4, Insightful)
Receptionists, shipping clerks, call center reps, cashiers, nurses, and most day-to-day office workers don't need the portability and form factor of a laptop. Furthermore, it's a lot more likely that a company will let a new hire or someone who has dealing with the public at the system use a desktop that's cumbersome to unhook and carry out the door than a machine designed for that purpose. People might not be any more likely to steal a laptop than a desktop in principle, but making it easier for, say, the guys who visit the Public Aid office to get in and out with them isn't necessarily a good idea.
Desktops are a lot cheaper to design and build for the budget role, and are more easily customizable for all the myriad business machines out there that require computer control. USB and Firewire are great, but they're still not as flexible as PCI and PCI Express. Extra drive bays make it much easier for IT to add storage or unusual hardware (ZIP, HD-DVD, some new memory card reader) that would have to be a separately inventoried if it was an external add-on for a laptop.
A desktop can easily be expanded into a cheap, low-end server. Most laptops don't meet this criterion very well. Memory limits asre often lower, the memory is more expensive, and you only get one hard drive in 99.8% of models out there. Lots of small businesses or working groups in larger ones tend to turn an old PC into an impromptu server for a while until the budget allows a proper server.
There might be some split into laptops for the masses, workstations for high-end work, and servers for rack-mount applications, but you can be sure lots of businesses will the just buy workstation or server machines as desktops. As long as the business world demands the mini tower, it'll be available for you to buy from Dell and HP. The enthusiast sites will probably still offer them long after that.
Besides, when has "lower growth" ever meant "decline in number"? Last I checked, growth meant more units sold, period. Less of an increase than last year, maybe, but still an increase. What if one day the market saturates and everyone only buys replacement systems? Will all the suppliers of hardware close and not bother?
Desktop Real Estate, Computing power, etc (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, as others have mentioned, I can get superior graphics performance from a desktop because it's easier to manage thermal output and you can therefore utilize video processors which have greater thermal emissions. "Graphics performance" isn't limited to games here, either; I enjoy being able to do high-polygon work in SketchUp with 4x anti-aliasing turned on.
The cause I see for the spike in laptop purchases is twofold. One, more people are buying them because they're affordable. Two, they're replaced more frequently than desktop PCs because they are abused (and therefore broken) more frequently than desktop PCs. I don't drop my desktop on the floor regularly, but everyone has been known to drop their laptop bag now and again without thinking. I don't have a tendancy to block the air vents on my desktop, but laptop air vents are often placed in very inconvenient locations. etc, etc. These two aspects are related, really. The drop in the price of laptops is mostly due to them being made more cheaply (not a "more bang for your buck" cheap, but a "lower quality" cheap) and therefore more prone to failure when mistreated/misused. I think that people are replacing laptops on a more frequent cycle than desktops, and that's why we're seeing this surge in laptop purchases.
Not dead yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I'd wait untill desktop shipments start to reduce until I call it dead.
It's not quite sane to call dead something that is growing 12% a year.
Laptops are Vulnerable (Score:3, Interesting)
When I went off to college I got a laptop -- before that I had always used a desktop. It was pretty nice being able carry my computer (life) around with me. Then I slipped while going down some stairs, my laptop took a spill, and the hard drive went into a death spiral. I was able to get the data off it (and I had an older backup) but it made me realize that it probably wasn't a great idea to have such a vulnerable device for my main box. Now I have a desktop with a RAID sitting in my room. It's not going to get dropped or stolen. If I need something on it, I can ssh in. I still find my laptop very useful, but not as my main computer.
Very few reasons for a desktop (Score:3, Interesting)
1. Cost - but most cheap desktops are rubbish
2. Screen Size - but then most laptops allow you to run dual screens. I only use a laptop at the moment at home and believe me I love using two screens. Try this on many desktop Pcs without buying a new graphics card, unless you have an Apple that is.
3. Lack of internal upgrades - but most new desktops have smaller chassis and after a few months it will still become difficult to upgrade without changing the motherboard, essentially replacing the whole computer.
4. 3D video cards - My laptop has a reasonable video card ofr the day (it is two years old). It will not play the latest games, but then if I wanted to play games I would by an XBOX360/PS3/WII because I wouldn't have so many constant you need to upgrade issues and the basic hardware is soo much cheap.
5. The old chassis form factor is too big for the modern office.
The advantage of a laptop is a computer that takes up less space. The problem is that most of them are not very portable.
The problem will be is that the latest PDAs and Smartphones (iPhone included) that have wifi and standard web browser can easily be used to virtually control a desktop or laptop using remote desktop software, some of which is free. On this basis, I think that the large laptop will become obsolete in the next few years, to be replaced by small form desktops and larger screen PDAs.
Apple are well ahead with the MINI, IPhone and IMAC.
Computers are bought by the square foot. (Score:4, Interesting)
In the 35 years that I have been a computer professional, I've observed that the form factors change very little. The computing power and storage available per square foot has gone up radically, and some new form factors have emerged -- lap top, palm top -- but the fact remains that, by and large, the "square foot" categories remain the same.
1975: Pheasant Under Glass computer rooms.
2007: Lights out server room.
1975: PDP-11/35
2007: Single rack departmental server stack.
1975: 24x80 "glass teletype" time shared VAX.
2007: desktop
1975: first "lugables" on the drawing board.
2007: lap top.
1975: HP-55 calculator
2007: Palm (or whatever they call themselves today).
The desktop will not die until the desk dies. It may change form, as the mainframe has been largely replaced by racked up servers, but the *footprint* still exists.
True--but... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd say desktops are likely to be more limited to high-end users in the future. (As laptop prices continue to fall.)
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Re:Not until the keyboards improve (Score:5, Funny)
Hmmm....we may see that one day. [apple.com]
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Agreed on the monitor... but scissor-action, laptop-style keys should have taken over the desktop a long time ago. Both faster and ergonomically more effective, because you don't have to move your fingers nearly as far for each keystroke.
There are a few scissor-action desktop keyboards out there but I'm constantly surprised they're not mainstream. Maybe the next iMac keyboard -- rumored to be based on the current MacBook keyboard -- will finally change the situation.
I don't know... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You know HDMI is exactly the same as DVI except HDMI has audio and no VGA.
You can buy a cable online for $10 with DVI at one end and HDMI on the other.
As far as digital audio.. yeah, you're on your own.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Desktops always just feel a lot faster to me. Maybe it has changed lately, but the harddrives used to always be painfully slow in laptops. I had a laptop that I thought was fine, but once I started using a new desktop with 22" widescreen and 10,000rpm hardrives, the laptop is a painful experience.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
My cell phone has much more performance than the desktop on my desk.
Therefore, desktops suck.
Re:It's all about the I/O (Score:4, Interesting)
Just as anecdotal, but...
I only know a couple of people who have more than one computer. Among those people (of which I'm one) there's usually one desktop, or possibly two.
Among the vast majority of my friends/acquaintances, each person only owns one computer. In every case where someone only owns one computer, it's a laptop. Many of those people had desktops five years ago. None of them does anymore.
My conclusion is that laptops are replacing desktops for those people (i.e. the vast majority) who don't need something only a desktop can do. The desktop will increasingly be relegated to the office (unless laptop volume gets so much higher that the extra cost of a laptop goes away), hobbyists, and specialized uses.
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