If there’s one over-used buzzword currently making the rounds in the technology industry, it’s ‘post-PC world’ – or the notion that desktops and laptops are a dying breed. Todd Bradley, executive vice president of HP’s printing and personal systems group, thinks this is a nonsensical notion – and he’s right.
In an interview with PC World, Bradley was asked about what he thought of the ‘post-PC world’. His answer left little to the imagination. “Look, it’s just wrong. Just think of the decision when your child is going off to college. What’s a requirement? A PC.Or you run a business and need your employees to be productive. You need a PC. The size of the global PC business is huge, and I think some people are trying to be dramatic,” he said,”That said, there is a growing role for tablets, and we will absolutely be a significant force in that space.”
While Bradly obviously has something to sell, he’s still right. Because of the ‘post’, it implies we’re all moving beyond the PC, that it’s going to die out in favour of tablets and smartphones. In fact, in certain parts of the web this has actually created a certain animosity towards laptops and desktops; a form of disdain, if you will. Laptops and desktops are old-fashioned, and if you prefer them, you’re behind the times.
These people will be in for a surprise once they leave their dorm-classroom-Starbucks triangle, only to find out that in the real world, tablets are basically toys, and ‘real’ computers are very much a requirement. Considering this won’t change any time soon, the traditional PC market will remain a large market for a considerable time to come.
This, of course, does not mean tablets aren’t going to have an effect. I think the most important effect is that PCs won’t be replaced as often, since they’re being used less (part of their duties are taken over by tablets). If you look at it this way, tablets are a supplement, not a replacement. The PC market isn’t morphing into a tablet market – the tablet market is simply a new market, with a small amount of overlap with the PC market.
If someone announces the death of a certain product of product category – ‘post-PC world’, ‘iPhone killer’, etc. – always consider the source. More often than not, it comes from people who are trying to sell you something.
The real revolution that tablets are ushering in is the walled garden approach to software payment and delivery. iPhone started it, but it wasn’t until the iPad that we saw a successful implementation that combined iOS App Store’s model with a reasonably large screen intended for PC-ish work. Windows 8 and Surface are the next logical steps: the former brings the PC platform to the payment/distribution model, the latter brings the emerging tablet platform and its accompanying payment/distribution model closer to the PC.
The real question is what will happen once we start seeing iPads at Goodwill and garage sales. In a PC world, you can buy the hardware, install your previous software, or even pirate your software like most of the world does. Loose/non-existant software controls make hardware usage fluid. Will it remain fluid with tablets?
What about internet cafes all around the world running pirated software, or all those XP installs running cracked versions of Photoshop? Will they ever be able to jump onto the tablet bandwagon?
steam and xbla anyone?
But they didn’t and don’t offer nearly the same breadth of software.
Not yet, but that situation could change. That’s like saying Windows could never one-up the Macintosh back in the early 90’s, because it didn’t offer nearly as much software.
I think, eventually (and I mean probably twenty years or more) the PC will be supplanted. I do not, however, believe we will see the demise of the traditional PC input methods (keyboard and mouse) nor will we see large screens die off. I think what we’ll eventually see is a modular system where by you dock your tablet into a larger workstation. The tablet is the control (the tower, if you will) and you have keyboards, mice, monitors and external storage.
I’ll have to disagree with you for one reason, and one reason only. Lack of the ability to upgrade.
The funny thing is, the reason the “PC” exists as it does now is for that very reason.
The reason that we still don’t have Atari and Amiga computers is because IBM had opened up the specifications for their BIOS and expansion boards, and the birth of cheap clones came about.
Tablets (and the new Macbooks) are going backwards in time to the days when you had a closed off hardware platform that would only run the operating system that it was intended to run. The ultimate lock-in.
Unless Tablet hardware does an about face and starts allowing expansion capabilities beyond just external storage, a video output and keyboard / mice inputs, then they’ll still remain throw-away devices like printers generally are.
“Oh look the new shiny Tablet8000! It’s so much cooler than my Tablet7999! Well, guess I’ll eBay that one, ’cause the new one has 1 iteration of coolness more! I guess I’ll have to sell off all my accessories too so I can have ones that fit the new cool port!”
I think you’ll find IBM had it opened for them by Compaq. Further proof the non-existence of Intellectual Property is directly good for society. Also does more for the economy than allowing any single entity to control ideas, and I daresay, would do a lot for the single entity if it learned how to let go and move on.
I think I basically said that
Pretty much the spec for creating expansion cards were there for manufacturer’s to make, and then it was more or less reversed engineered to create their own BIOS to emulate the IBM PC. If the other makers (Apple, Atari, Commodore) had opened themselves up for clones, the computer landscape would probably be VERY different today.
That’s the problem of tech futurists. PC will not go away. Why?
1.) As discussed already above, I can buy just a motherboard and a CPU or a GPU, and I can build everything and anything under the sun a computer, a super computer a high computing machine, just using an off-the-shelf components.
I cannot do this with the current tablets.
2.) I need a high-end machine with GPU power. Think about Hollywood(Film industry), Graphic designers, Video editors, Packaging companies, etc., etc. They will not go away in your future time.
Ok, in the future, computer hardware(CPU/Motherboard/GPU/Memory/etc) will morph into smaller devices so that these hardware com
ponents can be stacked together so that they will fit to the same size of a 10-inch tablet. Imagine what will happen to the “real” tablets.
The problem is that the OEMs are trying to go back to the old integrated model, because it is the only way out of the almost non-existing margins they have to face nowadays.
So the trend is to go back to the Spectrum, C64, Atari, Amiga days, where OS and Hardware were deeply integrated.
Apple is the only one that managed to keep alive using this model, and now due to the thin margins, everyone wants a piece of the cake.
In the long run, buying off the shelf pieces won’t go away, but it will become very specialized field, the same way like trying to build a car on your own is nowadays.
My last desktop was bought in 2001. Since then I’ve only owned laptops.
I’m not gonna lie, I would look forward to having an all-in-one comp with the A1200-like form factor, even though I admit that brings with it some logistical and practicality challenges.
That said, if it’s forced upon consumers because of some CFO’s bottom line rather than from an architectural design of making a well integrated product, then I doubt the nostalgia will outweigh the headaches of crappy worksmanship.
You can find some form factors like that here in Germany, but this model sucks.
http://www.conrad.com/Joy-itMini-PC.htm?websale7=conrad-int&pi=8738…
Agreed, but that’s immaterial. I was making a historical point, both that iOS had the first widely successful walled garden general purpose app store, and that it was that app store which made its way onto a semi-PC like environment (i.e., iPad) with a screen large enough to do real work. The success of that combination has shown the way for everyone, and I see Windows 8 as a natural next step.
Should Steam get productivity apps, for example, they would certainly be emulating Apple’s/Google’s/Nokia’s/Microsoft’s app stores at this point in this regard even though they pioneered the technology way before Apple or those other players. (Well, I’m not so sure about Nokia…)
Uhhh…how EXACTLY is Steam a “walled garden” when cracking it is as simple as going to gamecopyworld, no different than with any other retail game?
Now with XBLA you are correct because the act of cracking it would probably screw up the install (unless you did a hardware hack) but there is a free tool out there that will let you set multiple Steam game folders (for those with SSDs) so you could have your cracked games and your non cracked games and switch between them no problem with Steam, although why you’d actually want to crack when the sales make it cheaper than renting the thing.
Heck anybody who hasn’t decided if they want Saints Row 3 can go download it free on Steam and play it all weekend, its a whole $14 if you want to keep it, fun game.
iOS was never meant to run applications – when it was launched Steve Jobs was adament that there was no need to run applications and that web apps would be the future. The Jailbreak saw this as a challenge and that is the origin of ‘Jailbreak’ was to run applications on iOS before there was an official SDK provided. Apple eventually caved in realising they could make a few bucks and here we are with the walled garden and application stores.
Personally I have nothing against an application store as so long as the process of filtering is consistent and transparent – where the filtering is done for genuine reasons rather than, “we don’t want a competing browser in the app store’ as with the case of iOS. For me I have a Samsung Galaxy S3 and I don’t have any problems with the Google Play application store – my personal preference is Opera but when Chrome matures I might give that a go – end of the day I have that freedom to choose rather than Apple deciding that certain applications that ‘might confuse customers’ cannot be allowed on.
As for the PC – I can’t ever seeing the PC being locked down; I could see maybe in the future for OS X as they become more consumer orientated (throw the professionals overboard in the process). Windows – even without the regulatory concerns, I just don’t see it in their DNA; Windows Phone and Windows RT? sure but I don’t ever see it expand beyound a few niche scenarios.
Edited 2012-09-21 16:13 UTC
Absolutely correct. Regardless, iPhone still takes the credit for the phenomenon. (Steam and other genre-specific delivery platforms notwithstanding.)
I don’t have a problem with it, either, except when the OS starts inching toward restrictions on installing programs outside of the app store as we see with Windows 8.
Even with Metro being app store-only? What happens when other API’s get fully deprecated? Nor is the potential only limited to “home” consumers. OS X server might be an underwhelming product, but Apple has shown that it’s possible to deliver even server platforms through app stores.
Even before then I had a Handspring PDA which had a mobile phone module you could buy (turning a PDA into a mobile phone) and there was an online store where you could buy applications from – be it not a walled garden though.
But even then I don’t see it happening broadly – end of the day large chunks of WinRT either are a wrapper around win32 or developers are pretty much required to use a only the win32 that Microsoft have earmarked as being ‘ok’ to mix with a WinRT application (I assume those marked Win32 are ones that are modern and non-derprecated). I’m still confused some what regarding WinRT and it’s relationship to Win32 – it was marketed as a wholly native API but when one does a dependency trace large chunks still rely on many parts of Win32 which makes me wonder whether WinRT is more like a higher level of abstraction off win32 rather than a complete win32 replacement.
But end of the day Apple is a consumer electronics company who can quite easily throw their professional base under the bus if they become more problematic than they’re worth. End of the day they can look at their demographics and if they have xx million users and x million professionals with all the growth coming from non-professionals then Tim Cook might just decide that throwing under the bus its traditional user base is worth it for the long term potential market gain of selling a product that ‘just works’. When your operating system is locked down and the only applications that can run are those sold through the application store then don’t be surprised at the number of end users who see that as a benefit to ‘keep secure’. You and I might have esoteric discussions about freedom but for Joe and Jane Sixpack the argument will be ‘does it allow me to do what I want without having to worry about anything’ – and if means that Apple becomes the gate keeper then many will trade that freedom for the sake of at least perceived security.
Compare that to Microsoft who mainly have enterprise customers – they have millions more professional customers out there who run in large enteprrise deployments and for that alone any decisions made will have to take such a situation into account. It is the enterprise customer that’ll ultimately moderate Microsoft’s behaviour with rumours not too long ago that side loading applications won’t be as difficut as first thought. For me if there is a way to get around the restrictions whilst giving Joe and Jane Sixpack the walled garden they want then it’s all good.
Edited 2012-09-22 03:10 UTC
No.
“App stores” for PCs existed long before the Iphone and were widely utilized.
See my reply above; Steam et al. were and still largely are specific for one genre of programs. I don’t know of any app stores before iPhone’s that were widely used and that had programs for a wide variety of categories. That is the key to the unification of tablets and PC’s.
The origin of the “app store” has been thoroughly debated on this forum, most recently when Apple and its fanboys tried to float the notion that Apple invented the concept of the “app store.”
Some even suggested that it was Apple who invented the term “app,” for Iphone programs. However, the fanboys quickly retracted and added the word “store” when it was shown that the term “app” was in wide use many years before the first Mac appeared.
Evidently, the Apple fanboys think that combining “app” with “store” was an inspired stroke of genius by none other than “Steve” (Jobs).
It comes down to this: Linux repositories and package managers are “app stores” which have existed since the late 1990s, with a zillion myriad apps downloaded prior to the existence of the Iphone.
If a fanboy later adds the irrelevant condition that one pays for apps in Apple’s model, one merely need mention Lindows/Linspire CNR (Click-N-Run), a paying Linux repository/package-manager which existed five years before the first Iphone: http://www.michaelrobertson.com/archive.php?minute_id=340
Care to add any more conditions or qualitative distinctions?
Edited 2012-09-21 22:32 UTC
Huh? I am openly telling you that Apple did not invent the app store when I recognize that there were precursors. l2read.
Irrelevant? You’ve gutted a key part of my argument, which was that the tablet successfully combines a form factor that’s OK for PC-ish work with the app store delivery and payment model. The fact that they found a way to make the payment side work is of utmost importance to closed source participation and, what I am ultimately arguing, the widespread adoption of a particular hardware platform.
At any rate, neither Linspire CNR (of which I actually have an old CD that a friend gave me) nor package managers like Debian’s (which is what CNR is based off of) are anywhere near as successful as the major app stores in reaching consumers. I am talking about the first, massively successful, general purpose app store that found its way onto a screen form factor that’s good enough for doing serious work.
BTW, “a zillion myriad apps downloaded” is not exactly true. I doubt that Debian has more than 30k packages (let alone apps), and that’s one of the bigger ones; it is miniscule compared to the app stores in terms of number of apps and probably even number of downloads. But, of course, this is not what I am arguing; I am arguing based on overall number of users.
How can you call me a fanboy? Is it not obvious from my original post that I find this trend detestable? Hell, I don’t even like package management let alone app stores. That’s why I use Slackware 😉
Edited 2012-09-21 22:43 UTC
@earksiinni
Which means if you did not recognized these precursors(due to ignorance or unwillingness to read history) that there are similar app stores(software repositories) in the past before the unveiling of Apple’s app store, you will credit to Apple the concept of an app store?
It seems praising Apple is the default behavior of Apple fans, until corrected, but then again, the praise and honor was already credited to Apple.
Me: P was the first of Q that was also A, B, and C.
tupp: Y u claim that P was the first of Q??
Me: No, you have misunderstood me: P was the first of Q that was also A, B, and C. P had precedents; P was not the first of Q in an absolute sense.
allanregistos: Y u claim that P was the first of Q??
Me: …and therefore, the situation that Apple has created is not good.
tupp: Y u Apple fanboi??
Me: No, you have misunderstood me: the situation that Apple has created is not good.
allanregistos: Y u Apple fanboi??
l2read, kthx
Edited 2012-09-22 01:10 UTC
I make no comment on the success of the combination of tablets, “PC-ish” work and a paying app store — I simply point out that Apple (nor any other tablet maker) was decidedly not the first to combine such elements.
Furthermore, I now add to my argument that adding a payment method to a repository/app-store (regardless of the “form factors” of the related hardware) is as obvious as any idea can get.
As shown in my link above, that “payment side” was found for PCs at least five years before the first Iphone.
And, again, adding a payment method to a repository is an excessively obvious notion and would have been an extremely easy task right after the first web “shopping cart” system appeared.
I see… So, now, on top of the argument given in the original post, we are suddenly adding the subjective condition that the repository/app-store must be “massively successful.”
This new development in the debate is certainly a surprise.
I will directly address this new “quantity/success” argument, but first I would like to make an observation.
On this forum, years before the Iphone app store, those arguing with Apple fanboys would often cite the Debian repository and its thousands (18,000-20,000, at the time) of available apps as an advantage of over the relatively small number of apps for OSX. Invariably, the Apple fanboys would respond with a subjective, qualitative criticism to the effect of, “Well, those apps are mostly half-baked with a bad UI!”
Well, what percentage of the apps in the “massively successful” Apple app stores are actually robust and universally useful programs that get work done, instead of some stupid widget that makes farting noises, or the equivalent of someone’s vanity fan web page, or some store’s shopping application, or someone’s shallow, generic app idea that they think will make them a quick fortune, etc.?
I am glad that the Debian repository has 30,000 “half-baked, bad UI” and useful programs (conceived by actual coders), rather than the millions of pretty, insipid pieces of sh*t found in Apple’s app stores.
Now, in regards to this new quantity/success argument, adding the condition that an app store must be a “massive success” has no bearing on whether or not an app store is an app store.
In addition, what constitutes “massive success” is totally subjective.
I don’t know the total number of apps over the past 14 years that have been downloaded from Linux repositories, but I think that it is safe to say that the number would be over 100 million. The Click-N-Run app store alone had over 9 million paid downloads. Those are “massively successful” numbers, especially considering that Linux has had practically zero advertising/marketing since its inception.
By the way, most Linux userland apps work with large-screen “PC-ish” hardware as well as smaller screens. So, the “form factor” is immaterial.
Let me also make a quantity/quality/success music analogy. Miley Cyrus and Justin Beiber sell more songs than the Beatles. Who is the most “massively successful” — Miley Cyrus, Justin Beiber or the Beatles? I think that you will find that different people give differing answers to this music success question (the Beatles, by far, would be my answer).
Likewise with computer platforms. Even when specifying exact quantities, success is a subjective argument.
Where did I call you a fanboy? I have not even addressed you directly, until this comment.
I believe it.
Edited 2012-09-22 01:37 UTC
Yes, but that is my ultimate point. I’m only arguing about the app store bit because ultimately I am trying to say something about the convergence of a model that became successful on smartphones (the iPhone originally) and that is now making its transition to PC’s, which themselves are partly merging into/becoming tablets.
Of course. Totally agree with you. Rather, I’m saying that Apple’s app store happened to be the first one to meet certain conditions, the key ones being that it was wildly successful and that it had apps for doing PC-ish work.
Agreed. Look, I’m not trying to suggest that Apple is somehow “innovative”, I’m just saying that they happened to be first (again: not first to create an app store nor first to create an app store that requires money; but that they were the first to be so successful and include a wide variety of apps). I think the fact that payment is part of it is important in the sense that it helps grow the ecosystem and therefore enhances the appeal of the hardware platform, but if open source or “free as in beer” ecosystems were wildly popular then that would work just as fine.
Yes, I see that I should have been more specific in my original post. I thought it was implied when I wrote “successful implementation”, but probably my vagueness is the root of the misunderstanding. My fault, my apologies.
Well, I am not one of those fanboys and I am not making that argument. You seemed to be alluding to app numbers; my criterion is number of users, not even app quality.
…duh? When did I even imply that? I keep repeating: “Apple did not invent the app store!”
Now you have the exact definition that I am working with.
Obviously, number of downloads =/= number of users.
lolwhut?
Not if you are defining it in a very limited sense for the purpose of making a specific argument. Subjective =/= relative.
Sorry, you seemed to be implying it since you were disagreeing with me and then tacked on a bunch of stuff about how fanboys act.
<blockquote> I don’t know the total number of apps over the past 14 years that have been downloaded from Linux repositories, but I think that it is safe to say that the number would be over 100 million. The Click-N-Run app store alone had over 9 million paid downloads. Those are “massively successful” numbers, especially considering that Linux has had practically zero advertising/marketing since its inception. </blockquote>
ITunes does a Billion software downloads every few weeks. Which means they are doing over your 100m figure per day every day. And don’t forget a noticeable percentage of those are paid downloads. Now the phone software market is nowhere near the size of the desktop software market yet. But the growth in both units and sales per unit are staggering.
But not walled gardens.
The whole “post PC” thing to IS complete nonsense, what has actually happened is PCs went from good enough to insanely overpowered so now like washers and dryers people don’t replace them until they die. Can you imagine someone writing a “post washer and dryer” article?
I mean look at what I was selling on the low end FIVE years ago: Phenom I X3 or X4 with 4Gb of RAM and a 300Gb+ HDD. Now is there ANYTHING you average user is gonna run that isn’t gonna be curbstomped by that chip? heck I’m playing all the latest games on a 3 year old Phenom II X6 and my youngest is doing the same on a 4 year old Phenom II X4, and in both cases the chips spends more time idling than anything.
I mean look at this kit, throw in a copy of Win 8 pro for $40 and you have a quad core WITH graphics that will curbstomp anything your average user wants to do, is it any wonder people aren’t buying when even the $300 cheapo units are so insanely overpowered?
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.as…
I built my GF one of their “$199 triple core blowout” deals last year, she got 4Gb of RAM, 650Gb HDD, and an HD5450. what does she do with a PC? She goes to websites, she listens to music and watches videos, she burns DVDs. Her last PC lasted her nearly 8 years so I can see this triple lasting her even longer, we’ve just got more power than we know what to do with, trhat’s all.
Finally as for pads? i predict other than iPads (which are as much about fashion as tech) we’ll quickly see the same thing happen, now that decent pads are $99 it won’t be long until everyone that wants one has one and then the market will drop. Personally I wouldn’t be surprised to see dual core pads for $50 this time next year, and single cores sold in toy stores, they are gonna be throw away toys, not used for real work.
For content-consumers sure, good ol’ PC is a thing of the past. Now it’s Smart TVs, tablets/pads, supersmartphones etc. Another question is how can you replace a workstation, you know, the thing that one uses to actually create the content everyone else consume, e.g. software, games, artwork, music and videos.
I think when people talk about the end of the PC-era they are correct and it happened already.
The point is that PC means Windows-PC what refers to the Microsoft monopoly on Computers we had for a whole decade. THAT is gone and today we have Microsoft, Apple, Android and more choice.
Today its exactly not any longer a Microsoft Personal Computer monopoly-landscape we have. This is gone and with it the Windows-PC that equaled to the Windows Computer got replaced with Smartphones, Tablets and other devices with other OSes having successful build an ecosystem and selling huge number of products.
So, yes, we are at the end of an era, of the (Microsoft Windows monopoly) (Personal) Computer era. Now we are in the multidevice, multiOs era where interoperability and choice matters.
Edited 2012-09-22 08:35 UTC
http://abhota.info/end1.htm
One of my favourite websites. Everyone likes to be the one who “called it”. But history shows that it’s nothing more than people staring at the toaster or the traffic light and saying “Now!” every four seconds.
* Of course, even more sadder are the stock market types on this website who won’t even entertain the possibility that “the end” may come because their numerology system convinced them it won’t.
I think you are missing the basic use cases. That’s what really matters. If a tablet can ultimately fill in for the use cases of a traditional PC, then ultimately it will supplant the PC. And I am certain they can. It’s really just a matter of time before the software is all in place, and not much time at that. Then all the hardware vendors have to do is make it easy to walk up to a *terminal* and tap into the tablet.
A terminal can be any supplemental interface, but in the PC case obviously it is keyboard and mouse, and optionally a larger monitor.
Tablets have some overlap with tasks a PC currently performs, but are unlikely to replace a PC entirely for quite some time, if ever.
Right now I’m using three monitors. The two guys next to me use six monitors each. Monitoring alarms, Visio-style design sheets and managing multiple disparate systems. I’m sure there are plenty of other (better) use cases, too.
Your world may make do with a display and input device, but many other people need more.
By saying, a tablet can ultimately fill in for the use cases of a traditional PC.
Then these are the traditional cases of a Traditional Personal Computer(tm):
Please answer,
In the future:
I can do multi-OS installations on a tablet?
I can upgrade any component on a tablet(MOBO/CPU/GPU/HDD)?
I can wipe out the OS on a tablet if it gets corrupted and then install all my PREVIOUS software on it?
I can run high-end software on it? Think about Blender, Maya, Lightwave, Modo, CorelDraw, Illustrator, Photoshop as these software needs multi-core CPU and GPU power??? Not to mention those custom software developed by companies for in-house use!
Yeah, tablets are now quad-core, and they can be stacked together in “hundreds or thousands” to form a cluster / HPC, so that we can render images generated by our 3D software in minutes? Then, how much it will cost in the future? Will it cost less than buying off-the-shelf components?
Yes, in the future they will have more cores, but do you believe that in the PC industry, it won’t advance further into more powerful CPUs with more powerful GPUs?
You mean, I can run high-end games on a tablet in the future? So if it can run today’s high-end, what do you expect from the PC gaming industry? Just watching movies?
But then, the PC components(CPU/GPU/MOBO/HDD/Mem) will morph into smaller form factors, so that in the future, it is possible to stack them together to form a tablet, including a multi-touch monitor and then I can create a PC out from it. What will happen to the tablets at that time then?
I can go on and on, with so many use cases of a traditional PC that are not possible in a tablet, now and in the future.
Sure, the Tablet supplants the PC’s use cases of checking email, opening doc attachments, viewing/reading books. Editing documents, playing casual games, viewing video clips. But that’s it, a tablet is a supplement to the Traditional PC, a helper.
All the examples you gave are actually somewhat of outliers; they are not representative of what people generally use PCs for or how. In certain professional fields, yes, but in general, no.
Anyways:
Hopefully.
Not likely.
You can already do that with Android.
I’d say you’re very likely able to do that in the future.
No. All businesses I saw were using traditional PCs, yes some do use tablets, but who cares. Graphics/Video/Film/Publishing are _NOT_ niche markets. They are the mainstream. I think what you’ve said is home PC owners, but then again, I digress.
+1
[/q]
Then a show-stopper. It won’t supplant the PC industry’s flexibility.
Good.
[/q]
Then I think you did not know what you are talking about. See you when quantum computing is possible.
Apple’s post-PC narrative has never proclaimed the death of the PC. However, it’s foolish to claim “work” is the umbrella for these markets. Smartphones will likely be one of the few markets the size of (if not greater than) the entire population of the planet, utterly dwarfing PCs. Tablets, 3 years in and with few successful products outside of Apple, will soon skyrocket past PCs (although not as ubiquitous as smartphones). We work less than 1/3 of our life. Even then, the majority of work tasks can be done equally well, if not better, on a tablet or smartphone. (Heck, even jobs that are computing intensive can be augmented and improved with a supplemental smartphone or tablet.) Moreover, we are also doing non-work during work time (personal research, entertainment, communication, social networking). Most old school PCs spend the majority of their cycles on entertainment and tasks well-suited to smartphones and tablets (browsing, games, social networks, messaging, passive media consumption). Now… traits like instant on, long battery life, power efficiency, size, simplicity of hardware and software are compared against the exemplars created by the post-PC devices. Most consumer-facing (and even enterprise) software development efforts are primarily driven by the new mobile devices or the cloud.
Yes, the PC will preserve a role for a long time and for most users, but it will be a small fraction of developers’s and users’s time and investment. It is already so. And we are in a post-PC era. For that to be true the PC does not need to be dead. (That’s like saying the 90s wasn’t the Windows era because graphic designers still needed (preferred) Macs.)
(I wouldn’t want to speak for your experience, but, yes, many people I know already do more “computing” on smartphones and tablets than computers. A far, far greater number certainly do more “personal computing” on the smartphone and/or tablet. And in many cases, people I know who did not use a computer at work (or barely so) are doing NEW and MORE computing by augmenting non-computer work via the smartphone or tablet where the PC was otherwise superfluous. But I guess others see the world as all work, in front of a desk?)
Edited 2012-09-21 00:01 UTC
No you have bought into post-PC hype.
http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_vs_desktop-ww-monthly-201108-2012…
Most code is still in-house and corps don’t care about tablets for normal office workers. So no.
Hear hear; I like what you have to say. I never thought of the term ‘post-PC’ as meaning the slow death of PCs either; in the web development world, I think that it means something more like ‘the PC has lost its monopoly and it’s a multi-player game now’. It presents new challenges for those of us who create content — especially (but not exclusively) on the web — but they’re fun challenges.
So I agree: the post-PC world is not about the death of PCs, and I don’t know who actually uses the term in that sense. The post-PC world is about a confusing but healthy polyculture of computing devices that let you do what you need to do — devices that speak the same linguae francae (the Web is chief among those, but standard file formats are important in that regard too).
Edited 2012-09-21 04:40 UTC
I know some will deny this (“Business success doesn’t matter…. Financial success isn’t necessarily driven by technological trends… Yada yada yada”), but I don’t think the financial reality can be wholly dismissed either:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=AAPL+Interactive#symbol=aapl;ran…
In the future there will be consumers that use things like tablets and smartphones. These people will be called “Eloi”.
There will also be people that use full laptop/desktop systems (with keyboards and large monitor/s) and servers. These people will create the content for the Eloi, and will be called “Morlocks”.
– Brendan
the problem is the definition of “PC” varies and is unclear.
when Great Apple said “post-PC”, that meant “post-microsoft” because microsoft had used “PC” to describe a computer with microsoft windows on it.
and since microsoft is getting toasted, that post-microsoft idea was correct.
but things start to get strange when you use “post-PC” with other meanings of “PC”
PC’s may not be dead (post-PC never claimed it would evolve dead PCs), but HP’s creativity seems to be. When I click the link I see an iMac with an HP logo.
Why is an article of 6 sentences on the “front page” anyway? If it’s about the interview, why not link to that directly?
HP hasn’t been a oasis of foresight and inspiration lately.
Also I wonder why Thom agrees, while the most news on this site is related to mobile devices like phones and tablets.
Because PCs these days are boring, while mobile devices are still in their infancy. The mobile devices have quite a ways to go before they reach the maturity of the PC, so naturally there’s a lot of exciting development going on there.
That being said, I don’t think a ‘post PC’ world means that PCs are dead, just that they’re no longer the center of the universe. And already, the lines are getting blurred between what is a tablet and what is a PC, especially when you can dock a tablet to a keyboard and attach a mouse. What then becomes the difference, especially if that tablet has an x86 CPU that can run a full-blown PC OS when docked?
The first time I heard the term was when Steve coined it and he had the same definition as you and one I also agree with.
People who ‘deny’ post-PC always change this definition and set the complete disapperance of the PC as a compulsary property.
Like Bradley?
Well, not like Bradley. HP doesn’t have any post-HP stuff to sell, so he’s part of the group that denies post-PC… and then tries to sell PC stuff.
I just meant that: “so he’s part of the group that denies post-PC… and then tries to sell PC stuff.” – like Thom stated: ” it comes from people who are trying to sell you something.”
btw only thing that “open”* IBM PC bring is CRAPWARE to masses for next 15 years! Atari and Amiga from 1985. looks like STAR TREK technologies compared to PC (or Mac).
*(like someone said: Compaq open it, IBM never share BIOS specification)
Thanx to that “openness” of PC, today we have Apple that have no real competitors because everybody made only dummy hardware – they gave up from software and rely on Microsoft solutions! Thanx to Steve, Apple manage to survive; otherwise we would loose great NextSTep/OS X and lot more (we all saw Microsoft “vision” of Tablets in 2001…)!
Well, I wouldn’t say PCs are crap.
They are very flexible when it comes to combining hardware, meaning motherboards, CPUs, memory, drives, expansion cards, etc…
What makes most PCs crap is that they come with a lot of crapware. I’m still not sure what Norton is. I mean, does it actually do anything positive or just it just nag you to pay up? If you check the list of auto starting programs it’s not unusual to find 6 or more vendor-added things.
Love it or hate it, Windows has its fans and a lot of people seem to be able to do with it what they want.
Now what is fun it so take an old PC or even a new one, customize it they way you want it or just grab expansion cards you have hidden in the attic and try to fit as many as you can in your PC. Then install Linux and try to make everything work. What I like to do is compile a new kernel (the latest), only include drivers that are needed to boot the machine and make the rest modules. It doesn’t have a real practical use, but it’s a nice feeling to know your kernel doesn’t contain any stuff you don’t need.
Linux on de PC is bloody boring and crap if you just use it as your desktop OS to do real world stuff. But it is a lot of fun if you mess around with it. Everything you need is free. Mail/file/web servers, database systems, programming languages. Install it with the touch of a button and you’re ready to play around with it. It’s very self-educational.
Sure, you can do this too with Windows or OS X, but it just doesn’t feel right.
I see nothing that intrinsically prevents tablet hardware from replacing PC hardware for most use cases in the future.
However, as long as the software that is installed on it turns it into an expensive toy for content consumption, that is unlikely to happen.
Most tablet limitations which I see mentioned here and there are software-related, not hardware-related. Just like desktop OSs before, cellphone and tablet OSs need to grow up. Only this time, it’s in the opposite direction : not from utterly arcane to usable by everyone, but from brain dead and artificially limited to compatible with the full breadth of modern computer use cases.
Edited 2012-09-21 09:21 UTC
in the computer industry. All of their products are either defective or just flat out suck, well except for the HP touchpad but that’s been discontinued probably because they would rather sell tablets with Windows.
I had bought one of their desktop computer five years ago, it completely malfunctioned within four years. I go to a computer repair shop most of the desktops being repaired are either HP or Compaq computers. HP is just a mouthpiece for Microsoft and all the other tech giants who want consumers using tablets.
Anything they say I take with a grain of salt. Everything they do is always to the detriment of the consumer.
Edited 2012-09-21 11:06 UTC
Apple users [& Steve Jobs] are biased because, like it or not, modern iMacs are just tablets with a handy stand and a keyboard.
Sorry for the joke.
Now that I have my Apple Newton, I don’t knees any morph disk tauppes are lap tauppes. Ant the gnu andrew net, man!
This topic has already been talked/debated to death. Why is it being resurrected yet again.
I guess it needs to be said, yet again, that laptops and desktops aren’t going anywhere. Anyone who thinks a device/platform that consistently sells hundreds of millions units a year, is quite simply a fool.
This thread can be closed now.
Edited 2012-09-21 14:53 UTC
Just to throw in some trivia:
More memory chips are now made for tablets and phones than for PCs.
Desktops and laptops aren’t going anywhere soon, but people are spending more and more time away from them using other devices.
…and? There are more tires sold for bicycles than for cars, so you also believe we’re living in a “post-automobile” world?
How many of each are sold then?
That is an interesting analogy.
Even if people started to use bicycles, motorcycles and public transportation anywhere where they make more sense than cars, such as single-person transportation in a urban context, (easily rented) cars would continue to exist for some purposes, like going on vacation or carrying heavy goods around.
Which is exactly what some people claim is going to happen to the PC: the computer industry wouldn’t fix the tablet ecosystem’s flaws, since it can make much money off them. Instead, it would focus on making tablets so attractive for their use cases that people would buy one of them first, and only then think about purchasing a PC if they have a need for it.
Which is a disgusting commercial practice if you ask me, but the only thing that matters in the end is whether it will work or not.
sorry to disappoint you, but tablets and phones combined use less than 20% of all dram while the pc accounts for 49% (if you believe isuppli)
Edited 2012-09-22 20:47 UTC
“While Bradly obviously has something to sell, he’s still right. Because of the ‘post’, it implies we’re all moving beyond the PC, that it’s going to die out in favour of tablets and smartphones.”
Anytime you use a word like “all” just shows how stupid this comment is.
Is the world is a post dumb phone world? Yes. Did “all” people stopped buying dumb phones? No. There are still a lot of dumb phones being purchased. Face it though, smart phones are the big sellers now.
What does that have to do with anything? Well, iPads outsold ALL models of desktop/laptop computers for any one company with over 64 million sold, which is more than double the year before. Hmmm. Keep in mind that iPads have only been around for a little more than a year and a half and the sales rate is still climbing rapidly. Meanwhile “PC” sales are growing at a measly 1.2% rate.
Will people still need PCs? Sure, of course. Some people. Most people don’t need pickup trucks but a lot of them are sold each year. But most people buy cars. That is probably the way the non-tech, non-nerd world is going to be.
Feel free to bury your head in the sand.
So, in summary, your argument is: “the prefix ‘post’ means whatever I want it to mean, because I say so”.
Oh goody, more the angry-defensiveness that seems to be the default emotional state for Apple fanboys. Yawn, next?
I really think this craziness of Tables 7, 10, 11 inches, separated smartphones, separated television and so on will be blurry very soon.
Look at our data. More and more we need them no matter where we are. The way I see, we are going to have a master device, a very smart smartphone that connects with all other devices we may need. If we need to get to office, fine, put your device over the table and the connection between a real keyboard, mouse and large screen will be done. At same time, the device will be charged, probably by wireless only putting it over a special surface to conserve energy, it will be probably a communication hub for the same reason plus security. Same when you get home.
Need more power? The base may have extra processors, memory and storage and the system in our smartphone will recognize them and will have a kind of hot-plug capability when connected, the same way we have now on servers. This will be probably the main difference between a normal “computer” and a top “workstation” because frankly, the storage is getting so cheap that there is no reason to not leave the OS modules already stored in our smartphone anyway, the same way we have today on our computers.
I really think that these “closed” systems will experience the same fate as of those of their ilk did in the past: will be supplanted by the shear volume and flexibility of open systems (not to be assumed open-source).
If we take a close look, the real constraints are those related to interactivity, i.e., screen size and handling/input comfort, plus battery size to keep the thing going on when in the run, because processor power and storage are already not for most of our needs.
When this claim was made even 3 years back it was debatable. I think there is a misunderstanding reading the comments. PostPC is a question of which device plays the mass role. What is the primary device the majority of people use. There never was a claim that heavy content creators wouldn’t need more sophisticated devices but rather that the general in use device would be optimized for consumption or light editing not creation.
That’s already happened. Smartphones will outsell desktops in 2012 by volume and by dollars. The research money is going into smartphones. Tablets have emerged offering a hybrid and are cutting deeply into PC sales. There cannot be a debate about if, what was claimed has already happened.
What’s worth debating is how far can this process go? We currently are around 300m PCs sold a year. Can this be dropped to 100m / yr? Could tablets drive it further and desktop type system be down around 10m a year? Those are interesting questions. But we are in the PostPC era. That’s done.
Just one slight problem with your comment… It’s not true. PC sales remain consistent and have seen very little impact due to tablets. People are not replacing PC purchases with tablet purchases. The theory that PC sales are being “deeply cut into” by anything is simply not supported by any facts.
Taking IDC numbers for example for 2Q
2011 vs 2010 growth 11.2%
2012 vs. 2011 growth -1.%
2010 vs. 2009 btw was over 14%
So we are talking (2012 isn’t over) something like 30-60m less PCs sold this year than would have happened without the tablet based fall off.
You’re confusing people not upgrading their PCs as often due to no need (which has happening before tablets hit the scene), with people replacing PCs with tablets — which they are not. As much as you want to believe tablets are smashing PC sales, the facts just don’t support it. When cherry-picking a bit here or there is the only way to give the impression that your claim is supported, there’s something wrong with your claim.
Cherry picking! We are looking at total sales of all PC globally, that’s not a cherry picked number.
2009 sales are rising and the rate they are rising is slowly falling
2012 sales are falling and the rate they are falling is rapidly increasing
Something happened between 2009 and 2012 and it is not a drastic shift in PC reliability.
Global recession?
No, if it were the recession we would have expected to see a sharp fall in sales in 2008 maybe into 2009 and then recovery like we have with most other semi-durable goods. Instead we saw strong sales in 09 that have been weakening steadily.
The problem with your theory is that you’re ignoring the fact that people aren’t upgrading their PC’s nearly as much as they were a mere few years back because they simply don’t need to. Further, you ignore that sales were slowing before tablets come into play. And, you’re claiming the “real” reason for the decline is credited to the rise of tablets although you have no credible source in support of this.
I know the tablet-lovers really really want to believe their `precious` is killing PC’s but the painful truth, for them, is they’re not.
Which is a begging the question kind of fact. Why did the “need” to upgrade fall so sharply in the last few years.
No, sales were growing before tablets came into play. The rate of growth in sales was falling but it was still very much a growing market. More importantly there was a huge downtick in the fall of the rate of growth.
OK what about NPD. NPD did a survey of home users in early 2011. Of those users:
24% did their home browsing on their tablet.
60% found tablets to provide an acceptable internet experience.
Tablets I should add have gotten better in the last 18 months, so things would look bleaker now.
First, it didn’t and hasn’t fallen “so sharply”. Second, the small decline was already attributed to more capable hardware. The economic crash didn’t help anything either. These are plain & simple facts whether you like them or not.
So like I said, sales were slowing before tablets came into play.
Why do you keep dramatizing the slowing? There was and is no “huge downtick”. It’s like feeling a light misty rain and you’re telling everyone it’s a downpour.
You do realize, I hope, that none of that lends support to your claim that tablets are killing off PC’s. How many surveyed own both a PC and tablet, and prefer the tablet over the PC? How many of them prefer the tablets internet experience over the PC? Blah, blah, blah… Again, the need to cherry-pick doesn’t actually help, it only reveals weakness in a claim.
What would thinks look bleaker? Tablets are still a growing market. The tablet market is not replacing the PC market as you seem to think, it’s a different market altogether. One product is not being replaced by another, rather it’s been added to the pool of available options. I don’t know why it’s so hard for you to understand that, especially given it’s based on facts and not simply a desire to believe something.
Some guys really really believe jesus is coming back. And some guys really really believe tablets have killed PC’s. And some guys know better.
No, that’s not the same thing. There is a difference between distance traveled, speed you are traveling at and how fast you are accelerating or breaking. What you are doing is saying a car reducing its acceleration, but still increasing its speed, was braking.
2011 vs 2010 growth 11.2%
2012 vs. 2011 growth -1.%
That’s not a light misty rain, that’s a devastating collapse in sales. That combined with the huge growth in smartphone sales has led parts manufacturers to shift focus.
As for the economy, were it the economy we should have seen a sharp drop in 08-09 and then an increase in 2010, 2011…
No, what I am saying is that the decline was already present before tablets and was not noticeably accelerated because of tablets. That is plain & simple fact.
Two enormous problems with your theory… One, there’s no sign of devastation. There’s not even any sign of serious concern. And two, none of the companies in these two markets have said anything that remotely agrees with your claim. I guess they’re too busy raking in piles of cash to notice the “devastating collapse happening all around them.
The economy is part of it, not the entire thing. And it would be extremely foolish on your part to suggest the economy wasn’t a factor when we know for a fact it was. This is not exactly a secret.
…Again… You really really want to believe tablets have killed PCs. And again, you ignore any facts that opposed your theory and refuse to understand that tablets and PCs aren’t the same thing/interchangeable, and have separate markets. No amount of deniable will change the fact that the PC market continues to sell hundreds of millions of units per year with profits in the billions. Now how exactly would this be possible with the PC market was experiencing a “devastating collapse in sales”? It wouldn’t.
Good article
http://techpinions.com/the-terrible-tablet-tsunami-two/10379
It ends with this msessage
The tablet tsunami isn’t coming, it’s here. We can ride the wave…or we can wave goodbye any chance of understanding the future of computing.
Good catch, I didn’t know that website and it is really fun.
However, I’m not sure that these “experts” realize how silly they are.
Pretending that tablets are replacing PC and saying that it is “the future” is incredibly stupid. Nothing never replaces anything.
Apple success is not about giving better tools, it is to make people buy things they didn’t know they needed.
For example, if Mr Jobs was still alive, He would setup a secret lab developping “Home Robots” or “3D printers”, things insanely cool, already invented, but just lacking polish and applications for everyone.
Sounds to me like you may have your own reality distortion field
This is worth a look, by Jean-Louis Gassée no less, the guy who had the other OS when Apple chose Next.
http://www.mondaynote.com/2012/09/02/apple-never-invented-anything/
I don’t see how this article contradicts what I wrote.
Is it the “already invented” part that angers you ? WTF ?
I agree with what wrote J.L.Gassée. For example, robots have been around for 30 years, but Apple could transform them into successful products, coming at the right time as suitable technologies emerges.
I was not even negative about Apple!
Sorry – my bad – I was typing way too late and my brain was frizzled. Keep well.
There will be always work
too big for a portable to dare.
The challenge belongs to the programmers:
To write down something worth the power,
for all the people.