[lper100km]

A recent malfunction on a PC I use specifically for digital musical instruments and multichannel recording applications has had me looking for a replacement for a four year old PC. Going to the usual local outlets has been an eye opening experience. Whilst all are heavily into mobile devices and laptops, the number of tower computers on display has dwindled to a handful, with essentially only three major manufacturers represented. One outlet definitively stated that they are now stocking only Macintosh all-in-one computers as a desktop, and a variety of other manufacturers laptops, tablets and other mobile devices. Others are stocking primarily various versions of the all-in-one PC as desktops. Of course, this is the consumer retail market, but what was once a big staple of this market seems to be an endangered species. Is this a consumer preference or is it a planned move by manufacturers and distributors?

It is interesting to note that most of these newer devices now have none or very limited internal upgrade paths and have a limited number of expansion or memory slots. The upgrade path is to buy a more expensive version. What you buy is what you get. If you decide that you want more memory later, tough. If you decide that you need a 2Tb drive later, tough etc. The great advantage of PC tower designs from the consumer perspective is that within reason, upgrades are relatively easy and cost effective creating a robust after sales market. With minimal instruction, components can be added. A little more knowledge is needed to change out a motherboard or replace a hard drive. All of this flexibility seems to be in process of being engineered out of the current crop of offerings.

My solution will be to install a new motherboard and CPU for around $350 component cost, utilizing the existing peripherals. This compares with around $750 component cost for building a new custom computer or around $1,250 or more for the purchase of an off the shelf box to obtain the features I need. It’s no wonder that the primary manufacturers want to shut down this after market ‘loophole’ by creating self contained ‘sealed’ products.

So it looks as though eventually it will be up to a dwindling group of custom builders and enthusiasts to create specialised PCs for gaming, music applications, artwork, or even basic functionality etc etc. as long as components continue to be made. It reminds me of the era of the demise of shortwave radio building. Finally even the hobby build enthusiasts had to give up because the components became unavailable.

As the future unrolls, companies will not require desktop computers in the sense that we now know them. Their future use will be simply as a slaves to corporate or cloud computing servers and with no inherent capacity of their own. A sort of a back to the future thing. Irony – employee and computer slaves working in tandem!

If cloud computing takes off, most people will not need a PC, maybe not even a laptop. Just a simple tablet with WiFi and internet access, perhaps with an accessory keyboard. Microsoft is headed for the toaster.

To put an energy context spin on it, the power consumption at the consumer end will drop to a few watts from the 400W PSUs now commonly required, though the server farms will consume all that is being saved there. Are you being served?

[lowem]

Yep, nearly everybody, from students to housewives to office workers would buy (or get issued) laptops nowadays. What used to be the usual (non-laptop) PC's seem to be geared toward the gaming and DIY markets. The consumer section is dwindling, with the trend toward all-in-one PC's, some of these with touchscreens, some of these integrated with the monitors. Not sure what people buy those for - to put in the kitchen?

Then there are the people building their own little HTPC's for viewing MKV's or whatnot on their big-screen TV's via HDMI. Even in this area, you can buy a pre-built media player device or Blu-Ray player for $100-200 which can take in USB HDD's or connect to the network via DLNA to get at your content.

The other niche area would be software programmers / developers / engineers who still would prefer to use desktop PC's for the sheer power (and RAM + HDD capacity). As well as an honest-to-goodness real full-size keyboard. For a keyboard purist (and former software engineer) like me, there is really no getting used to the placement of the insert / delete / home / end / pg up / pg down keys. I manage on my laptops, but it is quite a different experience from a "real" keyboard where I can go upward of 80 wpm.

[lowem]

... plus, the laptop keyboards are mostly so damn flat ..

It's mostly that. Not enough travel. Lousy tactile feel. And you can't just change the darn thing to another model if you don't like it. With a desktop PC I can put in any darn keyboard I like, Logitech, Microsoft or other, wireless or wired, click or non-click, full-size, medium-size or compact (as mentioned, I prefer full-size).

Ok, enough about keyboards, with the world seeming to move toward virtual keyboards on touchscreens which I have an even bigger issue with ...

[Cid_Yama]

If you are into computer gaming, anything short of a PC is inadaquate.

You have to go to places like Alienware that serve the PC gamer.

The rest of the mindless masses are happy playing platform games like Angry Bird on their portable, which is the same level of game technology as was available in the 1990's.

If you can build a system from motherboard up, I would recommend that, as it is far cheaper.

Systems are starting to become specialized to specific tasks. A friend of mine has a company that builds systems specifically targeting online streaming home theater/internet for your TV.

Targeted systems to specific tasks are far cheaper to build than a general PC.

[jedrider]

Seems to me that if you have a predilection for specifying the pricepoint and features of your system, that building your own is the only way to go. Most DIYers order online to get the huge selection they demand.

I've been waiting for 'towers' to miniturize as most all the features are already on the motherboard. There are 'mini-towers' that work nearly as well and there are HTPC cases and then there is ITX format. A lot of choices are available.

Apple has certainly changed the consumer market. Some of us just like to customize our experience and keep our options open. Now if Microsoft will just lower the price of their full feature OS for us DIYers.

[midnight-gamer]

A large sum of money can be saved building a computer from scratch. Tower PC's will run longer because they expel heat better than a laptop, heat is the enemy to a computer.

If you don't need the portability, and you care about value for your money, there's only one choice to make when you purchase a computer.

*Edit to add: Alienware is overpriced. If you want a PC for video games, roll your own, unless you have loads of disposable income.

[AgentR11]

There seemed to be plenty of towers at Fry's and Office Depot last I looked. That said, I get most of my tower CPU's off of Ebay; you can get a decent cpu/mem configed machine for under $300, but you kinda need to know what you're looking for, and tolerant of the occasional lemon or cosmetically challenged unit.

Other than a really hardcore gamer, I can't imagine anyone really wanting to spend $1,000+ on a tower cpu nowdays; even your average gamer can do just fine with an ebay'ed tower with an added high end graphics card.

[Cid_Yama]

See that's the point, your average gamer is happy with a 20 year old platform game.

True gamers need memory, video card memory, processing speed, buss speed,
etc. And all of it needs cooling, thus big internal space and powerful fans. (Also a big power supply to run it all.)

Off the shelf can't even play the latest games.

Yes, Alienware is charging better than a couple thousand what you would spend yourself building your own system.

But for gamers who can't build their own but want to play the latest, what are they to do?

For me the money is not important. I played with my old Dimension 4600 till it couldn't be upgraded anymore. I learned alot, but I decided I would just as soon tell Alienware what I wanted and spend a couple thousand extra.

I've now got the best system available. Not because what they offered, but because I knew what I needed and designed my own system. I had them build it because I didn't want the bother.
I don't know any other major names building high end gaming systems and if there are, they are most probably charging the same.

[Pretorian]

couple of thousands? Why not Xbox or PS3? And strategy games can be run on a cheap PC

[Cid_Yama]

Play the top end RPG and turn based strategy games and you will see. AI has come a long way.

The only reason real time strategy exists was to mask the fact that they couldn't develop a good AI at the tech level they were at.

The AI doesn't need to cheat anymore to win.

XBox and PS3 have great graphic engines, but the games aside from the graphics haven't changed since Super Nintendo.

I like a little more depth, unless I'm golfing.

Funny you mentioned cheap PC strategy games. I just found a website http://www.gog.com
(Good old games). I'm currently playing Baldur's Gate.

Bringing back old memories.

[Novus]

I do kind of smell a corporate conspiracy to take the PC away from the consumer. The PC and the Internet makes us powerful and power to the people is exactly what they don't want. They want to package it all up for us so we can only get our news from CNN and Fox news and then force us into a comma of watching retards get stupid on reality TV. It is all brainwashing you know. It is mindless television that turns normal people into pro war Republicans who vote to outsource their own jobs. And then they are so brainwashed they can't even feed themselves anymore because they have been trained by advertising to think that a 25lb bag of flour, rice, or oatmeal is not food.


The loss of the PC is a regression in human development. About 4 or 5 years ago Sweden changed their constitution and wrote down that access to the Internet as a human right. They did not include the TV or the cell phone or any other technology as a human right because those things are irreverent. They did this because freedom of information is not possible without Internet access. If only the powerful have access to information then the information isn't free and we will be in for an Orwellian future straight out of the novel 1984. If hunger riots ever broke out in America the government could simply lie and say they were terrorists and mass arrest them. Or if there was a nuclear disaster in America the government would not tell us anything except that every thing was fine. They would get away with it too if there was no Internet to keep them somewhat honest.


I can't imagine a world without PC's and Internet. A world with no PO.com, Drudge, LATOC, Zerohedge, tickerforum, etc. It would not be like the past. There are no newspapers or free press anymore and the Government has computers of their own control you and keep tabs on you 24/7. It would just be complete tyranny like after Egypt, Libya, and Syria pulled the Internet kill switch on their countries only worse because American government has far more resources at its' disposal than those tin pot dictatorships.

[steam_cannon]

Mostly it's a market decision.

The primary buyers of computers don't understand buying hardware, owning their software, security, backup/restores, customization or upgrades. The most popular phone is a black phone with everything managed for them as much as possible. No thinking, they are just magic wands. The big box stores don't have to offer variety because there isn't much of a market for that. They sell one speed tricycles because that's what people can carry around and motorcycles are too complex for them.

You can still get good parts though. If you want a tower or more powerful system you have to order it and that's what companies do for setting up powerful servers.

[Expatriot]

OP - you're being paranoid.

1st, the electronic stores and big box stores cater to the average consumer. The average consumer isn't interested in swapping out his hard drive.

2nd, the need for constant upgrading is less now than it ever was. Go back to 1998, and sure, it was good to have expansion slots. Put in a video card, audio card, internet card, whatever. But now, most functionality that is desired by 99% of users comes with the machine. And given USB ports, further functionality can be added easily. In short, why do you want an expansion slot? I used to look at all those parameters way back when. How many PCI slots, G slots, maximum DRAM upgrade, and so on. Now? Not at all. I run an XP laptop that I've had for 3-4 years. The number of times in 3-4 years that I thought I would like to upgrade something? Once. Thought about getting a better battery.
Fact is, computers are now way more powerful than they need to be to do 99% of what your average user wants done. If you're storing videos, you'll need a bigger drive. Otherwise, what? I've got 72 gig of unused space on my hard drive. I'll never use it, unless I start saving 4 gig movies. But then I'd just get an external hard drive. Things like remote storage also reduce the need for upgrades.

3rd, the marketing is to the dumbed down. Think about it. Apple had a one button mouse up until a few years ago. There literally was something appealing to a non-tech person who came in and looked at the Mac and saw one button. You could almost hear the thought bubble above Sally Simple's head "One button? Oh my. That doesn't seem too bad." You look over at the PC, it's got 2 top buttons, 2 side buttons, and a wheel. The brilliance of Mac has always been to target the middle/low end of the computer savvy IQ curve, without worrying about the top 10% of tech folks who do want the ability to upgrade and set interrupts and such.

4th, there are several places on line where you can spec out a box to whatever you want. That's where you want to be if you want to be sure you can upgrade rapidly when "Dogs of War: Towelhead Slaughter 7" comes out and you find your 4 Terrabit/second 4 parallel feed processor is just not going to allow you to exhibit your true gaming potential.

[AgentR11]

I do kind of smell a corporate conspiracy to take the PC away from the consumer. The PC and the Internet makes us powerful and power to the people is exactly what they don't want. They want to package it all up for us so we can only get our news from CNN and Fox news and then force us into a comma of watching retards get stupid on reality TV.

Let me take the corporate sympathizer role for a second...

Curtain opens on corporate exec meeting...

Guys, every time we sell an openly configurable tower to these folks, they stuff it with incompatible components, download hundreds of virus/malware packages, then load it up with a dozen separate packages to "speed up" their system, then manually edit the registry without knowing what the f they are doing; then take a magic bootloading virus scanner and say "fix"... then they call us and say, "I wanna refund, my computer won't boot and I can't get my fox news!!"

If we aren't going to go bankrupt we need two things, a way to keep them from attaching junk directly to the bus, and we need to have a way to restore the system back to the way it was when it was shipped with regard to software. Thus let us sell laptops and ultrasmall desktop units with no bus expansion ability at all; but loaded with usb, bluetooth, wireless lan, 1394, gigabit ethernet, etc. And we shall develop and deploy a bios recovery mode program to reset the system's software back to the way it was when it left the factory.

Section chiefs say HAI!
Curtain closes.

Now, they know they can't sell these machines to corporate engineers and developers, so they do have online ordering processes where you can select a full tower case and whatever custom stuff you want stuck in it. But the corporations would much prefer casual users buy a laptop or preconfigured small, integrated system, if only so they don't spend more to support it than they made on the sale.

[Serial_Worrier]

Cid - is high-performance gaming your last joy in life? For a doomer that's an awful lot of energy expenditure for entertainment. Shame on you.

[midnight-gamer]

I just found a website http://www.gog.com

I see they have Planescape, Torment. That's a must own Cid.

[cephalotus]

I bought my last desktop around 1997(?) and my first notebook in 2001. My father still uses this one.
Now I use a 11" netbook as my main PC.

My last desktop PC consumed around 100W in those times + some watt for the screen. Both laptops that I bought in 2001 and 2005 used around 20-60W, my netbook uses 8W and my smart phone around 1W.

All notebooks that I bought are still in use by other people, while all desktops and all desktop components and all those screens have long ago gone to the (toxic) waste bin...

My TV is still a 50cm cathode ray tube and my stereo system is more than 20 years old. I used 3 mobile phones so far, the first one was a present, because it was outdated at that time. I used it for 8 years. Now I'm on my second mobile phone since some years (bought a used one).
The smart phone is my first one and I use it as my MP3 player, GPS, navigator, control device for my ebike, mobile computer and so on...

[Pretorian]

Cid - is high-performance gaming your last joy in life? For a doomer that's an awful lot of energy expenditure for entertainment. Shame on you.

He grew in my eyes actually. To be an avid gamer at his age? What's not to admire.

[Serial_Worrier]

Cid - is high-performance gaming your last joy in life? For a doomer that's an awful lot of energy expenditure for entertainment. Shame on you.

He grew in my eyes actually. To be an avid gamer at his age? What's not to admire.

Goes to show that even doomers need fun.

[Expatriot]

The hilarious part about Cid blowing huge coin on a gaming computer is that he is PO.com's resident chief Marxist.

If he had his way, and government ran everything, we'd still be trying to work out how a semiconductor could be used as a transistor.