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PC obsolescence is obsolete

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Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#61

Post by wes-exp »

cynicalkane wrote: post #22
Silhouette wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sad, but true. Faced with the reality that well-designed, flexible, modular systems have simply become too good, manufacturers are now effectively building in forced obsolescence, either tying components together (the Apple way) or arbitrarily declaring that only certain combinations are permitted (which also works with consumables, like the way my HP colour printer refused to print a black and white document the oth…

The computer market is not a conspiracy of manufacturers that get together and decide to screw customers. And absent a conspiracy, there's no profit in that. Actually, I'd argue that the computer world has been increasingly tending toward openness, not away from it; but consumer devices are special a use case where almost all of computer-buying humanity simply doesn't care about the things you care about. Anyway, I'd…

"The computer market is not a conspiracy of manufacturers that get together and decide to screw customers."

I agree, but for the record, there have been a variety of customer-screwing conspiracies within the computer market. If memory serves correctly, price-fixing arrangements have occurred in at least RAM and LCDs. Not to mention various anti-trust issues.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#62

Post by notatoad »

MattRogish wrote: post #33

I think this pretty well reflects Microsoft's long-term consumer risk, too. More than half of MSFT's revenue ( http://www.tannerhelland.com/4273/microsoft-money-updated-20... ) comes from Windows and Office (and over half the profit, Windows http://news.yahoo.com/microsoft-defer-revenue-windows-upgrad... ). Back in the 90s and early 00s, the rate of change in the PC market was amazing. The hardware you could buy in 1…

>Competition in the PC market have driven hardware profits to zero. MS and their clone makers have painted themselves into a corner.

this might serve to explain why the latest version of windows seems to be tailored for mobile devices, TVs, and other consumer electronics instead of traditional PCs. You can't sell somebody a new desktop every year anymore, but you absolutely can sell the same person a new tablet every year.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#63

Post by ajasmin »

monkeyfacebag wrote: post #5

No doubt it has been replaced by device obsolescence, where the screen, camera, wireless radio, etc. are bundled together and improvements in any one component compels the purchase of a whole new unit.

Device obsolescence is also encouraged by subsidized phone contracts, aggressive marketing and the craze new hardware cause in the tech press.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#64

Post by MattRogish »

notatoad wrote: post #62
MattRogish wrote: post #33

I think this pretty well reflects Microsoft's long-term consumer risk, too. More than half of MSFT's revenue ( http://www.tannerhelland.com/4273/microsoft-money-updated-20... ) comes from Windows and Office (and over half the profit, Windows http://news.yahoo.com/microsoft-defer-revenue-windows-upgrad... ). Back in the 90s and early 00s, the rate of change in the PC market was amazing. The hardware you could buy in 1…

>Competition in the PC market have driven hardware profits to zero. MS and their clone makers have painted themselves into a corner. this might serve to explain why the latest version of windows seems to be tailored for mobile devices, TVs, and other consumer electronics instead of traditional PCs. You can't sell somebody a new desktop every year anymore, but you absolutely can sell the same person a new tablet every…

Yup. Mobile computing devices are the PCs of the 90s. Even more so with the two-year contract extension device subsidization. $100 for the latest and greatest iPhone every two years? Absolutely!

Eventually the iDevice market will "settle down" just like regular PCs, and so I think Apple's strategy of software and design lock-in makes a ton of sense. In the long run, it's much easier (comparatively speaking) to innovate on the software end than on the hardware end. Once the iDevice gold rush is over, the software lock-in will keep me in the Apple family.

With more and more things moving to the "cloud" I think that will continue to make phones and tablets "disposable" in the way PCs aren't. Apple is trying to get there with the App store and iCloud, but they are still long off from "buy a new MacBook Air, sign in to iCloud, and it's just like your old computer!"

(aside: device subsidies never really worked for PCs, wasn't ePC some sort of a leased computer model?)

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#65

Post by JackC »

keithpeter wrote: post #58

Let's turn this thread on its head Does anyone think a desktop PC with a 20 year life is possible now? What kind of design?

If nothing else, I think power consumption is a dealbreaker for a 20-year desktop PC. In (say) five years, there will be an iPhone with the same specs, and then you'll be running a desktop PC for 15 years at 100 times the power consumption for no reason. A good analogy is the way otherwise perfectly-good CRTs disappeared so quickly in favor of relatively expensive and low-contrast flat-panels. I'm using extreme numbers, but at that timescale even small efficiency increases will make it worth upgrading, and efficiency increases are a huge focus right now.

The place to look for a 20-year computer is probably the same place they are now -- embedded systems with minimal power consumption and ample specs for the limited job they're designed for. E.g., cars.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#66

Post by greedo »

keithpeter wrote: post #58

Let's turn this thread on its head Does anyone think a desktop PC with a 20 year life is possible now? What kind of design?

Depends on OS developments. My 2006 Mac Pro is not supported under Mountain Lion, but it's still an excellent machine; 4 cores @ 2.66Ghz, 32GB of memory, and 6TB of disk. GigE, FireWire, USB, DVD/CDRom. I see no reason other than PC envy to upgrade to a different system. Eventually Apple will stop releasing security updates for Lion, and then I'll have to consider moving to a Linux distro. Short of a hardware failure I figure I'll get another 4-6 years out of it. Replacement parts for Mac Pros suck in price, but I bet I can find what I need on eBay. Heck, my system appears to be worth less than $500 according to my last search.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#67

Post by __alexs »

According to cpubenchmark.net the Nehalem Core i7-920 in (from November 2008) mentioned in the article has about half the performance of the Ivy Bridge Core i7-3770K released in April. In 2004 the best we had was Pentium 4's which were around 8x slower than the i7-920 that came 4 years later.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#68

Post by theorique »

podperson wrote: post #34
rodly wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's easy to see Microsoft profiting by leveraging its Xbox division to boost PC sales (Windows license sales). I can't find a source for this, but I doubt Microsoft made much money if at all on the Xbox 360. The money is in Xbox live subscriptions and taking a percentage from sales on the marketplace. This is similar to how Amazon sells its Kindle line at a negative profit but makes a killing in Prime…

The irony here is that Microsoft cannibalized the PC gaming market to create the XBox market (and kill its one true enemy at the time: Sony). The result is -- arguably -- stagnation of the desktop PC market which was always -- I contend -- driven largely by gaming. The problem is that the desktop market made Microsoft money whereas consoles... not so much. It seems to me that problem here isn't cannibalization -- if…

the desktop PC market which was always -- I contend -- driven largely by gaming.

For the leading edge of the desktop PC market, definitely (advanced graphics cards, fastest possible processor, fastest possible RAM).

On the other hand, the broad center of the bell curve of the desktop PC market has been driven by office applications. These have never needed the high performance that the gamers demanded - users simply wanted something "good enough for Word, Excel PowerPoint, and email".

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#69

Post by FilterJoe »

For those who don't game or edit videos, this has been true for about 8 years. I retired my 2004 1GB RAM Dell desktop in 2012 and still keep it as a backup. The ever increasing speed of browsers and the shift of my work from the desktop to the cloud kept my system operating at the same speed it did 8 years ago - not blazing fast, but good enough.

I expect my Sandy Bridge replacement system to go another 7-10 years before I replace it.

Re: PC obsolescence is obsolete

#70

Post by theorique »

mikeash wrote: post #55
Silhouette wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Modular systems have costs, both in terms of money as well as size and weight. Right. It's absolutely necessary for Apple to make the new iPad so that you can't even take it to an Apple Store and get the storage upgraded, and to literally glue the Retina version of the MacBook Pro together so it's almost completely impossible to repair anything if it breaks. Some integration has a genuine benefit, such as minimising…

Neither of Apple's non-modular systems you mention are artificial. Upgradeable storage would require substantial additional room in a device that has no room. The Retina MBP's screen is glued together because it makes for a substantial thickness and weight savings. I'm not saying you can't complain about junk. I'm saying that it's really odd to complain about how it's some conspiracy of manufacturers when it's actual…

Neither of Apple's non-modular systems you mention are artificial. Upgradeable storage would require substantial additional room in a device that has no room. The Retina MBP's screen is glued together because it makes for a substantial thickness and weight savings.

Agreed. This is not some evil conspiracy of hardware integrators (led by AAPL) to make non-modular devices. This is a design tradeoff in a leading edge machine [1] in which upgradeability was deemed to be less of a concern than making maximum use of space and weight.

[1] You can't get a Retina MBP for less than $2200, making it a premium product for the laptop category.

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