Tablets to Top Laptops This Year, All PCs in 2015

[A Guy]

It's long been said that tablets will at some point become more popular than laptops, but according to a new forecast from IDC, that shift is poised to occur this year.

The market research firm predicted that tablet shipments will grow 58.7 percent year over year in 2013 to reach 229.3 million units, up from 144.5 million last year. Meanwhile, the "slumping PC market" is expected to see negative growth for a second consecutive year as tablet shipments outpace laptop shipments in 2013, and exceed the entire PC market - including desktops - by 2015.

Source

A Guy

 

[theveterans]

Well, people have been keeping their laptops for much longer recently while trying a taste of tablet computing which have advantages such as fast access to daily tasks like checking e-mail, Facebook, News and Weather etc. That trend will continue but laptop and PC market will not die.

 

[Lee]

. . .nothing last forever. . .except death and taxes. . .

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
I'm not so sure -- certainly IMO the small (< 8 inch) tablets will NOT be hugely popular -- too big to fit easily in a pocket, they look REDICULOUS if you try and use them as a phone (like those "Phablets") and are SLOWER on Wifi than new 4G Phones -- so if you have say a Samsung S4 smartphone (screen just under 5 inches) which is just about the largest pocket size phone out there you'd be far better off with that rather than have to carry a tablet as well that doesn't really offer a huge amount of bigger screen real estate anyway.

I can see people going for 11 inch tablets for some portable applications - the limitations of the 8 inch and smaller just don't seem to me to warrant buying one when I already have a decent smart phone.

Laptops strangely will probably make some sort of "Bounce Back" in 2015 -- more and more large companies are going down the BYOD (Bring your own device) route -- that way they avoid the whole W7 / W8 / constant hardware and software upgrade ritual and can save 100,000's of dollars on avoiding costly updates every few years --just upgrade servers and provide a platform for users to logon with their own gear. I know already a lot of users often have MUCH BETTER gear at home than they get to use at work anyway so the BYOD policy is usually a popular one -- although it's not as easy to implement as it sounds.

So I think the forecast is wrong on ALL counts --small tablets will IMO become just a toy - not very useful -- and look STUPID if you try and use them as a phone -- a smartphone does a better job - especially now on WiFi with 4G speeds, laptops WILL get a small bounce back in 2015 due to the BYOD policy of a lot of companies and 11 inch or so tablets WILL be the most popular -- as these are reasonably portable and have screen sizes capable of being USED for serious applications.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[Faladu]

Yeah BYOD sounds horrid for IT support folks.

I can just hear the people trying to get all their PC issues solved....

 

[linnemeyerhere]

I think the Haswell chips will provide some crazy performance growth for Tablets and Lappy's. But the rumor of my desktop's demise is highly overrated, but as I do more then just email, browser searches and social media I could be in the minority......sad really sad !

 

[bobafetthotmail]

small tablets will IMO become just a toy - not very useful -- and look STUPID if you try and use them as a phone

I have seen a lot of reports saying that people in developing countries (not third world mind me) tend to prefer phablets (yes, the small tablets) because it's a crossbreed and can do tablet and phone decently enough.

I still don't understand how can someone watch a movie on such a device (even on a full-blown tablet) and be entertained, but I was already proven wrong on electronic cigarettes so yeah...

 

[jimbo45]

small tablets will IMO become just a toy - not very useful -- and look STUPID if you try and use them as a phone

I have seen a lot of reports saying that people in developing countries (not third world mind me) tend to prefer phablets (yes, the small tablets) because it's a crossbreed and can do tablet and phone decently enough.

I still don't understand how can someone watch a movie on such a device (even on a full-blown tablet) and be entertained, but I was already proven wrong on electronic cigarettes so yeah...

Hi there.

Electronic cigarettes appear to be just as irritating for Non Smokers as the "Real Deal". We've just passed a law that treats them as "Standard Cigarettes" so people have to go outside Bars/Restaurants/Work places etc to "Smoke" these just like normal cigarettes. These cigarettes were (are ?) just a "Nine days wonder" so I think comparison with tablets might be more accurate than you think

Tablets won't replace PC's for those who need a PC - the volume of PC sales will be much less in future of course -- hardware doesn't need upgrading often any more and therefore volumes will be tiny compared with past sales -- obvious enough to me. It's nothing to do with the OS that's on the PC -- even APPLE is not selling as many as they used to.

Most people I've seen who use "Phablets" very rapidly get fed up with them after they've tried using these as ridiculous looking phones in crowded places and see people either laughing at them or more commonly just pitying them.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[lehnerus2000]

So-called 4K

Tablets won't replace PC's for those who need a PC - the volume of PC sales will be much less in future of course -- hardware doesn't need upgrading often any more and therefore volumes will be tiny compared with past sales -- obvious enough to me. It's nothing to do with the OS that's on the PC -- even APPLE is not selling as many as they used to.

Given that W8.1 supposedly supports so-called 4K monitors (they aren't 4K in any dimension, they should be called 2160p) we will soon need more powerful desktops to be able to edit video and screenshots for that format.

Lets see someone do that on a 5" phone or 7" tablet in a reasonable time frame (i.e. before the battery dies).
That applies to the "Cloud" too.

 

[Layback Bear]

I was in a V.F.W Post and notice a long time compute person and his wife were their. I approached because I notice he was using a tablet. We talked while he was on a website for gardeners.
I was wondering who else is living in their home that they had to come to a V.F.W. Post to access the net and check out flower seeds. I don't think it was their two dog or the bird that sits in a cage and does nothing raising hell about internet use so they must have gotten a kitten who lay down the law about internet use at home.
May be it was the kitten using Facebook at home using all the bandwidth. The dogs don't use the internet because their large paws don't work well with keyboards and mouse and the damn bird never gets out of the cage. Yep it must be a new kitten. What else could it be?

Their is a place and time for just about anything one wants to do.
You will not get cancer talking to live people in person.
After a short period of withdrawals you will be able to go into the public without talking on a phone or using a tablet.
Believe me it can be done and without medication.
Then tablet sales will have a downward thread.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
Guess what happened to me about two hours ago.

I went into one of my favourite bars in Manchester England (currently just finishing a short term gig there) and I noticed people were actually moving their lips and emitting strange noises bearing some resemblance to a long lost spoken language - sounded something like English I think !!

Not a single phone / tablet in sight !!. I think in the dim and distant past way back into pre-history - wasn't this type of activity actually called Conversation.

Try it sometime -- it really works and is a lot of fun too. !!!!

Cheers
jimbo

 

[linnemeyerhere]

Sorry jimbo, I'm afraid it's a lost language here in the states we have to run ads to warn people to look both ways when on their devices and on the street. Read any blog and it's plain as day the written and spoke word are being lost. I hope conversation and writing makes a come back as I need all the help I can get myself !

 

[bobafetthotmail]

Keep dreaming.
The trend of chimps with a smartphone that constantly check facebook or other social stuff while WATCHING A FRIGGIN MOVIE at the multiplex here is in the rise since the inception of spartphones. Now it's always at least 10-15 screens online at any given moment during the whole movie (on around 50-100 people total). It's annoying.

If it goes on like this I'm going to buy a jammer and see how they freak out and leave the multiplex. I mean really.

Given that W8.1 supposedly supports so-called 4K monitors (they aren't 4K in any dimension, they should be called 2160p) we will soon need more powerful desktops to be able to edit video and screenshots for that format. Lets see someone do that on a 5" phone or 7" tablet in a reasonable time frame (i.e. before the battery dies).
That applies to the "Cloud" too.

Theoretically the "cloud" could do it, servers lend well to massively parallelized tasks (you know, tons of multi-core processors), and technologies like the NVIDIA GRID are designed to do just that, allow a server to do the graphics-intensive stuff with its graphics cards, and pipe the results to a dumb cheap terminal, be it a thin client or a tablet or whatever.

I still don't see the point for going beyond 1080p, but I'm probably just a retrograde unwashed luddite.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
You don't need to buy a Jammer.

I'm an old fashioned engineer -- you can MAKE one for a few cents -- it's called a WHITE NOISE oscillator - just create a 2.2 GHZ signal with a 5mw power - mobile phone signals are in MICROWATTS so a MILLIWATT signal will swamp any mobile phone signal within about 100 metre range of your device. It'll run easily with a couple of small 1.5V cells and the device could be hidden in say a Mouse (that's what I use) so it passes any security control. Works great when I'm travelling between UK and Paris / Brussels on Eurostar train -- people move at least 3 -4 cars away to continue rabitting on their wretched phones while I and several very grateful companion passengers enjoy a peaceful trip between Brussels / Paris and London.

White noise - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You can also add frequencies to jam as 4G is rolled out too -- use the physics formula 2 pi * omega lc to get the values of inductance (l), capacitance (c) frequency (f) etc.

More info

Frequency - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cheers
jimbo

 

[lehnerus2000]

Personal Render Farm

Theoretically the "cloud" could do it, servers lend well to massively parallelized tasks (you know, tons of multi-core processors), and technologies like the NVIDIA GRIDare designed to do just that, allow a server to do the graphics-intensive stuff with its graphics cards, and pipe the results to a dumb cheap terminal, be it a thin client or a tablet or whatever.

It might work for people with 1Gb/s Internet connections, but it's a no-go on my ~6Mb/s connection.

Given that Blu-ray movie discs seem to be over 25 GB, presumably the "4K" versions will be over 100GB.
That would be ~37 hours to download and ~180 hours to upload.

I dread to think about how much hiring a "Cloud" render farm would cost.
It would probably be more practical to buy half a dozen high powered machines and set up a personal render farm.
How To: Building Your Own Render Farm : Introduction

When you aren't rendering you can use them for other purposes.

You don't need to buy a Jammer.

I'm an old fashioned engineer -- you can MAKE one for a few cents -- it's called a WHITE NOISE oscillator - just create a 2.2 GHZ signal with a 5mw power - mobile phone signals are in MICROWATTS so a MILLIWATT signal will swamp any mobile phone signal within about 100 metre range of your device.

Nice.
I think that it would be considered illegal in a lot of countries though.

 

[Layback Bear]

Jimbo the White Noise idea sound great to me.
I wish I new how to make one.

 

[bobafetthotmail]

heh, non-military/police use of jammers is illegal in most of the known universe. Mainly because you are preventing people from making "emergency calls". I'd personally object that a mutiplex's movie projection room isn't so far from civilization to make that a major issue, but I'm not the one writing the laws.

I'd love to be able to jam only the mobile internet, but I doubt it is feasible, as it's on the same frequency afaik.

It might work for people with 1Gb/s Internet connections, but it's a no-go on my ~6Mb/s connection.

Yep, all this hype about ultraportability seems to assume that everyone and their dog has easy access to fiber optic broadband. Which isn't really the case. I'm stuck on a 512 Kbit/s line or so.

Fun read about that render farm though. Now where did they place the last batch of pentium 4 PCs? :devil:

 

[Faladu]

I shouldn't worry about 4K video until you can afford a TV that is 4K. muhahaha
I might die before that happens.

If cable TV finally drops low def I will be pleased.