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Sunday, 20 July 2014

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Long live the PC

With the proliferation of tablets such as the Apple iPad and the Samsung Tab S, many people began to talk about the death of the Personal Computer (PC), which, for all intents and purposes now means the laptop computer. Desktop PCs have been around for nearly 40 years and laptops have been with us for around 30.

However, tablets have become enormously popular since their introduction in 2010 (just four years!), leading many tech analysts to predict that the PC would die a slow death. Indeed, there was a dent in PC (including MacBooks as well) sales as tablets ate into their sales. Tablets too have become very powerful in just three or four generations and most of them can do almost everything that a traditional PC does.

But I used one significant word in that sentence - almost. Yes, tablets are not quite up there yet with the PC when it comes to sheer performance and the tasks you can perform. Besides, typing on a touch screen is a bit of a pain and even with a small Bluetooth keyboard attached, it is not quite the same thing as typing on a PC keyboard.

Nothing really can beat a hardware (physical) keyboard. Some tablets also have other limitations such as zero capacity for expansion, lack of USB slots and limited connectivity options. Even gaming, while great on a touch screen, cannot come close to the offerings on dedicated consoles and desktop PCs. Tablets are seen as primarily media consumption devices while laptops are seen as content creation devices.

If you love your PC, there is good news. Reports of the death of the PC have been greatly exaggerated. In fact, the latest statistics suggest that PC sales are rebounding as people replace their older machines which have obsolete operating systems such as Windows XP.

Moreover, interest in tablets is waning as manufacturers struggle to introduce new features in an already saturated tablet market. After all, no one is going to buy new tablets year after year if there is only an incremental increase in performance, applications and screen resolution.

Shipments

The research firm Gartner recently issued a report projecting that PC shipments could reach about 317 million in 2015, up from 308 million units expected to ship this year. Gartner's report projects that 2014 PC shipments will drop only by 2.9 percent compared to last year, an improvement over recent years.

In the report, Gartner analyst Ranjit Atwal estimated that about 60 million PCs will be upgraded to new machines this year. The revival of the PC business will be driven by upgrades of Windows XP-systems that have been used by office workers and consumers for the past several years, he said.

“PCs never died, but some people opted to buy a tablet rather than replace their ageing PC,” said Patrick Moorhead, an analyst with Moor Insights and Strategy. “At some point, though, their PC gets too old and needs to be replaced. That's what's happening now.”

There are several reasons why the PC is having a good time again. The processors from both Intel and AMD are more powerful than those found in tablets, RAM and hard disk memory is way above what tablets can manage (an Apple iPad will offer a maximum of 128 GB of storage whereas a typical PC now offers 1000 GB), screen sizes are far bigger, laptops are getting lightweight and more efficient, they still include optical drives, connectivity and expandability options are legion and finally, the all-new Windows 8.1 is much better.

According to one analyst, “Given the currently available hardware options, aggressive pricing by vendors and improvements Microsoft has made to Windows 8.1, there has not been a better time to upgrade. Businesses and individual users seem to fully understand that.”

Diverse

Moreover, the PC devices themselves are becoming more diverse. Microsoft’s latest Surface Pro 3 is probably the best combination of a tablet and a laptop currently in the market, if your pair the Surface tablet with the optional Typecover.

PC makers such as Lenovo are making hybrid tablets and laptops which can turn into either configuration in a matter of seconds. This way, you can literally have the best of both worlds. In fact, hybrids or ultramobiles will be responsible for all the growth, with shipments of the hybrid form factor set to grow 50 percent to 32.3 million this year before powering up 71 percent to 55 million in 2015, according to Gartner.

Google has also entered the fray with its Chromebook series of highly affordable laptops which are ideal for those who just want to send an email, browse the web and do the occasional MS Word document, albeit through Google Docs.

Windows 8.1 Laptops themselves are now sporting touch screens which used to be the exclusive domain of tablets. Intel and to a lesser extent AMD have done a lot to make that happen. They have invested billions into touch screens, miniaturisation and lower-power, higher-performance chips. And in any case, most laptops are still priced lower than premium tablets.

The computer industry is constantly evolving and we cannot even predict what kind of devices will be with us in just five years.

Thus there will be many new products in both laptop and tablet lines, not to mention hybrids.

Moreover, people are using more than one device - I have an Amazon e-Ink Kindle just for reading, an Apple iPad Air and a couple of laptops which I use intermittently.

Most people also have a smartphone and/or phablet which can do many of the things that a tablet does. In this light, there is really no danger of one product going obsolete.

But both camps (well, most PC vendors also make tablets) must improve battery life which is not at all great especially on laptops – there are reports that Apple is working on fuel cell technology for laptops and tablets.

All this is good news for the consumer who now has a choice of devices to choose from at his or her price point. For most people, that is all that matters.

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