In a way journalists writing this type of article over and over puts a little fear in my heart. I don't ever intend or want to pass up my PC or laptop in favor of a phone or tablet interface; as a content developer its just not something I could ever see myself wanting to change. Sure, I own a smartphone and tablet but they're recreational at best and often used only for efficiency in my life, never a replacement for my PC where work gets done.
But what I mean when I say I'm afraid is that people listen to these articles. They believe what is said and trumpet it across the skies for everyone to hear. I'd gamble more than 90% of the consumer market are content consumers exclusively; they don't see the need or benefits to having a powerful machine that lives upon your desk. Its not mobile, its not sleek. What happens next? Manufacturers follow that market and begin to neglect the ways of old.
I never would believe the PC ever disappears but what I can see happening is it becoming a more niche market. Prices will go up and selection will go down as a result. It wont be soon but it will eventually happen. Perhaps I'm just afraid of change like my father before me. Perhaps I'm a bit too stubborn for my own good but whatever the reason I fear the day when finding a PC and OS modern enough to fit my needs isn't as easy as it is now. Until then I'm just going to keep on hoping the strong PC gaming market keeps the platform afloat.
I think this overlooks one fairly major fact and the reason Microsoft became one of the most valuable companies in the world: businesses have employees. Employees use productivity software. Productivity software cannot run on a tablet in any practical sense. Even if it could, most large companies (which are Dell and Microsoft's bread and butter) lag a good 10 years behind technology trends. This is why most employees are running Windows XP or 7 and the same stodgy Office productivity software they've been using for 20 years. It works and is universally accepted.
If there is ever a drop in demand large enough that would render the desktop computer market small enough to halt production, I would bet that you will find that you no longer use it for productivity either. I'm a developer too and that is not a niche market. It's easy to think of it as such but the reality is that old-fashioned productivity isn't going anywhere. Tablets have replaced non-consumption and at best complement desktop machines.
“Businesses have employees. Employees use productivity software. Productivity software cannot run on a tablet in any practical sense.”
Employees stuck in offices use productivity software. There are so many settings in which notebooks and desktops aren't practical, but tablets are. Places where specialized software is required. Tablets deployed in retail, healthcare, defense, airplanes, hospitality, parcel delivery, onsite sales and repair, city councils, classrooms, elderly homes, etc etc.
Also, even productivity software works better on tablets in some cases. Nowadays, I use OmniPlan for iPad instead of Microsoft Project and Apple Numbers for iPad instead of the OS X version. I make website mockups on the iPad instead of on the desktop. For what I need to do, it's faster and more convenient.
"There are so many settings in which notebooks and desktops aren't practical, but tablets are. Places where specialized software is required. Tablets deployed in retail, healthcare, defense, airplanes, hospitality, parcel delivery, onsite sales and repair, city councils, classrooms, elderly homes, etc etc."
This is partially what I meant by "non-consumption." In few if any of those environments are tablets replacing desktops. They're making those jobs easier to do by integrating software where previously it wasn't possible. Perhaps it's replacing a clipboard and pen, but not really a desktop.
"Also, even productivity software works better on tablets in some cases. Nowadays, I use OmniPlan for iPad instead of Microsoft Project and Apple Numbers for iPad instead of the OS X version. I make website mockups on the iPad instead of on the desktop. For what I need to do, it's faster and more convenient."
This may be true, but I would argue that this is what would be defined as a niche market. People in corporate America using Word and Excel is not.
However I do recognize that this might not always be the case. The tablet may come to surpass the desktop in enabling productivity which is why I said that if manufacturers ever halted desktop production, he/she would likely not be using desktops for productivity anymore, either. Chances are what he/she does isn't all that unique compared to the overall market.
That's why employees should get a Microsoft Surface Pro.
They get the full-featured operating system that they're used to and they can operate the full OS via touch, pen, keyboard or mouse. I've got one and I love it. No walled garden for me, thanks!
I sympathize with your point of view. On the other hand, it seems like you could take your comment, replace "PC" with "mainframe" and "mobile" with "PC" and it would be right at home in 1975 or so.
It's interesting because the 1975 version of the comment would be absolutely right. The PC did herald the end of the mainframe as we knew it. Sure, they're still alive, sort of, but it's not like it once was. And yet, the transition ultimately ended up being wonderful. Maybe this new transition will be great as well. Let's hope so.
The difference is the backwards shift in the user interface this time around. The touch paradigm is fundamentally less powerful and efficient than KB+mouse. Conversely, a PC can do anything a mainframe can do, from a UI standpoint. The true supplanter of the PC must have parity in this regard.
It depends what you mean when you say you want a "PC".
Do you mean something that runs x86 architecture? Something with keyboard/mouse as the primary interface? Something with interchangeable commodity components? Something with lots of local storage?
Lots of gamers custom-build their own PCs, so as long as people keep playing games on Windows and demand ever faster graphics cards and CPUs etc. the desktop PC should be fairly safe.
Its a bit narrow to think that 90% of the makers are just consumers. The whole kids market has been narrowed down to iPads which is kind of sad because kids can do so much more. (If they were given more input device optins than today for example ). This whole narrow thinking is unfortunately throughout the general populace whose creativity has been inhibited by apple products ( just using their name because they are the ultima e proponents of 2-3 sizes fit all )
This guy has seemingly made a career out of being wrong about Windows.
Here's a quote from one of his other articles, "I can't say that I've looked at Windows 7 nearly as closely as Kennedy has, but I've looked at Windows 7 enough to know that it's no real improvement on Vista."
It's too bad that "journalists" can be consistently wrong with impunity.
That said, based on his track record, Windows will probably have a bright future.
There's a lot of good stuff under the hood in Win8 (file system improvements, etc). Unfortunately, the Windows UI was taken over by zealots, and that never ends well.
I think that Win8 could be saved if MS just published a few registry tweaks, combined with a checkbox saying that "No, I don't want to use Metro, ever."
But it would require someone in upper management to admit they were wrong. They would get a bad review. Sadly, it's better to let customers go and let revenue slide than to admit that you were wrong, in a company like Microsoft.
Off the top of my head: it boots faster, it operates faster, it's more stable, the interface is less bad (I hesitate to write "better"), and it dials down the panicky Cancel or Allow dialogs.
If I recall correctly, it system requirements are actually lower than Windows 7's as well. Way to go against the grain.
But that said, Windows 8's improvements are pretty much all under the hood: they're not user-facing. It's no wonder people don't see them, because the improvements are not designed to be seen. Unfortunately, that also means they can't really be marketed except in very niche scenarios.
I'm using Windows 8 with the aftermarket StarDock start menu, and I've pretty much forgotten that I'm not using Win7 until I accidentally blunder back into Metro. I thought Metro was really neat for the first 20 minutes after I upgraded - until I realized that the mail indicator inexplicably doesn't connect to Outlook. It works with Windows Live/Outlook.com/Hotmail, but not Microsoft's flagship office software suite.
PC sales may be mostly done. A desktop that was bought 10 years ago can still run fine today - and many still are.
We reached a point in computing where upgrading doesn't make that big of a difference. You can use the same machine for a decade or more without problem if you're an end user, especially given so many rich web apps that don't require high processing power.
A Pentium 4 or Athlon XP 2700+ from 10 years ago has been unusable for all but the simplest tasks for years. It would have also needed to be upgraded along the way - it came from the factory with just 256MB or 512MB RAM. You can still edit office documents and do some light web-surfing, but for todays interactive sites and content it falls far behind the experience that an iPad can provide.
My mom still has no problem using QuickBooks and doing all the required web stuff at work with a Pentium 4 and 512mb ram. She literally just bought a new desktop because quickbooks requires it.
In an office environment, she really doesn't need more.
So a guy who was wrong last time he said it, says it again. Ho humm.
Thing is I think we all believe that the demand for desktops or high end laptops is probably going to flatline. The classic example is graphics cards for games. 15 years ago, a generation of cards made a massive difference to the quality of the games visuals. Running Half-Life with software rendering was awful compared to my Voodoo2.
Nowadays the progress is purely a small refinement, my desktop from 3 years ago is still more than adequate. Meanwhile the other end of the scale people don't want a proper PC, they want a locked down, does what it can simply, with no side-effects life.
But to suggest the end of Windows is to ignore their core business model.
There are still things that would benefit from faster PCs (e.g. VFX).
What I'm looking for is a form factor change to be part of the next wave (Post-PC as Apple says). Something I can carry around and have all my files on and be connected then plug in for bigger screens and more power.
Keeping all my files in the cloud is still a backup thing and not a live thing. Connections cost too much and aren't very reliable.
“I struggle to think of anything that Windows could add to its functionality that would make me want a new version.”
Windows 7 and OS X 10.8 are fine desktop OSes that one can continue to use for years to come. However, I can think of two improvements for future versions:
* Better file systems. Windows was supposed to get WinFS, OS X was destined to adopt ZFS. Unfortunately, neither of those panned out. HDDs are on their way out, we need native support for a file system that is reliable and is optimized for SSD use. Preferably, both Apple and Microsoft use the same open source solution for all their platforms, but that's not likely to happen.
* APIs to aide cooperation between mobile apps and desktop apps and TV screens. Right now, there are few good examples of mobile apps adding to the desktop experience, or the other way around. At the moment, only Adobe Nav[1] and Adobe Color Lava[2] come to mind. This is something Apple en Microsoft need to solve, not make each developer do so for themselves. Look at the brilliant folks at Panic and their Status Board app: they spent months working on a solution to display high quality graphics from an iPad to a TV screen [3]; those things should be much easier.
I love how it says "but the numbers show that Windows is coming to a dead end". So where are the numbers for Windows sales in this article, I just see PC sales. Typical journalism.
>> but you know what device we'll still be using for most of our interactions? It will be a PC, simply because it's easier to enter data with a real keyboard than any other interface.
Real keyboards are nearly gone from the smartphone space. Several people I have spoken to assert that keyboards will also be gone from the workplace in a few years.
I have some ideas on how to enhance a real keyboard to make it more productive and ergonomic. My key motivation behind these comes from I myself wanting such a thing. However, I have been having mixed feelings about pursuing these due to mixed feedback from friends, primarily because they think keyboards/PCs are going away, or that getting external funding in this space would be nearly impossible.
Do you have any advice on whether this area is worth pursuing or not? Are PCs and real keyboards going to go away, or there are here to stay as OP says?
As the article itself suggests, the better title would be "the desktop OS is dying (to an extent)".
The author states that desktop PC sales are declining, tablet sales are increasing, yet also states that sticking with Metro makes MS "idiots". Are they supposed to use the desktop UI on tablets? Of course not.
Windows isn't dead or dying. Laptop and desktop form factors aren't seen as the primary or only way to interact with software anymore. Windows is the king of desktop and laptop machines (by volume). iPad is the king of tablet/touch computing. Android via cheaper tablets is taking the lower end. So, where does Windows live on touch devices? Does it go head to head with the iPad or Android? I don't think it has the apps or mindshare to do that.
Desktop and laptops are shrinking as the primary platform of computing, and with it Windows. Shrinking, not dying.
I don't think Windows is done because there's always going to be a market for cheap(er) laptops and desktops. My girlfriend is a teacher. She can't afford a Mac. She doesn't want a Chromebook because she spends time in locations with no internet connection. She'll be buying a Windows machine for THOSE reasons.
Someone could absolutely disrupt Microsoft in the low-price market (and who knows, Chromebook might get there) but we're not going to see everyone switch to Macs just because the new Windows isn't great.
I believe the point is that the market is shrinking, so Microsoft is now the leader in a segment that gets more irrelevant every quarter while unable to enter in any meaningful way to the mobile race.
Unable? I don't think so at all... Have you tried a Surface device? I got the Pro - it's a full operating system in a device the size of an iPad, with Intel i5 CPU and graphics. What's not to love?
I predict that Windows is going to be increasingly more available on smaller mobile devices. Not much of a prediction because to me it's obvious that's the direction they're heading in.
The huge market may keep Windows in the game longer than anticipated is the often-overlooked monopoly they have with DirectX, and graphic drivers that work (reference to my recent experience using Ubuntu for a while with nVidia hardware)
It will be interesting to see Apple's Mac sales numbers this quarter. Last quarter they were down close to 20% year-over-year.
My personal theory for some of the loss in sales is that PCs are lasting much much longer than they used to. I just recently retired a laptop after using it for 6 years and am still rocking a quad core PC that is over 5 years old. My earlier computers were replaced earlier.
The defendant microsoft still has enough market clout left to scorch the metaphorical earth and poison the well for the rest of the industry. I'm talking about SecureBoot of course.
So the answer to your question is a resounding no.
10 Years ago, if you had told me that a linux-based OS would be beating Apple and Microsoft's offerings, I would have called you a pie-in-the-sky dreamer. Today, we're celebrating the natural conclusion of the Halloween Documents in pure Ghandi style; They ignored us, then they laughed at us, then they fought us. Now we've won.
But what I mean when I say I'm afraid is that people listen to these articles. They believe what is said and trumpet it across the skies for everyone to hear. I'd gamble more than 90% of the consumer market are content consumers exclusively; they don't see the need or benefits to having a powerful machine that lives upon your desk. Its not mobile, its not sleek. What happens next? Manufacturers follow that market and begin to neglect the ways of old.
I never would believe the PC ever disappears but what I can see happening is it becoming a more niche market. Prices will go up and selection will go down as a result. It wont be soon but it will eventually happen. Perhaps I'm just afraid of change like my father before me. Perhaps I'm a bit too stubborn for my own good but whatever the reason I fear the day when finding a PC and OS modern enough to fit my needs isn't as easy as it is now. Until then I'm just going to keep on hoping the strong PC gaming market keeps the platform afloat.