Apple Sees Tablets Soon Outpacing PCs

firas said:
not when the biggest top-end video card or a 1200W PSU is not bigger than an SSD drive, yes a very long shot.
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My watercooling takes up the most space. The heatercore is larger than a top end vidcard and PSU combined.
 
nutzo said:
He is making a typical mistake in assuming tablet growth will continue at the current rate. There is a limited market for $600+ tablets, and at some point the sales numbers will level off or even fall.

Now if you expand the definition of a tablet to include everything from ebooks to anything with a screen and no keyboard, he might eventually be correct.
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I think he is expecting the rate to increase as prices fall and more firms ramp up production. One could easily find a reasonable 7 inch tablet for 180-250 dollars. I would expect sales would do reasonable well at this price point(when larger units hit said price point.)

Tablets seem well positioned. They reduce costs in a few key areas over pcs and tend to offer better battery life. They are easy to carry and handle most apps required to communicate with others and watch videos. The main risk I see is memory prices, with screen production and quality being second.

I can't see most people not being interested in a 10 inch nook color/asus like tablet at 300 or less. It simply is a mater of how you predict production and prices to go over the next 36-48 months. This is without taking into account factors which might accelerate pushing prices down.

The Interesting question is a nook color a tablet or an e reader? :)
 
Uncle said:
Good marketing can have that affect on people.
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And people who buy XTREME GAMERZ HEATSINK PLUS SUPER EXXXTREME SUPER FAN HEATPIPEZ SNIPER MILSPEC HEATGUARD MOTHERBOARD for RAGE KILL!!!!!!ONE are somehow immune to this marketing? Son't forget the PSU with five times the capacity that your system actually uses. BECAUSE YOU ARE EXTREME WITH TEH OVERCLOX!

Tablets are handy. That's why a lot of people use them.
 
ianken said:
And people who buy XTREME GAMERZ HEATSINK PLUS SUPER EXXXTREME SUPER FAN HEATPIPEZ SNIPER MILSPEC HEATGUARD MOTHERBOARD for RAGE KILL!!!!!!ONE are somehow immune to this marketing? Son't forget the PSU with five times the capacity that your system actually uses. BECAUSE YOU ARE EXTREME WITH TEH OVERCLOX!

Tablets are handy. That's why a lot of people use them.
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Must be a throw it away and buy a new one kinda guy eh? :rolleyes:


Someone making such a statement has no idea what they are talking about.
 
ianken said:
And people who buy XTREME GAMERZ HEATSINK PLUS SUPER EXXXTREME SUPER FAN HEATPIPEZ SNIPER MILSPEC HEATGUARD MOTHERBOARD for RAGE KILL!!!!!!ONE are somehow immune to this marketing?
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Actually yes. PC enthusiasts tend to have very specific reasons, goals and price targets for what they are trying to accomplish. A lot of people are buying them because it's the thing to do. People don't buy 2,3 or 4 GPUs and 1Kw to keep because it's the thing to do, at least not with the public at large.
 
ianken said:
And people who buy XTREME GAMERZ HEATSINK PLUS SUPER EXXXTREME SUPER FAN HEATPIPEZ SNIPER MILSPEC HEATGUARD MOTHERBOARD for RAGE KILL!!!!!!ONE are somehow immune to this marketing? Son't forget the PSU with five times the capacity that your system actually uses. BECAUSE YOU ARE EXTREME WITH TEH OVERCLOX!

Tablets are handy. That's why a lot of people use them.
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Ppl who build gaming machines aren't immune to the marketing, but odds are low that they'll ever give up their gaming machine for a tablet. Adding a tablet as a companion device is a possibility of course.

But hey, when a tablet can do everything my PC can do and also has user replaceable parts, then I might consider replacing my PC with it. As of now, it can't replace any of my PCs.
 
Joe Average said:
They will get to a point where they outsell desktop PCs, sure, that's easy and will probably happen within 2-3 years given the current rate of adoption. 6 months ago I wouldn't see a tablet nearly anywhere here in Las Vegas except in a store - last night I went out for a walk in downtown on Fremont Street and saw probably 15 people using tablets in various locations, and I don't mean smartphones, I mean actual 7-10" tablets of all kinds: iPads, Galaxy Tabs, a Nook Color or two, a BlackBerry PlayBook, and even one guy with an Archos 70 taking a video of the Fremont Street Experience show.

That's a pretty significant thing... and it'll just increase as time goes by. ;)
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15??? That sounds questionable. I've seen one. Ever.

Apple would say this, because their PC marketshare is effectively non-existent and they need to hype their bread and butter. Marketing to gullible people is how modern day Apple has always made their money.

Tablets are functionally useless. A laptop/netbook does everything better and costs less. Their only practical function is drawing and web-surfing, but their processors are too slow to run drawing applications practically and some can't even run flash. They may sell more units, but not until they hit the Wal-Mart bargain bins.
 
sleepeeg3 said:
Tablets are functionally useless. A laptop/netbook does everything better and costs less. Their only practical function is drawing and web-surfing, but their processors are too slow to run drawing applications practically and some can't even run flash. They may sell more units, but not until they hit the Wal-Mart bargain bins.
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Tablets are simply too diverse to discuss them in any meaningful way with the generic term "tablet". The better Windows tablets are just as functional as Windons laptops. They are more expensive than average laptops but the better Windows tablets have better hardware than your typical laptop.
 
Ya, way too many types of tablets. You have the convertible netbook tablets, the convertible laptop tablets, the Windows slate tablets (usually netbook type hardware), the smartphone tablets with no phone capabilities, and so on.

I'm surprised that Wacom hasn't built their own graphics tablet yet. Just stick a laptop into their Cintiq line.
 
heatlesssun said:
No attached keyboard or track pad but external ones work perfectly fine if needed. And netbooks can't be used easily in the environments that tablets can't. I would rather use my EP121 without a keyboard and mouse than most netbooks. It simply performs that much better even with Windows 7 Ultimate on it.
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Still has absolutely no bearing on the fact that for a wide variety of tasks and recreational uses, and in terms of value per dollar and raw performance, and ease and cost of maintenance, nothing beats a desktop. There can be no greater economic incentive than that offered by a desktop, imo.

But then again, no one with any experience might ever expect a tablet to be as flexible and as powerful as a desktop--just like no one expects a laptop to be as flexible and as powerful as a desktop. Tablets and laptops excel in exactly one area only: portability, which is the sole dynamic they are designed around. Other than portability, it is difficult for me to see the appeal of a tablet/notebook at all.

We shall see, it really all depends on execution at this point. Certainly a single device that can do it all has a GREAT deal of economic appeal.
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There doesn't exist a "single device that can do it all." Tablets and notebooks don't come close (although it strikes me that a notebook is potentially far closer to that ideal than any tablet ever will be.) A desktop comes closest to being able to "do it all," with the lone exception of portability, of course. I actually have a great deal of pity for people who's idea of "doing it all" is Internet browsing, email, Facebook, and Twitter. I think there is a large market of such people, certainly--but they were never in the general computing market, anyway. Those ~400M x86 general purpose desktop/laptop computers that will be sold this year alone will go to *other* people, for the most part, I have no doubt.

And let's not forget Windows 8 ARM devices, they'll not have any backwards compatibility with Windows x86 and be specifically for slates and tablets.
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Which will then put Microsoft on an equal footing with Apple's iOS in that regard--which is where Microsoft wants to be. In offering up Win8 for ARM, Microsoft will join Apple in further separating and segmenting the cell phone/tablet/device market from the x86 general-computing markets.

However, Apple branded PC's these days (nostalgically called "Macs") *are* fully backwards-compatible with x86, even to the degree that today's "Mac" boots Windows natively and Apple supports that functionality directly inside OS X so that even Mac users can install and run Windows in almost trouble-proof fashion...;)

... Again, it's all about execution and what the hardware can deliver and right now ALL the chip makers are working on faster and lower power chips. If they succeed, particularly Intel, Windows 8 will be the biggest hit ever to come out of Redmond.

If Windows 8 were to come out today it would flop, this OS is being targeted at next gen hardware without question.
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I think that you are mistaking the recently shown GUI for Windows 8 with support for "next-gen hardware." (I thought everyone already knew just how last-gen ARM cpu technology actually is, for instance. I guess not.) The tablet/device GUI portion of Win8 shown recently was shown in the context of a Microsoft Mango cell phone information update--the GUI shown here specifically was meant to augment Win7 phone information. The article was very careful and very clear to state that the standard Windows/7 GUI general computing interface wasn't going anywhere in Windows 8, and that the additional GUI configurations were being added to Windows as of Windows 8. And of course, full x86 compatibility will be the bedrock of Windows 8, including support for next-gen x86 devices and specifications.
 
sleepeeg3 said:
15??? That sounds questionable. I've seen one. Ever.

Apple would say this, because their PC marketshare is effectively non-existent and they need to hype their bread and butter. Marketing to gullible people is how modern day Apple has always made their money.

Tablets are functionally useless. A laptop/netbook does everything better and costs less. Their only practical function is drawing and web-surfing, but their processors are too slow to run drawing applications practically and some can't even run flash. They may sell more units, but not until they hit the Wal-Mart bargain bins.
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I did say I live in downtown Vegas, if you'd actually have read my post with some level of comprehension. We get people from all over the planet, every single day, hundreds of thousands of them, so the 15 I saw didn't just mean 15 American people using a variety of tablets, definitely not.

As for the "Tablets are functionally useless." part, that's just ignorance at work, again - people are still (and will continue to do so for a very long time to come, which I understand) looking at tablets from the wrong perspective almost entirely. Some of us have been using such devices for the better part of 2 decades now and we get it, but those folks new to this "tablet thing" will take time and that's cool.

I made a post here several years ago that soon things would change and we'd have touch-capable devices of all kinds, and I didn't mean using a stylus: I meant actual touch-capable devices that worked just with contact from our skin, and they would be very popular and grow in popularity becoming rather ubiquitous pretty fast. I had someone here at this forum basically reply to that post calling me a blind fool, an idiot that was just spewing off at the mouth, that such devices would never be of any use or interest to anyone at all, that he himself would never EVER own such a device, that "keyboard and mouse rule," that he'd never forgo his desktop PC and own a laptop, etc - certainly never a "tablet" device of any kind.

Basically, by making his post he made a complete ass of himself and became the fool.

Last week, that same person made a post in the Mobile Computing subforum in the Asus Transformer discussion thread saying he had just got himself a Transformer and loved it to death, finding all sorts of uses for it from web surfing on the go (tethered to his HTC EVO 4G smartphone) to controlling his desktop PC using some remote desktop tools and watching movies on it too instead of his huge home theater system.

My how things change... ;)

The statement "Tablets are functionally useless" is about as accurate as that entire post was, to be honest. But you'll figure it out soon enough.
 
I'm actually bullish on tablets myself....

And shockingly, its because of what Microsoft is doing with Windows 8, the new interface, and ARM processors....

I was very impressed with their tablet overlay, that ran a full classic Windows desktop underneath. That combination is fan-freaking tastic, and as long as MS keeps windows totally open to the user and doesn't lock it down iOS style, Windows 8 will be my future platform.

Holy crap, after nothing but lamenting the state of MS, especially their mobile strategy, I can't believe I'm this excited for Windows 8....

But think about it.... Future cellphones can run that WIndows 8 mobile interface, and when you go anywhere with a dock, expand into the full blown Windows environment. All running the same OS, totally mobile, absolutely consistent. I can run the same OS, with exactly all the same functions on my desktop, laptop, tablet, cellphone, refrigerator....

I know MS isn't pitching Windows 8 for the cellphone yet, but if it did, and it worked on the cell phone just as it does currently (full admin rights, ability to get windows updates on the fly, ability to tweak the system, etc), MS would have a hit on its hands.... and not just with enthusiasts....

I've completely turned away from Microsoft in recent years.... if they pull off what I'm imagining, I'll be back in Windows 2000 era (best windows EVAR!!) love with them....
 
WaltC said:
Tablets and laptops excel in exactly one area only: portability, which is the sole dynamic they are designed around. Other than portability, it is difficult for me to see the appeal of a tablet/notebook at all.
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I only see ppl buy laptops for 2 reasons nowadays. Portability and space. I mean you could get an all-in-one, but then that lacks portability.

There doesn't exist a "single device that can do it all." Tablets and notebooks don't come close (although it strikes me that a notebook is potentially far closer to that ideal than any tablet ever will be.) A desktop comes closest to being able to "do it all," with the lone exception of portability, of course. I actually have a great deal of pity for people who's idea of "doing it all" is Internet browsing, email, Facebook, and Twitter. I think there is a large market of such people, certainly--but they were never in the general computing market, anyway. Those ~400M x86 general purpose desktop/laptop computers that will be sold this year alone will go to *other* people, for the most part, I have no doubt.
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Get a gaming laptop. It'll do it all, except be cheap.

However, Apple branded PC's these days (nostalgically called "Macs") *are* fully backwards-compatible with x86, even to the degree that today's "Mac" boots Windows natively and Apple supports that functionality directly inside OS X so that even Mac users can install and run Windows in almost trouble-proof fashion...
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Ummm...Macs don't run Windows natively. It requires bootcamp just to install the damn thing. Maybe when Apple decides to upgrade their hardware more frequently, you'll see UEFI 2.x, so they could actually natively install and run Windows (only 64 bit Vista SP1 or 64 bit Win 7, nothing else). Right now Apple uses a fucked up implementation of UEFI 2.0 and EFI 1.1 mixed together.
 
Windows does run natively on Macs. It isn't emulated (only what is necessary to get the OS to boot, given the lack of a BIOS), therefore it is native. Only given a sensationally restrictive definition of the term "native" does Windows not run natively on x86 Macs.
 
Why get a tablet when you can get a netbook for half the price while doing basically everything you need if you are just an email/facebook/browsing type. Its small, has a keyboard and is much cheaper than a tablet. I still don't understand the point of tablets, keyboard>10" touchscreen.

Btw, tablets are gonna be able to do 3d work/designing better than a pc? How did this guy make it up so far, he's a complete idiot.
 
xIronCrossx said:
Why get a tablet when you can get a netbook for half the price while doing basically everything you need if you are just an email/facebook/browsing type. Its small, has a keyboard and is much cheaper than a tablet. I still don't understand the point of tablets, keyboard>10" touchscreen.
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Because some people don't want a netbook for half the price while doing basically everything you need if you are just an email/facebook/browsing type, one would believe. I'm in that group, personally, always have been.

We're not there yet (no current tablet or future one that I've seen any press or info about even comes close to my dream tablet), but someday we'll make it.
 
Joe Average said:
Because some people don't want a netbook for half the price while doing basically everything you need if you are just an email/facebook/browsing type, one would believe. I'm in that group, personally, always have been.
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Wait what? Sorry I am just not understanding what you are saying, I am partially sleep deprived so that isn't helping me either :p
 
xIronCrossx said:
Why get a tablet when you can get a netbook for half the price while doing basically everything you need if you are just an email/facebook/browsing type. Its small, has a keyboard and is much cheaper than a tablet. I still don't understand the point of tablets, keyboard>10" touchscreen.
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Try to use your netbook while lying on your back in bed, or reclining in an easy chair, or on the crapper...or while baking something new in the kitchen or with more than one person trying to watch a movie on-the-go. Those are places the tablet excels over a laptop/netbook.

Someone stole my iPad and I don't feel the need to buy a new one, but those are all the places I find myself missing it :(
 
mope54 said:
Try to use your netbook while lying on your back in bed, or reclining in an easy chair, or on the crapper...or while baking something new in the kitchen or with more than one person trying to watch a movie on-the-go. Those are places the tablet excels over a laptop/netbook.

Someone stole my iPad and I don't feel the need to buy a new one, but those are all the places I find myself missing it :(
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Sorry to hear about your iPad.:(

There are common themes that you hear from people that are negative towards tablets and one of them is the lack of value that they see in the ergonomics of tablets. They are simply usable in places that conventional keyboard clamshell devices aren't.

If this capability is of no value to you that's fine but don't kid yourself thinking that netbooks and laptops are as portable or useable in all the environments that slates and tablets are.

I've appreciated this about slates and tablets almost two decades before the iPad existed.
 
TL;DR
I think that eventually tablets will BE desktops for most people, that is you will have a dock you set your tablet in (or it may even be some form of high-bandwidth wireless like BlueTooth 5.0 or such) and it connects to a mouse/KB and monitor (and optionally other USB periferals like Printers, BD drive, etc) to create a desktop machine, then when you are heading out you simply un-dock it, and take it with you.

Untill that time, though, I dont see tablets even outpacing laptops, much less desktops. (Though I can see them overtaking netbooks, considering you usually get MORE screen and batter for LESS weight...)
 
I can essentially do what you're describing with the EP121 today very easily. Lay it in my stand, connect the power and HDMI connector, give it a second for the Bluetooth keyboard and mouse to connect and voila. It doesn't have the power to do anything heavy gaming wise but it can run quite a few at low settings and it plays a number of popular touch games like Angry Birds and Plants Vs. Zombies.
 
heatlesssun said:
I can essentially do what you're describing with the EP121 today very easily. Lay it in my stand, connect the power and HDMI connector, give it a second for the Bluetooth keyboard and mouse to connect and voila. It doesn't have the power to do anything heavy gaming wise but it can run quite a few at low settings and it plays a number of popular touch games like Angry Birds and Plants Vs. Zombies.
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yeah, I can do that with my EVO 4G, but like you said, it's not exactly a super-powered desktop... (though for basics as many people do such as email, basic web surfing, facebook, etc, it would certainly suffice)

I have no doubt we're reaching a point in technology where this will be happening more and more often - I seem to remember an ATT phone that "converted" to a laptop, so it's not much of a leap to make a similar dock to get desktop options. The corporations simply have not seen the $$$ potential yet (or on the other paw, they HAVE seen it and woudl rather sell 2 devices than one)
 
You can't honestly compare an Evo phone to Core i5 Windows 7 machine that can go to 4 GB of RAM and 120 GB of SSD, run Photoshop, Eclipse, Visual Studio, Office, and literally a million other Windows apps and have dual monitors counting the 12.1" display on the EP121 itself.
 
heatlesssun said:
You can't honestly compare an Evo phone to Core i5 Windows 7 machine that can go to 4 GB of RAM and 120 GB of SSD, run Photoshop, Eclipse, Visual Studio, Office, and literally a million other Windows apps and have dual monitors counting the 12.1" display on the EP121 itself.
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I'll be honest, I didnt look it up, I assumed since you said it was a portable, that it was either an Atom or a core2duo depending on age.

And your right, as soon as those come down in price and companies market them as "desktop-and-portable all in 1!" that is when the consumer tower will vanish.
 
netbooks are cheaper though I would rather have one. I prefer physical keyboards. specially for long typing...

tablets are best for certain things like standing up with one is easier and they look flashier.

they both have their tradeoffs.
 
phide said:
Windows does run natively on Macs. It isn't emulated (only what is necessary to get the OS to boot, given the lack of a BIOS), therefore it is native. Only given a sensationally restrictive definition of the term "native" does Windows not run natively on x86 Macs.
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If you can't even install it natively, how is it native?
 
krotch said:
Get a gaming laptop. It'll do it all, except be cheap.
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Sure, like EyeFinity, or SLI, or Crossfire, or any number of things I can think of off hand. Certainly...;) Seen lots of gaming laptops equipped like that, have you?


Ummm...Macs don't run Windows natively. It requires bootcamp just to install the damn thing. Maybe when Apple decides to upgrade their hardware more frequently, you'll see UEFI 2.x, so they could actually natively install and run Windows (only 64 bit Vista SP1 or 64 bit Win 7, nothing else). Right now Apple uses a fucked up implementation of UEFI 2.0 and EFI 1.1 mixed together.
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Don't know what you are talking about. You can buy Windows 7 off the shelf (or Vista or XP if you already have them) and take it home and install it right on your Mac without a problem--and Bootcamp provides the hassle free install--This functionality is a standard feature of OS X.

Macs do run Windows natively, begging your pardon. Why don't you tell me what's *not* straight-up Intel-x86 in today's "Mac"? The UEFI distinction you make is entirely superficial and is related to the other artificial "hooks" Apple puts in place in its UEFI code--hooks that prevent OS X from being run on a non-Apple-branded x86 box, for instance. If Apple's UEFI implementation is "fucked up" it is "fucked up" deliberately--like everything else Apple does to try and artificially tie software down to Apple-branded hardware.

Bootcamp is needed in order to allow that mess to be circumvented so that Windows can boot natively--Bootcamp is needed to dual-boot with OS X. Other than the artificial distinctions Apple deliberately writes into its custom UEFI code to restrict the use of the Mac to OS X, and tie OS X down to Apple-branded, Intel-made hardware, there is nothing about a Mac isn't straight-up Intel x86 that I can see.
 
krotch said:
If you can't even install it natively, how is it native?
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Again, the only reason you can't "install it natively" is because of the artificial barriers Apple has written into the "Mac" UEFI code (as you say, "fucked it up") to prevent Mac purchasers from simply wiping their hard drives and installing Windows from scratch, and chucking OS X out with the trash. If it would be possible to flash the Mac UEFI with a standard Intel version that overwrote and eliminated the Apple UEFI, then I imagine you *could* then simply whip out a Windows DVD and install it from scratch.

Bootcamp is required, though, if you want to keep running OS X alongside Windows. Even with Bootcamp, however, as a previous poster pointed out to you, when Windows runs on an Intel Mac it is running natively, and not under any hardware or software emulation. It seems like the "install" problems have pretty much stumped you, and you should not let that be the case.

Apple "fucks things up" by writing in all kinds of artificial "tie-down" code into its products. Years ago, long before Macs became x86 clones, the standard industry joke was that "The Mac is the dongle Apple sells you when you buy a copy of the Mac OS"....;)

So much truth to that it's just gotta' hurt. It's still true to an extent today, but the difference is that today's Mac is a 100% IBM-compatible, Intel-made x86 clone, whereas yesteryear's Mac (the real Mac) was originally physically incompatible with x86 clone hardware standards. Basically, Apple is the DRM king--I can't think of anything relating to the Apple software ecosphere today that Apple has not artificially tied down to its own hardware products in one form or another, OS X included.
 
krotch said:
If you can't even install it natively, how is it native?
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Because you can install it natively, you could easily format the HDD of a Mac, and install Win7. The driver disc happens to be your OSX install disc, but that's just to save a disc.

All Bootcamp does is allow for a dualboot option and simplify the install process for Win7 in addition to OSX.

It's not an emulation, it is natively installed OS. Just because you don't know what, and how a Mac works, doesn't mean it doesn't work that way.
 
Do you have something to back that up?
Given the use of their UEFI 1.x and custom ACPI tables, I+doubt Windows works out of the box.
 
pankkake said:
Do you have something to back that up?
Given the use of their UEFI 1.x and custom ACPI tables, I+doubt Windows works out of the box.
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Windows 7 (and Vista) 64bit support UEFI. Although that doesn't have any bearing on whether the OS is going to run natively on the computer, imo, but if it's that important to you then it should be just as easy for you to google the information as it was for me.
 
It's not the UEFI 2.0 you typically see on PC motherboards, and there is still the ACPI issue.
 
pankkake said:
It's not the UEFI 2.0 you typically see on PC motherboards, and there is still the ACPI issue.
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Wait, I want to make sure I get this right, you're complaining because Apple uses something other then UEFI 2.0, and heavens-forbid, provides you with a disk, and toolset (Bootcamp) that configures the Custom Built UEFI by Apple to allow you to Boot into a Windows Install.

You're complaining, basically, that you have to flash the freaking BIOS with a tool that APPLE PROVIDES, in order to install Win7? Have I got that right?

This is [H]ardOCP, are you're complaining about having to spend not-even-5-minutes tinkering to get something to work. And to use a tool that was specifically written to make that tinkering as idiotproof as possible so normal people (not [H]ard) can do it if they want?
Hypocrite. . .
 
WaltC said:
Sure, like EyeFinity, or SLI, or Crossfire, or any number of things I can think of off hand. Certainly...;) Seen lots of gaming laptops equipped like that, have you?
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I have. Asus and Alienware have such gaming laptops.
 
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