Future of the PC

Technical Ben · Aug 08, 2012, 00:16:25

Quote from: Steve on Aug 06, 2012, 16:34:02
I think the generation brought up on smartphones, tablets and game consoles will have little use for a desktop PC although they might stretch to a laptop for serious work.

I had a look at Ubuntu and strangely it worked near enough exactly as a Android or IOS or tablet OS. Yet, I hate not having my PC stuff at my finger tips (it's there under the layer of Linux Terminal, I just like the Windows/OSX style ease of access and toolbox settings

). What is really surprising, is, how long has Ubuntu's new GUI been out? Yet has it taken off? I don't think it has much. Andriod also only has a bit in the mini PC market. So it leaves little doubt that there is not enough demand to cut all the PC features soon. The tablets and closed garden systems will be around, but the PCs openness and customisation will still be in demand I think.

At least I hope so.

armadillo · Aug 08, 2012, 00:29:25

Quote from: zappaDPJ on Aug 07, 2012, 16:56:54
There's nothing to stop you from maintaining a 32 bit system for an eternity but I'd argue that at some point down the line it becomes easier to just bite the bullet and move to current technology. You also get the benefit of what the current technology has to offer e.g. SSDs, which may well not work on older hardware. My solution would be to maintain two systems, it's something I've done in the past on more than one occasion

I had thought about keeping two systems going and it is a distinct possibility. The bullet of converting programs I have written is too big to bite. A multi-unit program with 30000 lines of highly structured and intensely mathematical code is not somewhere I want to go again in a hurry. I wrote it in Delphi 2, with lots of underlying Pascal to do all the maths. And I have many thousands of lines of scripts written in Autohotkey.

SSDs would be no compensation for having to trawl through all that stuff again as I could spend around two years doing it!

I wonder when we will see the first major failures in SSDs. After all, CF and SD cards can fail. But the idea of a 10TB SSD bank is amusing. I guess it needs a bank full of money to buy one of those at the moment. I would still go with HDs for the roughly 6TB of external storage I currently have. But SSDs for internal OS, programs and video and photo data processing are probably already adequate and cost effective.

armadillo · Aug 08, 2012, 00:41:40

Quote from: Technical Ben on Aug 08, 2012, 00:16:25So it leaves little doubt that there is not enough demand to cut all the PC features soon. The tablets and closed garden systems will be around, but the PCs openness and customisation will still be in demand I think.

At least I hope so.

I hope so too and I hope you are right. One reason I enjoy Delphi so much is that it gives me a GUI that allows me to design a GUI application and drops down into Pascal for the mathematics. My limited brain can cope with Pascal. It can be done in Visual Studio with C++ but it is serious effort (and money) to learn that. There is also Lazarus, which works in Linux as well as Windows. But I want to avoid incessantly rewriting things I have already done, with ever more difficult-to-understand code and interfaces. The PC is a tool that does not get in the way. Familiarity means I can find my way around it and put my effort into the mathematics rather than fighting an OS or hardware interface.

I would have no objection to using a tablet to backup my photos while out on a field trip (if tablets can do that, they would be rather useful). But if I am writing 30000 lines of graphics based mathematics, I am not going to be using a tablet for it.

Lance · Aug 08, 2012, 01:04:03

I use my iPad to backup pictures from my camera when out and about for a few days or more. I can also upload from my iPad to either Dropbox or my own FTP server should I need too.

D-Dan · Aug 08, 2012, 01:25:09

Quote from: pctech on Aug 07, 2012, 21:02:56
Hmmm, think my next move will be to ReactOS or Linux.

I honestly (Linux) won't try (Linux) to influence (Linux) your decision (Linux).

you could give Linux a try.

D-Dan · Aug 08, 2012, 01:29:21

Quote from: armadillo on Aug 08, 2012, 00:41:40
I would have no objection to using a tablet to backup my photos while out on a field trip (if tablets can do that, they would be rather useful). But if I am writing 30000 lines of graphics based mathematics, I am not going to be using a tablet for it.

Use something like dropbox (or one of the alternatives) - I have mine set up to make a local copy of new files, so double redundancy built in. A copy in the cloud and a copy on my home machine. Having said that, I use dropbox so that clients can get documents to me. A local copy is a must.

armadillo · Aug 08, 2012, 09:55:00

Quote from: Lance on Aug 08, 2012, 01:04:03
I use my iPad to backup pictures from my camera when out and about for a few days or more. I can also upload from my iPad to either Dropbox or my own FTP server should I need too.

Quote from: D-Dan on Aug 08, 2012, 01:29:21
Use something like dropbox (or one of the alternatives) - I have mine set up to make a local copy of new files, so double redundancy built in. A copy in the cloud and a copy on my home machine. Having said that, I use dropbox so that clients can get documents to me. A local copy is a must.

I have only ever used laptop + DVD burner. Is dropbox via tablet or iphone a feasible method for 4GB to 8GB per day?

Steve · Aug 08, 2012, 10:54:56

I think you'd need FTTC for those sort of uploads.

Technical Ben · Aug 08, 2012, 16:37:34

Lol. Yep, I've seen DVDs get filled with just about 100 or less high res photos (that's about 40mb per image?). Not needed to pass around to friends (the ones that sent the DVD to me did not re-code the images in jpg

so it was raw from the camera lol) but it is if your doing professional stuff, as jpg artifacts can show when your zooming in etc.

armadillo, sounds like Java/web or something portable is best these days. No worries on migrating then.

armadillo · Aug 08, 2012, 23:52:18

Quote from: Steve on Aug 08, 2012, 10:54:56
I think you'd need FTTC for those sort of uploads.

Looks like I had better stick with DVDs then

armadillo · Aug 08, 2012, 23:58:26

That is right Ben. I shoot raw at 25MB per image. Came back from Cornwall with a stack of DVDs. I would probably be there for the rest of my life if I tried to upload them.

Quote from: Technical Ben on Aug 08, 2012, 16:37:34
armadillo, sounds like Java/web or something portable is best these days. No worries on migrating then.

I am a bear of little brain. Can you explain that one to me as I am not sure to what problem this is the solution or exactly what you mean

Is it my original thread subject of life of the PC or is it backing up photos?

Technical Ben · Aug 14, 2012, 22:07:29

PS, can you not risk Tiff compression?

talos · Aug 15, 2012, 07:35:25

We have a desktop, laptop, tablet and smartphone, what gets the most use ? the desktop, it's booted up first thing in the morning and is in use by someone until the evening.
I dont think any of these new innovations will ever replace it, it may evolve over time, but not disappear completely IMHO