Posted on 12/19/2006 8:18:44 PM PST by jdm
We all know that notebooks are quickly overtaking PCs in terms of deployed numbers, but just how fast are people adopting them? With a significant rise in notebook sales this year, some are putting the notebook to PC ratio figure at over two thirds when it comes to sales:
About 65 percent of all PCs sold at the stores surveyed by Current Analysis--Best Buy, Radio Shack, Circuit City, CompUSA and Staples--were notebooks, said Sam Bhavnani, an analyst with the firm. Last year, the mix was about half and half between notebooks and desktops.
What does this mean for the future of desktops? While there are still many very clear advantages they have in terms of price vs performance and how far you can push them, today's laptops are simply proving to be more what people want.
FYI
I hate not having a real number pad. It would be cool to sit at the Mcdonalds with wifi and do more work on my lunchbreak, though.
Yep, lots of folks doing that nowadays. I only have a desktop, myself.
My sister, who was always a booknerd, hated computers when we were growing up. She has a real slick setup, and knows way more about computers than I do now.
My dad started his computer business in 1966, and i used to build PC's for him for $40 a pop in our garage. I coulda been richer than that Dell guy if I had stuck with it.
I really like my laptop. I have a wireless modem and local wireless. But with airport security how much hassle is it to get a laptop on a flight as carry on? I visting my sister for christmas and really would like my own computer with me.
I have one of each. An old laptop and a new desktop that I built myself. Dual processors, 2 gig Ram, 2 19" monitors for online trading. Probably going to get another 2 monitors too.
Will probably buy a new better laptop for travel and surfing in bed.
2 Desktops and 8 laptops here...
I had an old one right after the ex moved out with our new one. My dad gave me a POS cobbled together machine, but at least it was a lifeline. Yes, the little odd shaped keyboards are a nuisance.
It's not that much of a hassle to take your laptop.
At security, you take it out of it's carry on bag (I take mine in a backpack made for laptops), put it in one of those plastic trays with your shoes, pants, underwear, guns and ammo ( just kidding) go through the metal detector, bend over (just kidding again) and you should be OK. Millions of people take their laptops with them on planes.
Own both. Spend most of my time on a desktop.
No lie. Today a colleague offered to give "My 14 y/o Son the Tech-head" all of his old desktop PC parts including a high-end 19" CRT monitor.
Christmas came early this year!
You talk about an excited 14 y/o boy!
"My dad started his computer business in 1966..."
What was he selling in 1966? Just curious.
did data processing, payroll, etc. Big ole computer with the reel to reel and punch card machines that could do less than my calculator. later specialized in accounting systems for sand & gravel operations and concrete/asphalt batch plants.
Ah, those were the days. :')
When I was in college I had to take what they then considered computer training -- terminals attached to the invisible mainframe or mini somewhere in the building. After following the step by step directions and finally getting the needed sample printout (to prove I'd done what I was supposed to), I watched the comp lab tech start up a text version of a Star Trek game. :'D
Microcomputers were around of course, by then, but cost 2 to 3 $thousand. Calculators with trig functions were around by the time I was in high school, and cost upwards of $100. My oldest sister (by contrast) still had to learn to do stuff on a slide rule, just five or so years earlier.
You are around 40, I take it?
Closer to 50. It still boggles to contemplate the stuff that has become commonplace since I was, say, twelve years old.
I'm just old enough to remember the transition to color TV; VCRs are close to outmoded now, given the rise in digital recording, but I only knew one family which had one back when I was in high school. I remember reading (in InfoWorld, circa 1985) about the committee hammering out TCP/IP, and using Tymnet and Telenet to Telnet to BBS systems. I had a friend who paid for PC Pursuit.
Before the web, I'd belonged to a couple of online services which had local dialup access and multiple users online. The kids who will graduate from high school in the spring were born when I was still doing that. :')
In the early 1990s the dialup services started offering Lynx interface to the Internet, and best of all, email anyone could get to, provided they had some mail account somewhere which was Internet-worthy. Multi-line BBSes started to be the only game in town as the one liner local BBSes (dozens and dozens of them) got their plugs pulled. In the early to mid-90s there were BBS systems in town who offered internet gateways; John Dvorak loved his MCI Mail.
Yeah, things have changed. ;')
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