back to article US shoppers abandon PC makers in hour of need

America’s PC market sneezed in Q4 calendar and the rest of the world caught a cold: global sales declined in the final three months of last year, stats from Gartner indicated – although rival IDC did not concur. Shipments into the channel – retailers and tech distributors – dropped 2 per cent year-on-year to 71.6 million, …

  1. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

    to be expected

    In other news , sales of VHS tapes declined for the 20th straight year

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: to be expected

      See, that's why I use betamax.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: to be expected

      As long as Microsoft push the metro interface, and UWP apps and a subscription model, consumers will not support buying into the new "Windows". Forced updates, sneaky telemetary sent back to Microsoft, and unexpected blue screens. No one wants to be at Microsoft's mercy.

      Dear Microsoft, My PC is MINE to do with what I want, not a tool of yours to extract money and intelligence from!

      A reboot of Windows 7 is what is needed to boost PC sales.

      1. P. Lee

        Re: to be expected

        US software companies abandoned consumers in an effort to push them into their clouds.

        They had little use for new hardware.

      2. Andronnicus Block

        Re: to be expected

        Did anybody else notice that in the run-up to Christmas and the New Year that all the big PC sellers here in the UK had their usual full page ads in the press but none of them mentioned Windows 10 in their spiel?

        Not so long ago the Windows OS would have been plastered all over the advert in huge print as a big selling point but, for some reason, the likes of PC World, Currys (one and the same) and John Lewis all had almost no mention of the OS that came with their new PCs other than in the tiny print at the bottom of the advert even though you could tell from the screen-shots that it was Windows 10.

        There was one full page advert - can't remember which company - that didn't even show the laptop screens - just shots taken from the back of the laptop looking at the back of the screen.

        Is Windows now becoming toxic as a consumer brand following all the highly publicised criticism of the Win10 up(down)grade programme over the last year or so?

      3. bladerunnerblues@gmail.com

        Re: to be expected

        People outside of IT neither know nor care about any of those things. PC sales are declining because people don't need PCs. The vast majority just need a Facebook machine with email and a search engine. Tablets and phones fit that bill nicely.

        The other reason is that PCs aren't obsolete after a year. A 5-yo machine is still perfectly good, if it was a good machine to begin with. I'll not be buying machines for work in the foreseeable future.

  2. Charles 9

    Market Saturation

    This should be a warning sign that the PC market in North America is approaching saturation. Most everyone that needs a PC has one with enough oomph to get them through nigh anything they encounter on a daily basis. And thanks to cloud computing, there's less need for spare capacity that rarely gets used. Plus PC computing power is plateauing, showing signs of Diminishing Returns, further convincing owners not to upgrade. It happens to most markets eventually. The smartphone market is slowing down as well so it's not isolated.

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Re: Market Saturation

      Saturation was reached years ago (probably when notebooks overtook desktop sales), the market is now in retreat.

      1. SuccessCase

        Re: Market Saturation

        Though there will be a bump later in the year when everyone replaces their PCs again after Intel, ARM licencees and AMD have released *SECURE* (we hope) CPUs.

        1. JimmyPage Silver badge
          FAIL

          Re: everyone replaces their PCs

          you reckon ?

          I think we'll see a surge in landfilled PCs, and no replacements bought.

          In other news, my 8 year old Cyclone media player gave up the ghost recently. Rather than splashing out on a replacement, I got off my arse, spent 15 minutes setting up casting on my Android Tablet, and carried on regardless.

          (I could have done that 3 years ago, but the media player remote was always by the sofa).

          1. Tikimon
            Devil

            Re: everyone replaces their PCs

            "I think we'll see a surge in landfilled PCs, and no replacements bought."

            Jeebus, will everyone please stop smugly predicting the utter and final death of the desktop PC? And the fax machine? And the other Old Skull Tech that persist in having a useful purpose in the world?

            For us business types trying to get some work done, a good desktop and a couple of big monitors are pretty much required. Keyboards are faster than swiping or talking at a machine, mice and sticks are more accurate for selecting and placing items. I have four big tablets worth of screen real-estate for multiple programs and documents. Tablets and phones are not serious work machines.

            So why slowing PC sales? I blame Windows 10. Why buy a marginally faster PC if you have to trade Win 7 for "Windows As A Spyware Service"? If the Old Box works well enough, no need to replace it.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              A PC is also no longer a precious gift. Do you get a new washing machine as a gift for your beloved one? PC are now simple tools, no longer appealing fashionable showoff devices.

              But in some niche nerd circles, you no longer show off with a new PC. You show off with the latest bling phone, or some new IoT gadget.

              So PCs are bought when you need them to study or work, maybe waiting for some sale if you have to save some money. And you'll spend those saved money in gifts from the latest bling technology.

              1. Charles 9

                Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                "So PCs are bought when you need them to study or work, maybe waiting for some sale if you have to save some money. And you'll spend those saved money in gifts from the latest bling technology."

                Plus like I said PC power is plateauing. Case in point; there are so many capable secondhand PCs on the market these days there's little need to buy new ones. After I built a white-box PC 10 years ago (I actually still have it), all the other machines I've acquired since then have been secondhand. When you can get a Core i5 with monitor, keyboard, and mouse for only $130 used, and you can upgrade the bits you need upgrading, why buy new? And even many of the subpar ones make capable media players with just a few cheap additions.

                1. Loud Speaker

                  Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                  Ten year old screens can to 1280x768*, just like the new ones, and the 10 year old cases are a lot more robust than most of the modern junk. I can see why people are not in a rush to upgrade.

                  * or you can get a netbook with an 800x600 screen from PC world if you are really desperate.

            2. phuzz Silver badge

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              Wait, are you still using a fax machine?

              1. JimmyPage Silver badge
                Stop

                re: Wait, are you still using a fax machine?

                Whilst it does sound incredible, I'm afraid brain dead one-size-fits-all IT security is probably the fax salesmans best friend (and has been for a while). The most common use for a fax machine I know of is to bypass attachment-stripping email filters.

              2. Bill M

                Fax Machine ?

                I honestly cannot remember when I last saw I fax machine, but I think I remember what they looked like and would recognise one.

              3. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                People won't replace PCs over Intel bugs

                It isn't something to be overly concerned about versus the tons of holes that are found every year - the tons more that exist but aren't publicly known yet or have yet to be discovered at all.

                I imagine this is what Gartner and IDC are telling their clients, because they always say "good times are around the corner" and predict rising PC sales, but if they are falling even when world economy is doing quite well and Windows 7's retirement date is rapidly approaching Meltdown/Spectre isn't going to move the needle.

                It may result in enterprises and cloud providers replacing servers more quickly, since hit on VMs is far larger than the single digit performance penalties Intel is claiming. So I'd look for server sales to bump because of it.

              4. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                Faxes are still used in real estate by older agents who shun PDFs and e-signing. Nobody wants to lose a deal by telling them to get with the times, so you just put up with them. That's why my spouse has a multifunction printer set to fax mode connected to our landline.

              5. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                If you are an hourly paid contract worker (what they call the gig economy - probably because it is well short of a giggle) you probably still have to fax in your time sheets. May be not in the IT industry, but a lot of people still do it.

                My local pharmacy faxes my repeat prescription requests to the doctor's surgery, who fax back the necessary forms. They not only both have PCs and the internet (probably Windows XP, but I don't actually know) but the fax machine is actually an all-in-one connected to the PC at both ends. For some reason, it is widely believed to be more secure to use a fax. Obviously, the medical profession does not employ any black hats, so there is no one to explain to them the error of their ways, and I have better things to do than describe various world famous fax-based scams (and I would not want to say anything that might incriminate myself).

            3. JimmyPage Silver badge
              Mushroom

              Re: "utter and final death"

              who predicted that ? Not I.

              I have absolutely no hesitation in believing that "the PC" will be with us for a long time. In fact, truth be told, I will probably be in the market for one soon, as the heart of my hobby home-music system.

              However the glory days, when world+dog needed one have passed us by. In fact they probably passed us by 10 years ago (which is when I started calling the PC sales slowdown from a strategy POV).

              I guess there were probably similar misunderstandings when solid-state electronics became commonplace. People were bewailing the "utter and final death" of thermionic valves. Wrongly. Even in 2018 there are applications that call for valves, factories that make them, and people who can design them into circuits.

            4. big_D Silver badge

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              @Tikimon I agree with you, apart from the last paragraph. If you thing Windows 10 is WAASS, I assume you aren't using an Android or iOS device for your mobile communications...

              When properly configured, Windows 10 doesn't leak any more information than Windows 7, what it "leaks" is what you let it, for the most part. You want Cortana? It has to send additional information to the cloud to work, like an assistant. If you don't want Cortana, you disable it and that information isn't sent out. The same goes for many other services.

              In fact, there controls in the latest version of Windows 10 are even more controllable than under Windows 7. You can allow / disallow specific applications access to the camera, microphone, location services etc. Something which older Windows couldn't do - that said it still doesn't stop me putting tape over the camera lens! Better safe than sorry.

              I have used Windows 10 for a while now and I wouldn't want to go back to Windows 7 now, there are too many benefits, even if I have to take a couple of minutes when setting up a new machine / account to ensure that information leakage is set to the level I want to accept.

              1. Tim Seventh

                Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                @ big_D

                I didn't downvote you, but here's the thing.

                @Tikimon ... I assume you aren't using an Android or iOS device for your mobile communications

                Just because one does it, doesn't mean it excuse the others from doing. Also since windows did not have those 'features' before Windows 10 comparing to mobile devices which had it from the start, the users will see a bigger differences.

                When properly configured, Windows 10 doesn't leak any more information than Windows 7

                Well yes until you update it. Which from a number of people, it resets some/all your settings while adding new settings, making you redo every configuration. Unless you hope someone out there script it for you, you'll have to manually configure/ script the settings for every new update. Microsoft did this on purpose (they are effectively a reinstall/update which is easier on them when without the QA), and the power users / admins are getting sick of it.

                In fact, there controls in the latest version of Windows 10 are even more controllable than under Windows 7. You can allow / disallow specific applications access

                APPS, allow / disallow specific APPS. This doesn't work with 'programs' because they're not sandboxed. Consider plenty of users still use only 'programs' and not apps (which also not available on Windows 7), you'll still need the tape.

                1. HamsterNet

                  Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                  There is these newfangled Firewalls thingies, in which you can block IP ranges, sites and software from talking to the web. Once you master them, windows can easily be totally blocked from chatting back to MS, with or without updates. Turns out MS include such a firewall in Windows 10 and folks have written scripts for PowerShell that add in all the blocks you need.

                  Thus MS collecting your data, like Google, Apple, Amazon etc, is completely optional for anybody with a scrap of IT knowledge.

                  Worryingly MS base now their decisions off just idiots without any IT knowledge.

                  1. Anonymous Coward
                    Anonymous Coward

                    Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                    "There is these newfangled Firewalls thingies, in which you can block IP ranges, sites and software from talking to the web."

                    Except many of the IPs either keep changing or are dual-purpose. Block them and you also block the security updates that keep you from getting pwned. This is ALSO intentional on Microsoft's part to put you in a dilemma. And since all the telemetry and security updates occur over encrypted connection, deep packet inspection isn't an option.

                    1. big_D Silver badge

                      Re: everyone replaces their PCs

                      @AC re: Firewalls and blocking IPs.

                      Modern firewalls block traffic inteligently, based on more than IP address - all port, traffic type or traffic patterns. Some actually work on an "application" basis, so you can block the site for browsing for normal workers, but allow updates to be downloaded.

                      You can also block based on source (internal) IP as well, so your provisioning servers can pull down the updates and then push them out to the internal PCs. The endpoints don't need any access to the Internet for patching their OS or applications. Heck, you then even set up test groups to ensure the patches don't cause any problems, before rolling them out to the entire organisation.

            5. Elsmarc

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              "For us business types trying to get some work done, a good desktop and a couple of big monitors are pretty much required."

              But there are so few of you who "need" that these days.

            6. OldSoCalCoder

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              Thank you! 'For us business types trying to get some work done...' The problem is the world is bending towards doing everything on a tiny screen that you carry in your pocket (well, not really - does anyone carry an iPhone+ in a pocket? Don't you need a manpurse for one of those?). More and more websites are being designed primarily for the mobile browser. If you're using a regular pc to look at these sites you're s.o.l., you dinosaur.

              I actually have work to do, and need a full screen and enough compute power to get the job done. The last thing in the world I want to do is scroll an excel spreadsheet on my phone. I use command line scripts to offload data from SQL databases and run the results on my work pc. I have a job to do, not tweets to send or cat pictures to forward.

              All the companies out there from big banks to journalistic websites (thankfully not El Reg) see that 80% of their traffic is coming from smartphones so they change their design to accommodate, leaving the full screen format to rot. It's sad, it's 'progress' and it will only get worse.

          2. big_D Silver badge

            Re: everyone replaces their PCs

            @JimmyPage

            I don't see them not being replaced, at least not in most businesses. At my previous employer, the CAD and ERP employees were all working on PCs or workstations with at least twin 24" monitors. At my current employer, the programmers have a similar setup.

            You can't really replace multiple large screen setups with a tablet.

            1. JimmyPage Silver badge
              Mushroom

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              Sorry to sound snippy but where did I say business aren't replacing their PCs ? I even replied to myself to point out that there will ALWAYS be some use for PCs.

              I know this is just a knockabout forum, but if it's a microcosm of the comprehension skills in the real world, no wonder things are going the wrong way.

            2. Loud Speaker

              Re: everyone replaces their PCs

              You can't really replace multiple large screen setups with a tablet.

              Well may be you can't and I can't, but PHBs and MBAs are quite capable of it. That is how they justify those huge bonuses.

        2. Daedalus

          Re: Market Saturation

          People won't be replacing PC's because they don't have them. They have internet browsers and e-mail readers and movie streamers. We think of those things as PC's but they don't. Some even call their PC "The Internet". So when that box goes pfftz they're going to buy a different but cheaper Internet, maybe what we would call a phablet.

          Selling people PC's was a giant con, a way of making PC's cheaper by broadening the market to people who normally wouldn't think of touching a "computer". Even in cubicle land the all-purpose PC is being replaced by virtualized machines that, for the moment, happen to be accessed from PC's, but soon won't. I hated the idea of "thin clients" back in the day, but now they are the main defense against what bozos can do to the networks we all depend on.

        3. Charlie Clark Silver badge
          Thumb Down

          Re: Market Saturation

          Though there will be a bump later in the year when everyone replaces their PCs again after Intel

          Why should be people pay to replace what was broken by design?

        4. big_D Silver badge

          Re: Market Saturation

          The problem is, just because the old PCs are now insecure doesn't mean there is automatically budget available to replace them with new kit. If a company has just rolled out a bunch of new PCs in the last quarter, they aren't going to be replaced immediately, they will have to struggle on for another couple of years at least, even if they are a little slower than expected.

          Older PCs that were already nearing the end of their lifecycles (2010 - 2013 range), I can see them being replaced sooner, especially if the reported slowdowns are as bad as the press are saying... But in typical companies, where the internal IT infrastructure has a lower priority than the cleaning crew, I don't see extra money being made available for new PCs, when the old one still "work".

    2. fobobob

      Re: Market Saturation

      I subsisted on multiple PIII 800/1GHz desktop machines from ~2003-2012 (and a couple athlon XPs somewhere in the middle; I killed one, my cat killed the other.. both overclocking 'incidents') , and a C2D laptop from 2008-2013. I've been on SB/IB equipment since then. and I'm one of those who sees no pressing need to upgrade, as I don't do anything that scales efficiently beyond 4 cores. I'll probably rebuild this year, as the power efficiency gains have been significant in the mean time, and AMD is back in the running.

      1. Colin Ritchie
        Windows

        Re: Market Saturation

        I do hope you don't let the cat overclock this build for you.

    3. big_D Silver badge

      Re: Market Saturation

      Most people have PCs that are powerful enough for their needs.

      My old 2010 Sony Vaio Core i7 got an SSD last year and went to my wife, it is fast enough for her needs. My 2015 HP Spectre x360 is more than fast enough currently for portable needs.

      I did replace my 2008 Core2Quad Q6600 with a Ryzen 7 from Memory PC just before Christmas, because I wanted to experiment with Hyper-V.

      At work, we rolled out over 20 new PCs in 2017 (company with 150 employees) at my last employer and this year, at my new employer, we have already rolled out 4 new PCs (2 ThinkPads and 2 Intel NUCs).

      Some of those were PCs reaching the end of their useful lifecycle (5 - 8 year old PCs being replaced) or for new employees starting at the company. And that is the problem today, when the PCs don't stop working, they are often "good enough" for at least 5 years of use, whereas in the past, you really needed a new PC every couple of years.

    4. OldSoCalCoder

      Re: Market Saturation

      If you do all your web surfing/emailing on your smartphone you're not even booting up your Win XP, Win 7+ pc. Why would a consumer need to buy a new pc? Death of the pc was because of the smartphone for millions of home users. The business market just can't fill the demand gap.

  3. Charlie Clark Silver badge

    Cue Gardner / IDC report of groth in 3-2-1?

    NFT

  4. DNTP

    SaVaGe MiLLeNnIaLs TeRRoRiZe InnOcEnT PC InDuStRy

    Harmless desktops brutally ripped apart and rebuilt into soulless patchwork monsters with no OEM operating system! (in other words, anyone who knows the most basic PC building can get a desktop for free just by salvaging off the market saturation. But it's funnier to blame millennials for not going into more credit card debt to spend 3,000$ on a desktop that does nothing they couldn't do on a smartphone.)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "desktop that does nothing they couldn't do on a smartphone"

      Just because they do next to nothing useful on their smartphones.

  5. 0laf
    Boffin

    The need for most people is gone or going. The PC was the gate to the printer but now QR tickets on phone are now being widely accepted so you don't need the printer and if you don't need the printer you don't need the PC wired to it.

    A PC on/under a desk with a big monitor and a full sized keyboard is still the best device to do work on. But for a lot of people they're not doing heavy number crunching 'work' they're doing a bit of typing and devices are coming which will allow them to use the big screen and keyboard without the big box.

    Continuum could have been a winner there if MS wasn't so fucking awful at being innovative as opposed to selling licenses for slightly updated version of the same shit for the last 20yr.

    Gamers will still like a big box, tinkerers like me will still like a big box, but we're a shrinking minority.

  6. G R Goslin

    Rejoice!

    I'd have thought that, on the whole, the US would have rejoiced at the fall. Think of all those imports that no longer have to be matched with exports.

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Re: Rejoice!

      Except that items with the highest margins on the BoM of a PC include the Intel chip and the MS Windows licence which never leave the country…

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: PC include the Intel chip and the MS Windows licence

        Err.... In the past I have bought a new Laptop on trips to the USA. A few states have no Sales Tax and with PC makers using $1==£1 it makes sense to get one over there and bring it home. Even if HMRC stop you it ends up being cheaper than buying it here.

        Many of us in IT get used to different Keyboard layouts so using a US one isn't that difficult.

        Hate to say it, Mac's give you bigger savings over the UK price.

      2. joed

        Re: Rejoice!

        I believe most of Intel chips leaves the country for cutting, testing and packaging. Not the glorious part of the process (and likely not the most profitable) but necessary non the less.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Upgrading is cheaper

    I usually replace my desktop pc about every 5 years usually when it starts slowing down so much it frustrates me and I decide its time to get a new version of windows and a cheap office bundle deal.

    About 6 months it was time to upgrade but I decided to swap my dual raid hard drives for dual raid SSD drives. Needless to say the performance is amazing so I for one won't be purchasing a new desktop for a while, if it goes bang I'm sure I can pick up parts if not a replacement identical unit on a well known auction site for peanuts.

  8. a_yank_lurker

    Unexpected

    When one's options were a PC/laptop that is what people bought. Also, in many regions the market is mature meaning most sales of PCs are replacements. With the other devices being available and doing the job most people need, there will be declining demand for a PCs for awhile. Eventually the drop will flatten out.

    One point these 'analysts' seem to always miss is most families do not need that many PCs and many have more than they need squirreled away gathering dust. Businesses will need only issue one box to an employee at a time.

  9. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Windows

    “US consumer confidence is high…"

    I repeat. "US consumer confidence IS high"

    But I wonder how come they are so "confident"....

    Do they all have un-cashed-in bitcoins?

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Re: “US consumer confidence is high…"

      QE has finally "done its job" and pushed equities high enough for the wealth effect to kick in. The wealth effect does, of course, encourage people to borrow more money something that the US consumers seem to love doing anyway: household debt is starting to grow but it will be masked by the apparent value of the assets such as houses. Remember that walking away from a mortgage in the US has little real consequence for either debtor (bankruptcy imposes no limits) or lender (the mortgage is sold on before the ink is dry).

      1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

        Re: “US consumer confidence is high…"

        So, everybody is really pennyless but the fake numbers make up for it. Pension schemes ain't gonna pay out.

        2007, more powerful, when?

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Let them burn....

    The usual suspects / PC makers... Let them burn... Bloatware / Crapware / Spyware? No thanks! predominantly / exclusively Windows-10 solely? - No thanks! Who wants to pay to have all your activity logged and slurped and sold on by Microsoft.. Plus Win10 Ads and Nags... And forced updates / guinea-pigs for M$ corporate customers.. Fuck that! ... But how about Win7 / Linux? Yes please, but hard to find...

  11. steward
    FAIL

    With all the "cost-saving advances" in tech...

    somehow the price of PCs stays in the stratosphere - or beyond.

    PCs are simply too expensive for what people get. I found some good sales in 2015 and picked up a good Lenovo all-in-one with touchscreen and keyboard for about $400. I haven't seen anything close to that since then. HP and Dell are totally ridiculous with their retail pricing for the consumer market.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "PCs are simply too expensive for what people get."

      Sure, while a $900 phone is cheap, for what you get, right?

  12. PhilipN Silver badge

    Dazed and confused

    'Course CONSUMER sales of PC's are down. Welcome to 2018 : Why would Auntie want to fire up a box next to and the size of a microwave to check her recipe for [black]/[bread] pudding? Why would Grannie want to struggle with a box next to and the size of a dishwasher to email little Johnnie and Joanie? All done on a phone, not even, or seldom, on a notebook.

    What would be a lot more interesting and relevant is sales to companies.

    Come to think of it what would be even more interesting is, given the ubiquity and multi-functional abilities of the desktop PC, how as a direct result the labour market for a given GDP has shrunk in 20 years.

    I am going to stick my neck out here and say that 5 low- to medium-level jobs of a routine or clerical nature of 20 or 25 years ago should now be capable of being done by one person (trained, natch) and a desktop.

    And even (it's OK I am going to stop soon) whole departments in larger companies such as internal mail delivery ought to have been mothballed by now.

    1. Tim Seventh
      Coat

      Re: Dazed and confused

      "Why would Auntie want to fire up a box next to and the size of a microwave to check her recipe for [black]/[bread] pudding?"

      Because she's cooking black box pudding.

      "Why would Grannie want to struggle with a box next to and the size of a dishwasher to email little Johnnie and Joanie?"

      Because a box was in the way.

      I'll walk myself out with my box.

  13. David Roberts

    Still a huge market

    Nobody should expect sales of anything (apart from baked beans and bog roll) to just keep on climbing year on year.

    Each year products seem to be a little better made and longer lived. Examples include clothes and motor cars as well as computers.

    This doesn't mean that in the near future there will be no market for new clothes, motor cars and computers. Just that corporates may not be able to deliver year on year growth.

    You will know when things are starting to get tough when they introduce major scrappage schemes for PC hardware (not counting OS upgrades and bloating which have driven some of the replacement cycle in the last few years).

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    PCs are now akin to a water heater, refrigerator or toaster.

    A household appliance. Only the most hardcore gamers would upgrade constantly to the latest and greatest hardware. A mid-range machine one generation back is more than capable of playing most of the games out there.

    It also doesn't help that Windows 10, preinstalled on all new PCs, is a 'work-in-progress-as-a-service' schizophrenic turd, and for generic web browsing and media consumption, the smartphone is more than competent.

  15. Kevin McMurtrie Silver badge

    Why upgrade?

    I think desktop computers are vastly overpowered for their current surroundings. There's just no use for the extra power except for certain games. If desktop computer makers want to ramp up sales, they need to make some changes in the market.

    1) Put an end to the idea that somebody else is the "cloud." Apple, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, and Amazon are holding back technology for their own benefit, trying to convince us to view the world through a web browser. Build consumer-friendly cloud software into every single computer - mail server, file sharing, web sharing, video conferencing, social interaction, etc.

    2) Make IPv6 setup easier. Come on, it's time to standardize terminology so configuration is no longer a nightmare.

    2) Fight telcos that block peer-to-peer communications. Install awesome cloud software and give it consumer-friendly diagnostics that can point a finger exactly at the place where communications is being blocked.

    3) Move away from x86, MacOS, Windows, and Linux. They are archaic and too complex to maintain any longer. Let them die. Collaborate on creating open source virtual machines that can evolve independently of hardware and the low-level drivers. (Apple is doing this already but I don't think they have it right yet.)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Why upgrade?

      "Build consumer-friendly cloud software into every single computer"

      No thanks, that's a sure fire way to make sure I *don't* buy one.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    We struggle to give away laptops only a 5 years old. When we changed 350 devices from Windows 7 laptops to iPads we wiped the old laptops to factory and offered them to staff for free. We managed to give away about 30. These are not slow devices, so if we struggle to give them away people are not going to be rushing out to buy them.

    Even at home i am swimming in laptops, 2 MacBook Airs, 1 MacBook Pro, 1 Mac Mini, 2 Windows netbooks and 5 Windows laptops. I will not bin what still works, but saturation is an understatement.

  17. Greywolf40

    Yawn - space-filler news here

    The "consumer users" that I know prefer portables. Sure, many families may still have one box, but everyone has at least one device, which they use most of the time. For 'serious" work, a laptop is more convenient than a box. The ad-flyers push the "laptop PC", just to drive the point home.

    So, what's the important news here?

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    BUgged intel

    now that every Chip that intel makes for the next 2 years is a securitys risk whom is going to buy them.

    Meltdown and spectre are efectable huge holes in every PC and now every intel system neeedsa WARNING atttached to it saying This system is not safe for any use. it will take 2+ years before they can design a chip without this bug.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like