On Sunday, 16 September 2018 at 10:25:30 UTC, Dave Jones wrote:
Because for about £300 you can get an intel NUC system with 120GB SSD, which is more powerful and more upgradeable than your £700 mobile device. And some people still want that.
For the typical person, it's more likely that they'll get a laptop and replace the whole thing at once instead of upgrading. And a new rise of convergence devices would reduce laptop ownership.
Better network connectivity and cloud-based gaming would erode another segment of powerful personal computers. That could also impact things like content editing -- Adobe Creative Cloud might actually be entirely cloud-based eventually. Which is a mild improvement in that you wouldn't need a good computer to run Premiere Pro, but a large problem for actually being able to access your data and products you've purchased. It angers both the EFF and digital archivists.
Anyway, it's at least moderately plausible that, thirty years from now, desktop computers will be considered specialized gear.
