Gartner lowers PC sales forecast, says Apple's iPad 'redefining' computing - Page 2

Although I'm sure INXS is flattered by your reference as any publicity is good publicity, that song is actually by REM. Sorry. I was a child of the 80's.

Actually this might have been funny a year ago, but seeing what kind of apps came out for iPad, no it's not a big iPod touch. It's an iPad.

I've got so many apps that let me do so many things I needed my powerhouse to do previously, that this is a full fledged computer to me. Now, the first place I go to to get so many things done, is my iPad, and I imagine that will become even more so with the new model.

It's really funny. But I never could find a good reason to get a laptop. At first, they were too weak to do anything I needed. Then when that became no longer true, it was a question of which one. I would always look for the most powerful, the highest Rez, etc. But even though I have no problem spending whatever I need to for something, I could never find a good excuse to get one. I thought that if I wouldn't carry it almost everywhere, what was the point? And I didn't want to carry around a 4 to 7 pound slab in a case that added another pound or two, with a charger.

But I stood in line last year, May 3rd, to buy the 3G iPad, and I'm happy I did. Now, I carry this almost everywhere I go, and even with the lucky find of a case not intended for this, but perfectly sized, I hardly know I'm carrying it, from the weight.

Who needs flash, it will slowly die anyway. Blah!

If Apple give us access to free storage on the Cloud with a free MobileMe service, you would not need that PC to back up to anymore and the iPad could finally be unshackled from a second desktop/laptop computer to connect via iTunes for updates, downloads etc.

I suspect a LOT of new buyers do not realize they need to access the Apple Store through an Intel powered Mac or PC to get their iPad up and running and to back up. Breaking that chain will make the iPad a truly independent technology in it's own right.

Hey Tino, haven't seen you here for a while.

Well, what do you think about this first stab at video editing on the iPad 2? What I'd love to see is an editor that could do work on compressed files, possibly in Apple's format, and pass the info, in standard format, to their studio equipment later, the way we can do it now with FCS on a Mac Book Pro.

Actually... that was sarcasm.

My take... unless Adobe does some coding magic the competitor tabs will kill Flash once and for all.

The competitors will tout Flash to the moon only to find out that battery life is severely diminished if Flash is implemented.

Flash will then be verboten!

You are correct about iTunes. I don't think it will go away.

But like Ebergh pointed out, I wouldn't be surprised that when Steve launches its Cloud, most won't need a PC at all.

Except, like now, for example, developing iPad software, only a Mac.

And as they say, "Behind every cloud is a silver lining."

P.S. Thanks for the catch.

NO IT'S NOT! it's a mobile device but NOT a PC/Computer etc.
do not mis categorize the iPAd and what it does and how it does it.

Well, I for one, will get an iPad2 and with my iP4 and my original Intel iMac am good to go.

I doubt I will ever buy a desktop again. When my iMac dies, I will replace it with an 11" MBA.

I sold my ATV for $99 and will get the new ATV, soon. That's about all I want. The less tech I have around the better.

Best

Hey Mel, I've been in and out. I think we've mostly been posting to different threads.

I'm amazed that we can edit HD video on an iPad. Only a few years ago a PowerMac G5 was required to do any reasonable amount of HD video work. Notebooks could edit but rendering anything took forever.

Yes it will be great if the iPad could output a FCP XML file.

That's true. But as most people buying one of these already have a computer, it just isn't a big deal. And for those not having a computer yet, they can buy a used, low end notebook that has XP service pack 3, or Vista, or Win 7 for about $200-250, and use that, because they all will accept iTunes 10.2, which is needed for iOS 4.3. That's not much more than an external HDD.

In addition, downloading an OS upgrade, or one of the newer games requires almost a GB of data. You'd be crazy to want to download that over the air, even using WiFi "n". So you really need to hook up with a cable anyway.

Independence is better, but it's not as much of an improvement as some seem to think it is.

I'm with you on that. Personally I find the need to connect to a PC no problem at all - in fact the only time I really connect is when it's time for an OS update. I only really use it to consume, so I don't need to worry about regular backups. That said, it would be good if you could do away with the need to connect to a computer completely - I do think that's a logical step.

What I find incredible about this report is that if the other reports I've seen that Apple will ship >40 million iPads this year, that means they will ship >10% as many iPads as there are PC's shipped. Regardless of the "is the iPad a PC debate", that's a simply staggering number, coming from nothing a year ago.

Then you don't know what a computer is. This does the same things a more conventional computer does in its short existence. I do writing, drawing, painting, CAD, photo, and now video editing, spreadsheets, database work, and other things.

Oh, yes, it also does the media consumption that we've been relying on our "computers" for all these years.

I agree.

This is really a function of how broad the term "computer" is. Given the dictionary definition is "an electronic device designed to accept data, perform prescribed mathematical and logical operations at high speed, and display the results of these operations." most calculators are that!

The important thing for me is that I can do almost everything I used to do on my desktop with the iPad. It doesn't matter what you call it, that's pretty neat!

For now.
Remember to tag that to any statement about iPad's limitations.

For now.

I constantly find myself explaining to people that I get FAR more functionality and use out of my iPad than I do out of my 27" desktop.
There are a few very specific things that take tons of memory, or very generalized use (editing, programming, etc) that I still need a full Mac for.

But the iPad is an extension of me.
It knows where I am, how I'm moving, where I'm pointing, and can perform specific valuable tasks using that information in a way that no laptop or desktop can.
People have to get past the idea that computing is about number crunching or word processing, and understand that they are evolving to be an extension of our senses.
Generalized tools are rapidly giving way to focused, useful, functionality.

Flat out, if I now had to choose between my iPad and my desktop, I'd go with my iPad without a second thought. There would be more useful things I'd lose without my iPad than I would without a desktop.

Less we forget, the iPad has more power in it now than the big computers that controlled the early Appolo program; more power than the early mainframe computers of IBM in the 1960's-70's that occupied rooms and cryo-cooling to run. [So, they say.]

The day will come when the iPad will practically be standalone and be more powerful than they are now. This would be more than powerful for the needs of the layman -- email, simple text creation, image editing, chat and Facetime, stuff like that. Thus, it could then replace the current desktop and notebooks for many average users.

I like the truly unibody form, and with a very sturdy elegant cover for the screen. I would prefer the iPad form over the clam shell notebook -- compact and sturdy. This was what I had in mind when I first saw the original iPad.

I predict that there will be more sizes for the iPad, larger screens and more powerful ones for more professional uses. There will be more dedicated small screen forms, perhaps more akin to a larger iPod touch, more for specialized uses, e.g., credit card and transactions by the delivery people, factory foremen, roving cashiers and some other less RAM intensive functions.

To those who still think the iPad is a toy, just read more, and go outside your confines -- restaurants, car dealerships, salespeople, more innovative hospitals and research institutions. If you like art, you would find how the iPad has captured the imagination of digital artists, both young and old, as well as graphic artists, cartoonists, etc.. If you are into science and technology, biomedicine and research, engineering, the iPad would be more practical for any image visualization than the e-Readers used in laybook reading. Science and Technology including many more specialized fields like biomedicine (including pharmacy) are big in visual imaging. That the iPad and similar tablets are portable and compact make them even more suitable for the intensive interactions in these fields, even more so than in the business enterprise.

You will be amazed what people are doing with it, beyond consumptions.

It has become more than consumption, but a mode for creation, discovery and enhanced interactions. Because of its larger size possibilities, it would have more far-reaching impact than the smartphone.

One last thing, it is likely the iPad and simiar devices would not have all those USBs and connections we are accustomed with today. The trend is wireless interconnectivity and cloud computing.

CGC

Guys, guys, the answer's already been given (by SPJ himself, already):

The iPad is a mobile POST-PC.

As a few like to say around here, "there, I fixed it for you."

You can still buy a horse and buggy.
PCs aren't going away anytime soon.
And if you want even more freedom you can use Linux or even jailbreak.

Well, I for one am truly happy, that apple has no obligation to take your suggestions serious. iTunes is a great tool as it is and it gets better and better. I see it as the central hub for all my iDevices. I wouldn't want to miss it's convinience. the other thing you mentioned about iPad not being able to have direct acess to the app store must be a misunderstanding, since it works perfectly, be it WiFi or 3G. May be you should once try to get your hands on a physical iPad and see for yourself instead of regurgitating some stuff from android fan sites.

It appears your sarcasm detector is not functioning. Maybe you need more RAM.

This discussion has been very interesting, but I'm still confused. What the hell does this have to do with Charlie Sheen?

A long time. At the end of the day you still need a pc because the ipads storage is so small. Its great for films but if you want to keep a digital film collection you need 1tb not 64gb! And that would just make it to thick.

As the report says though, they still predict 10% growth which is more than inflation. Apple so far hasn't done anything to hurt pcs they've just added additional revenue streams and increased the amount people will pay for these devices.

Duh!

Really. He is wanting everybody to get over PC thinking. Or at least us, and who cares about the competitors.

But he gave them exact instructions on how to approch tablets. Forget about jamming up the interface with PC 'functionality' and make something that responds to the fingers.

And what is this neurosis over occasionally hooking the Pad up to a mothership? Such fussiness. I think it's coming from people who haven't experienced the liberation of a big-screen, no keyboard, mobile -- what's the new word? Noetic instrument?

Guess that won't fly -- somebody think of something besides computer! Or worse, personal computer, a term destined to sound like 'horseless carriage' someday, as suggested above by Johnny M.

I think that what is a PC is pretty well defined by tradition and usage -- like marriage (don't spam me).

I also think an iPad is a computer -- but a different category.

Finally, I think that the iPad will bring such things as: multitouch; intuitiveness; focused interaction; instant-on, etc. to the PC.

In the process of doing this, both the PC and the iPad will change -- the PC more than the iPad.

They will become parts of the whole that is our computing resource -- for work, play, education, health, social, entertainment.

Within 3 years, a PC without an attendant iPad will be as rare as today's PC without a keyboard and mouse.

For many users, the iPad will be sufficient to fulfill the role of computing resource.

For others, the iPad will become an integral part of their use of any PC.


iPad is used here to denote the generic multitouch tablet -- because:

1) I'm an Apple guy

2) The iPad can bring tablet capabilities/solutions to the generic PC -- better and sooner than the competition.

.

I think you nailed it!

.

Let's not be picky. Okay I am. Here's what he really said...

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles...jobs_says.html

Exactly. Only computer nerds care about "open". Everyone else whats stuff that works... and the IT industry has, by and large, failed to deliver on that.

What if all your personal info and data were stored in the cloud? Then you wouldn't need a PC right?

Netflix servers is where I store my digital film collection.

Looking at the rise in their streaming service its the same for millions of other people.

There are two ways to look at this.

In the basic definition of a computer, tablets and smart phones are computers. But they do not offer all of what we deem to come with personal computers.

At the same time tablets and smart phones are clearly the next evolution in personal computing devices. Over the next couple of years its expected that a significant number of people are going to access the internet primarily through a smart phone or tablet.

The new generic term for our proliferating, morphing device forms, even as their functions often converge, might turn out to be an elision like "' puter."

As for what that might include, I'll suggest that the main (but not only) axes of variance determining "personalness" and "computerhood" are 1. form, 2. function and 3. state of the art at the time, i.e., related to the era the device was designed and made.

PS: Could you/would you also call a PC made mostly from a malleable metal alloy, 90% tin, with the remainder consisting of copper, antimony, bismuth and lead a

"compewter"? Sorry.... I continue.....

I'll leave open the question about whether since all "computers" are "computational devices," whether it's equally true that "all computing devices are computers." Granted, it's a definitional thing. But I'd be interested in people's opinions.

Going forward, tho', clearly 1946's ENIAC and today's MB Airs are both "computers" - tho no one would call the former "personal" - and there's a lot more differentiation between them than there is between an iPad with a bluetooth keyboard and a MacBook Air - which both perform "digital computations" using hardware and software which has crossing, branching and shared hardware and software roots. iOS is a build branching from OS X after all, and there are a growing number of programs which manipulate the same types of data to the same ends like Pages, Garage Band, etc. And other iDevices perform useful and linked computing tasks as well.

Size alone doesn't determine if something is either "personal" or "mobile." Compaq got its name from a 1982 "portable computer" that weighed like 17 pounds (tho' the name is also a portmanteau derived from "Compatibility" and "Quality"). This "luggable," tho' was a hot item for the time, delivering the ability to move one's computing around, if with some effort. Even as more recently gamers were (are?) known to drag their Voodoo towers around to gaming parties. That's the relevance of the "state of the art" dimension.

The "Personal" dimension in the term PC is about usability by "normal humans" for their own defined purposes. But a dumb terminal hooked to a clever '80's-'90's network could also perform such functions, provided with the proper served programs. Is it a computer? Even in Sun's old "the network is the computer" sense? And a Google Chrome computer (my friend is a beta tester) fudges along similar directions.

Or take the new Motorola Atrix and its very PC-looking dock in terms of the "state of the art" dimension. What "device class" does that combo fall into? Separately or as a whole?

And intended or even user-added functions alone don't determine if something is a "computer" (again leaving that undefined for now), but function and binary operations might well define a "digital computing device (or DCD for my purposes)." (Adding "digital" excludes, for example, watches made with gears, even tho their internal ops result in a display of the time, and it's true that the roots of modern computing lie in gear-driven mechanisms). Nor I think does added programmability. Much of this depends on the conventions in vogue:

A modern scientific calculator, or really, a calculator from Dollar Tree does lots of digital calculations and might be somewhat programmable or upgradeable either physically or via a firmware update. It has input methods, an interface and offers visual and/or printed output. But, while it's a DCD, few people would call it a computer.

Whereas, because of how they're advertised, the read out on my car's dash that lets me know my current MPG and MPH or average MGP/MPH since I last reset them, miles to empty, etc. is called a computer by most people. Even tho' it's "just" a calculator with various sensors attached and with simple user input. And it doesn't look like "a computer" - being a dash display, two buttons on my steering wheel and a chip on a board somewhere in the car (a car which is advertised as having multiple "computers onboard.")

Is the controller console for a Predator drone - run by a single user - a computer? An XBox3 working with or without a PC?

Back to function, whether or not an iPhone or iPad is a C-word, it does do all the "computing" many people feel a need for, and its diminutive (to our age) size is mostly variance along the current state of the state of the art dimension. If a future "superminiaturized" version (with many as yet uninvented functions) can be implanted in our bodies, what will we call that?

I'll stop here, but I think a number of you could have some interesting responses....

PS: "Noetic instruments": I like that!

Ha!

When we owned the stores named: Computer Plus....

...the inside joke was to call 'em puter pus


Come to think of it...

puterpad

has a nice rhythm and sound that rolls off the tongue... I'll run it by the grandkids...

Edit: of course that naturally leads to:

puterlap, putertop; puterphone, puterpod, puterTV... and the verb: to pute...

-- posted from my puterpad

.

The term "personal computer" has never acquired a fixed definition. The only potentially useful distinction is the CPU being local and dedicated to the display device (as opposed to a dumb terminal time sharing arrangement), but even this is not the actual definition of a PC, since that arrangement was just as often called a microcomputer, back in the day when it had to be distinguished from mainframes and minicomputers. The only reason this term came into common usage to describe anything is because IBM named their microcomputer product the IBM-PC, and we know what happened then. Because of cloning, and for no other apparent reason than the resulting ubiquity the IBM-PC architecture, the term PC began to be merged with the concept of a microcomputer and to substitute for it, in the minds of many if not most. That doesn't make it correct. I'm sure many will remember when it commonly argued that the Mac is "not a PC" because it isn't IBM compatible. So arguing about what "is" or "isn't" a PC is futile, just as it always has been.

I'd forgotten that (I think?) IBM didn't say right off the bat that "PC" stood for "personal computer" (nor at first say what else it might stand for) even though the term Personal Computer had been in use for years before it came out. Good call. Of course Armonk did start calling it the IBM Personal Computer in short order.

"DVD" is another term that was kind of vague on its acronym - tho' I believe the coinage came from Digital Versatile Disc rather than Digital Video Disc.

One way the argument's not futile though, is for investors, analysts and "suits," who want to define leaders in "device categories," identify trends, market shares, ranks between companies, predict earnings, etc. So the classification game will continue ad infinitum whether it's a useful distinction in the real world of users or not. And if, for example, the feds ever started a "cash for computers" program to get people to turn in older computers for whatever reasons (power usage, poisonous components, e.g.), they'd have to define device classes.

My overall take, though, brings to mind something my Anatomy professor said way back when I was in school and someone complained about not being able to figure out where one tissue or something "ended" and became called something else.

Quote:

"Just because no one can tell you where the side of your face ends, and where the front of your face begins, doesn't mean that you don't have a side of your face and a front of your face, nor that they aren't different. "

Exactly. This is an indicator that Apple is totally focused on post-PC products, so far that means iPods, iPhones and iPads, but it won't stop there.

You have to use an adapter for the HDMI output.

HEAT UP THE TAR!!!! WHO'S GOT THE FEATHERS?!!

Ahem.

The term personal computer was in use, but so was microcomputer, to describe the same thing. If IBM's marketing department had decided to call their product the IBM-MC, we'd probably be arguing now about what is what is not an MC. It's all so arbitrary, but people do like to argue.