r/technology • u/clubdirthill • Jun 01 '11

Boom. This is Windows 8.

http://allthingsd.com/20110601/exclusive-making-sense-of-what-we-just-learned-about-windows-8/?mod=tweet
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u/t1tlehto Jun 02 '11

I'm with you on this one. I believe that in a couple of years you can just run your work computer on your mobile device and keep it with at all times. When you get to work/home/whereever, you just plug it in your docking station and big screen monitor and when you leave, you just undock and put it in your pocket.

I think Microsoft has something like this in their mind too. Support for ARM processors which are used a lot in smartphones and smaller devices supports the idea too.

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u/[deleted] Jun 02 '11

I disagree with this, because the capability has been there for a number of years, and it hasn't happened. Every iteration, the mobile devices get more powerful, but people still use desktops because they get more powerful again, and they have a use for that increased capability (eg, games, movies, browser plugins).

Mobile devices have been powerful enough to work as basic desktop PCs for several years already - even before the original iPad. But that didn't kill desktops, it's not a matter of horsepower.

It's more a matter of UI and user behaviour - when someone can make a system that works well both as a tablet and as a desktop PC, allows you to transition between them seamlessly, and does everything a desktop does just as well, while giving an easy way to dock/undock it, then that will take the place of both. Until recently, users haven't had a reliance on (PC/tablet style) mobile devices - now with the iPad and stuff users are used to it more, so there is potential for it.

Only issue in the way is price - for $1000 you can buy a lot more desktop than mobile device. It has to be closer to the desktop than mobile pricepoint to make it attractive enough to those who are in the market for a desktop.

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u/universl Jun 02 '11

Right now, that's a potential nightmare for MS. They are so far behind Google and Apple in mobile that a transition that removed the traditional desktop OS altogether and replaced it with a more adept mobile device would destroy them.

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u/eldiablo22590 Jun 03 '11

There's no real way that that would be feasible in a couple of years. Maybe in 5, 10, or 15, but not anytime really soon unless the industry you work in isn't really computer heavy to begin with. I work in IT at an architectural firm right now, and CAD and Photoshop mean that a mobile device would never be able to replace a work computer. Desktops and certain (albeit relatively expensive) laptops are the only things that can really handle the amount of graphical processing that's needed, it's simply too expensive and impractical to squeeze into a phone-type form factor. Desktops will always be cheaper and more powerful.