bitflipper


You have to wonder how such predictions are made. Does someone take a ruler and extend a chart of some existing trend? By that method, you'd have confidently predicted in 1973 that by now every person on the planet would be listening to 8-tracks.

I do not own a smart phone, but my wife does. I hate her phone, but she loves it and is as attached to it as any toddler to a teddy bear. Diff'rent strokes.

For me, the promise of all the computing power you need in your shirt pocket is being oversold. Does anybody really watch football on a 3.5" screen like they show in the TV commercials?

Nothing has irritated me more than letting the movie industry dictate where monitor sizes go.  Wide and flat is horrible for doing work on.  I've been clinging on to my two nice 3x4 aspect monitors dreading the day I'll have to get one made only for widescreen movies (which I would never want to watch on a small screen anyway).  My current monitors swivel so I can use them in portrait mode too.

bitflipper


You have to wonder how such predictions are made. Does someone take a ruler and extend a chart of some existing trend? By that method, you'd have confidently predicted in 1973 that by now every person on the planet would be listening to 8-tracks.

I do not own a smart phone, but my wife does. I hate her phone, but she loves it and is as attached to it as any toddler to a teddy bear. Diff'rent strokes.

For me, the promise of all the computing power you need in your shirt pocket is being oversold. Does anybody really watch football on a 3.5" screen like they show in the TV commercials?

I like my iPad ....but I looooooooooove my DAW






The only comment I have about the whole forbes predicting the future and all that of who will own what and when is .....




When I walk into the local best buy the Desktop sections computers is smaller than it used to be 




Not that that tid bit can predict anything or means anything ....just an observation 

Oh ... And 20 years ago ahem you bought a 16 track reel to reel ....did we use it until it broke ? Or until the newest model came out the following year


The feeling I get is some people in the DAW world are saying screw it ....what I have works .... I'll wait until it dont 


Is this trending ?

I've been clinging on to my two nice 3x4 aspect monitors dreading the day I'll have to get one made only for widescreen movies

Been shopping for a CRT monitor lately? Tried calibrating a less-than-unaffordable LCD monitor for color and brightness for use in photo work? When the market moves it really doesn't give a s**t about what it leaves behind. 


Finding the perfect parts to assemble your own desktop may well become an exercise in futility before long.

I was afraid of this. I am also concerned that desktop (DAW) computing power will suffer or become much more expensive also(and more redundant). I am glad that things hae gotten as good as they have... the future is not with producers, it is with watchers/listeners (thank God for gamers or we would probably be SOL. Tablets coming on, computers falling off... get 'em while you can.

J

I think this is absolute bull. Go back in history and look at every "this is the future of technology" type article/book and it's a complete joke. I think I still have a "Future TV" book from the 70's at home, which predicts what people's homes will look like in the year 2000. Of course everyone's wearing a silver one-piece jump suit with a diagonal stripe, and all TV's have a printer built in so that mom can press a button and have the recipe printed out when she's watching her cookery shows. 

The fact is that people like to sit at desks and look at vertical screens. If I sit looking down at a tablet for any longer than 20 minutes I get a stiff neck. So people will still, by and large, have monitors like we do now for their extended computer sessions. But of course the prediction is that everything will be touch screen. Except that reaching over a desk to touch a screen is a pain in the arse when you can just move a pointer around with a mouse, with far more accuracy and finesse. 

The future popularity of tablets will be curtailed by several inescapable physical facts:

1) People prefer to look straight ahead rather than up or down
2) People prefer a little distance between eye and screen, which means text can only be so small, etc. 
3) Most everyone prefers typing on a real keyboard to a touch screen
4) Fingers are a certain size, which means all-touch software will be constrained by the necessity of having to keep icons and buttons over a certain size, which coupled with the fact that tablet screens are much smaller, means tablet software will always be limited when compared to desktop software
5) Photography is a major part of everyone's lives now. Any kind of visual/design activities are better on a larger screen


I wouldn't mind if they just said that tablets are going to become more and more popular as alternative devices. Or even that there will be a considerable number of people who ditch computers for them. But 90%....it just seems like such a ridiculous figure. Not buying it at all.

The future popularity of tablets will be curtailed by several inescapable physical facts: 1) People prefer to look straight ahead rather than up or down 2) People prefer a little distance between eye and screen, which means text can only be so small, etc.  3) Most everyone prefers typing on a real keyboard to a touch screen 4) Fingers are a certain size, which means all-touch software will be constrained by the necessity of having to keep icons and buttons over a certain size, which coupled with the fact that tablet screens are much smaller, means tablet software will always be limited when compared to desktop software 5) Photography is a major part of everyone's lives now. Any kind of visual/design activities are better on a larger screen

All very true. But can you say d o c k i n g  s t a t i o n. For most users the size of the box that holds the CPU is more or less irrelevant. A smaller box is easier to move around, take home to work late etc. Many laptop users plug in to a full size screen and keyboard at the office, but they have as little interest in the components in the box as they do in the insides of a toaster or television. And even gamers will soon have more power in an off-the-shelf laptop than they can use. Hand built computers may well become like hand built automobiles, a hobby for the dedicated enthusiast, and a collectors item for the wealthy. 

slartabartfast

Many laptop users plug in to a full size screen and keyboard at the office,  

My situation at this very second, except my laptop is driving two moitors, a 24" and a 22", but I had failed to consider a mobile device in such a docking station, given sufficient power in the mobile device (we are no where near that point yet but...), add some external disk storage and you could end up with a viable system. Roland's new Duo-Capture audio interface is iPad compatable.
 
Without the docking station I find the laptop awkward, I would hate to have to do anything much on a tablet. I cringe when I here people in my company saying it would be great to replace laptops with iPads.

I made the mistake of getting a tablet instead of a laptop.  When it's not being constantly cleaned of finger marks, it's somewhat good for reading PDF files and viewing training videos.  I've played a few games on it, but they're all far below what's available for a normal PC, and mine is destined to be a cool remote for my music manager (I'm testing this app for the programmer in Norway right now).  I might use it for a photo slide show too, except that the screen is relatively small...

craigb


I made the mistake of getting a tablet instead of a laptop.  When it's not being constantly cleaned of finger marks, it's somewhat good for reading PDF files and viewing training videos.  I've played a few games on it, but they're all far below what's available for a normal PC, and mine is destined to be a cool remote for my music manager (I'm testing this app for the programmer in Norway right now).  I might use it for a photo slide show too, except that the screen is relatively small...

come on, tablets are not meant to replace laptops. They serve different purpose in the band. Do keyboards replaces guitars for instance? no!
they complements them. Same with tablets which I have a few different sizes. They are perfect for airline travels for instance or as go to bed 
computer when you're lonely etc etc. 

Regarding article they have a point, let face it (non pan intended), most people's activities these days are within browsers.
Advanced users like programmer, designers, musicians use desktops apps in addition to browsers.  As a software architect and manager
I see this trend since few years. Less and less desktop development projects each year are approved. Common User Interface slowly becomes 
internet browser hosting different apps. You may not like the truth but service oriented architecture in cloud computing is inevitable.
To be honest personally I still prefer old fashion desktop apps.