The PC Is Not Dead; Long Live PCs
First, let me pose a question: Why don’t other industries have the same black/white me
It seems like once a year an article or blog gets posted re-igniting the debate on the future of computing devices. Because I often speak about the future of technology, the topic is of great interest to me — especially when it comes to the future of PCs.
First, let me pose a question: Why don’t other industries have the same black/white mentality?
- Mutual Funds are dead!
- The car is dead – SUV’s will take over!
- The toaster is dead!
Perhaps other mature industries, with more than 30 years of history, see changes as trends versus end results. To illustrate, yes, SUV sales have increased over the past 15 years, but is it really the end for cars? Absolutely not. Cars sales are growing and evolving geographically (China and other emerging markets), by style (coupe, sports, etc), by price point, by usage, by target market (eco friendly), and dozens of other ways.
Looking at some of the sources of the “PC is dead” mantra, it is usually a new technology that inspires the prediction:
- Internet in 1994
- Thin Clients in 1996
- Smart phone in 2002
- Virtualization in 2005
- Cloud in 2007
- Netbook in 2008
- Slate in 2010
Interestingly, if you look at thin clients, virtualization, cloud computing, netbooks and slates, all very newsworthy and loaded with mountains of hype, none of them have taken over 11% of the end user demand in business and government spending.
What makes the PC so resilient?
Interestingly, many of the original PC decisions that were made in Boca Raton, Florida in 1980 created the longevity of the platform. IBM deciding to use third parties for things like the processor, operating system, and BIOS in their first PC created a truly open, non-proprietary sand box. Other decisions like plenty of internal and external ports created a platform that would grow and evolve with the technology world around it.
No one in 1980 could predict the importance of connecting PCs together. In fact, networking didn’t become popular until years later. Things like high level gaming, multimedia, graphic arts, communication and social interaction were also significantly beyond the vision for the PC.
The PC has always been an open and configurable device, with a very low cost of entry for any organization to add value. Thus, its ability to evolve is core to its continued success.
It is the central device that you will continue to rely on as companion devices grow, such as smart phones, slates, WiFi toothbrushes, treadmills and thousands of other devices come to market.
Now, the facts:
The good news for VARs, Managed Service Providers and other hardware resellers is the growth of the PC market has rebounded very quickly from the economic downturn. In fact, NPD just reported that US Distribution and Commercial Reseller categories increase both Notebook and Desktop almost 50% year over year.
Globally, IDC reported that PC growth last quarter was over 20% with strong results across the globe. This happened to be the first quarter of sales for the Apple iPad. This was a very similar story to the rapid growth of the Netbook two years ago – very little impact on PC categories.
What does this prove?
The facts are pointing to a new reality in computing. Users are looking for companion devices where they add value, but rely on the PC as their home base. Interestingly, configuring devices for the first time, whether it is a BlackBerry or an iPad, requires a PC!
Pervasive computing is a concept where you will likely own 20 or more computer devices in the next 5 years. The PC appears to be the one central device that organizes, builds and customizes content for these other companions.
Based on the past 15 years, trying to predict the next 15 is next to impossible. Knowing that computing will continue to build ubiquity and new and exciting usage scenarios are around the corner, the PC is well positioned to adapt and thrive.
Jay McBain is director of SMB for Lenovo. Guest blog entries such as this one are contributed on a monthly basis as part of The VAR Guy’s 2010 sponsorship program. Read all of McBain’s guest blog entries here.
There’s a slight error in your IBM PC history. The IBM BIOS was IBM’s own, in fact it was the major lockout element which initially confined aftermarket mfgrs to making peripherals.
Compaq and Phoenix Technology were responsible for opening up the market to beige-box cloning. PTI did a Chinese-wall clean-room reimplementation of the IBM BIOS for Compaq (one team generated specifications based on the IBM code they saw, then tossed the specs over the wall to the coding team to follow, so nobody who coded ever saw the original IBM code), thus allowing Compaq to vend its own machines without licensing the BIOS from IBM, and that started the beige-box gold rush. IBM’s attempt to then recapture the market with the more-heavily-restricted PS/2 Microchannel family failed, as customers and vendors largely ignored it in favor of enhancements to the PC-AT architecture aka Industry Standard Architecture, ISA, and that’s when IBM lost control of that market for good.
IBM’s BIOS, as of the last time I looked, was vended under the SurePath tradename.
IBM’s design targeted the Apple II market. I imagine if you searched you could find that history.
IBM published the source to their BIOS in the manuals that anyone could buy. We still have the XT and AT sets.
As long as it runs Linux and gives me a desktop I (ME!) can control, and local storage for my data, I will buy it.
If it fails to give me that then I won’t buy it.
Jay,
You said, “No one in 1980 could predict the importance of connecting PCs together.” Hmmm… John Brunner wrote The Shockwave Rider, first published in 1975. It is notable for its hero’s use of computer cracking skills, and for the coining of the word “worm” to describe a program that propagates itself through a computer network.
A little more research, maybe?
Crb3 and Carl: Good catch on the BIOS…I was trying to make the point that it was “open” (at least to IBM standards in 1981!). Here is a piece from Wikipedia:
“They also decided on an open architecture, so that other manufacturers could produce and sell peripheral components and compatible software without purchasing licenses. IBM also sold an IBM PC Technical Reference Manual which included complete circuit schematics, a listing of the ROM BIOS source code, and other engineering and programming information.”
Djohnston: I should have clarified – no one at IBM. Networks had been around for decades at IBM but they felt this was a “toy” and the sales projections were woefully low. It has been well documented that IBM didn’t take it seriously until it threatened the big iron.