

Why the laptop will become endangered tomorrow - superamit
http://superamit.tumblr.com/post/492401109/im-calling-it-now-the-laptop-starts-dying

======
jackowayed
I don't buy it. Many people do real work with a laptop as their only computer.
They code, they word process, they process obscene amount of email, whatever.
No one used point-and-shoots for real work. No reporters, professional
photographers, etc. used point-and-shoots, save maybe in very weird
circumstances.

The laptop isn't really a lesser desktop. It can do anything a desktop can do,
but with slightly worse performance.

It won't be until the iPad's input device is just about as good as a physical
keyboard and you can code and word process effectively that it will be viable,
and I think that's a long, long way off.

Laptops fit much better into many people's lives than desktops as a primary
computer, including power users. And a power user's primary computer can't
just be good enough in most situations.

Most importantly, there's a lot more power users of computers than there are
of cameras, and that number is growing quickly. It won't just be a tiny niche
of hackers that aren't ok with being physical-keyboardless whenever they're on
the go.

~~~
devindra
Honestly, it seems like the desktop is more in danger of dying these days.
Laptops have been far more compelling to average users for some time,
especially with the rise of netbooks, and the increasing proliferation of
cheap full-sized laptops. It's hard to even recommend desktops to users unless
they're heavy gamers or dealing with hardcore media editing.

~~~
jamii
> It's hard to even recommend desktops to users unless they're heavy gamers or
> dealing with hardcore media editing.

Even for gaming, my current laptop can handle everything I've thrown at it at
the highest settings _and_ I can take it to lan parties on the tube. The only
reason I would ever recommend a desktop is the lower price.

~~~
lief79
Best bang for the buck/upgrading GPUs.

I happen to be using my laptop for gaming now, and it can handle everything,
but I fully expect to need a new desktop in a year or two, because I won't be
able to update the graphics card. The laptop will be fine for everything but
gaming at that point.

------
jrockway
I love point-and-shoot cameras. When my cameraphone can give me an 8 megapixel
shot that is actually clear enough to print, let me know. A point-and-shoot
camera lets me turn everyday events into something beautiful. A cameraphone
only lets me snap a picture of a misspelled ad for my Twitter followers.

Similarly, my netbook runs Emacs. An ipad doesn't. Anything that can't run
Emacs isn't usable.

~~~
rimantas

      When my cameraphone can give me an 8 megapixel
      shot that is actually clear enough to print,
      let me know
    

How often do you print 16"x20" prints, because only for this size you need
8Mpx?

    
    
      Anything that can't run Emacs isn't usable.
    

Interesting, I don't run Emacs on any of my machines and they are all useable.
How exactly would Emacs help someone to browse the web, watch videos and
photos?

Why is this that so many are obsessed with what iPad does not do, instead of
how well it does what it does? How difficult it is to grasp that: a) iPad is
not intended to replace anything and b) it's first and foremost _consumption_
device.

Are we so used to eat from the same pot we did the cooking that we now longer
accept that plate may be better device to eat from?

~~~
sundarurfriend
> How exactly would Emacs help someone to browse the web, watch videos and
> photos?

I'm not even an Emacs user, but I'm certain that there are modes for every one
of those. Emacs even has modes for video _editing_ and photo _editing_. And
I've been told the Emacs browser is the most accessible browser for vision-
impaired users.

> Why is this that so many are obsessed with what iPad does not do, instead of
> how well it does what it does? How difficult it is to grasp that: a) iPad is
> not intended to replace anything

The grandparent was commenting on an article that specifically claimed that
the iPad was going to _replace_ laptops. Hence it is only fair that (s)he
would talk about what loss the switch from a laptop to iPad would mean.

------
GeneralMaximus
I disagree.

Camera phones are replacing point-and-shoot cameras because they're starting
to catch up to point-and-shoot cameras in terms of quality. Moreover, your
regular consumer can do just fine with a slightly blurry 5 megapixel image
because all he wants to do is upload his Saturday-night-party pictures on
Facebook. (Offtopic: most non-techie people I know prefer to use goodish-
quality POS cameras for their vacation/wedding/$IMPORTANT_OCCASION pics
because they know cameraphones suck.)

Now the iPad is a completely different beast. It has been designed from the
ground up as a _media consumption device_. Sooner or later, people will
realize that the iPad is a kickass entertainment device, but it's useless when
you need to _work_. Just imagine how painful it would be to type up a 200 page
report on that thing, even with an external keyboard.

There are a bunch of people who use their computers for actual work, and this
bunch is not limited to hackers. Architects, designers, musicians, filmmakers,
doctors, researchers, teachers, retail store owners -- all these people need
tools - both software and hardware - that the iPad simply doesn't support.
Okay, let's assume Apple makes the device more open, or a better device like
the Notion Ink Adam takes off. Even then, tablet computers (that's what
they're called, right?) will never be powerful enough for most people because
of hardware limitations. Media producers, at least, need powerful CPUs and/or
GPUs. And tons of storage. There's no way a tablet computer can compare to a
full-blown laptop or desktop in terms of raw performance.

Now, I understand the argument in this article is that people will prefer
using desktops as work computers and tablet computers as portable computers.
The OP is arguing that laptops are a poor compromise between power and
portability. Sure, you get more performance-per-dollar with a desktop than a
laptop, but laptops are useful not because they're portable computers but
because _they can double up as desktops_. Plug in an external display and
keyboard, and you're good to go. And, of course, they can do everything
desktops can do.

I, for one, wouldn't want to go to college with only an iPad in hand. I do a
lot of reading/programming in the library between (and sometimes during :p)
lectures.

PS: I really don't want to sound like a fanboy, but if you want a laptop that
is comfortable and has about 8 hours of battery life (10 if you dim the
display and turn off WiFi/Bluetooth when you're not using them), get a Mac :)

------
grandalf
I'm typing this on a $200 netbook that meets my needs far better than an iPad
could.

With apt and linux I have an awesome free app "store" with thousands of apps
that have been vetted by the community, a task that Apple's app store is far
from accomplishing.

I can connect to the internet via bluetooth through my phone's connection.

I use this laptop to write lots of code on, and rarely mind the slightly
slower processor, slightly smaller keyboard and slightly smaller screen.

All I'd ask for is a bit more battery life, but surely UNR will compile in top
end kernel optimizations for battery life, and maybe my next $200 netbook will
be a bit faster and get 10 hours per charge.

~~~
sorbus
My sub-$400 netbook (an EeePC 1005PE) gets around 10 hours (with bluetooth
off, the screen turned down, a customized kernel from the Arch User
Repository, and setting SuperHE to the full-optimization setting - but wifi
on, which is probably a big drain on the battery), so it's certainly doable.
Just takes a fair amount of optimization; before all of that, it was getting
around 6 without really trying.

~~~
grandalf
mine gets around 5 or 6 but with just the standard UNR kernel. I generally
plug in most of the time but I sort of want to try all the kernel
optimizations... sounds like they made quite a difference for you.

------
wvenable
Somebody should be recording all these predictions so that in a year we can
come back and laugh at the hype.

~~~
PG-13
The iPad is the absolute worst tablet device Apple could possibly have
released. There is literally no way they could have produced anything inferior
to it. I can forgive the Apple fanboys to an extent. When you're a fanboy,
it's hard to see the world for what it really is. I'm a diehard fan of certain
sports teams, and I'm not able to judge them objectively. Now the non-fanboys
who are predicting the triumph of the iPad are just people who fail to
understand technology. They resort to imagining use cases where "their mom"
loves the iPad. Your mom isn't the one preordering the iPad. You are the one
preordering the iPad. And at the same time, you say it isn't suited to "tech-
savvy people like you".

~~~
cglee
I preordered one for my mom, who's never used a computer before in her life.
Finally, I found a device safe and easy enough to let her dabble with. With an
iPad, she stands a chance to figuring out email and photo sharing and basic
web browsing. With a regular OS, she doesn't.

~~~
tremendo
Another underestimated Mom? Mine is 72, uses a PC with Win XP, first used a
computer about 5 yrs. ago. She's pretty proficient with it for what she needs
it for: email, IM and photos. My dad (78) is more of a computer-phobe, yet he
still knows what to do with the machine. The incentive of keeping in touch
with distant children and grand children, and friends, is quite powerful.

~~~
cglee
Why do you think I underestimate my own mom? She's been trying to learn to use
a computer for the past 10+ years, and she can't. I showed her my iPhone a few
months ago and she began to actually do something interesting with a computing
device for the first time in her life.

------
lotharbot
Missing perspectives:

1) The laptop still has several advantages over an iPad or similar device. The
full keyboard, for example. And in the specific case of the iPad, open apps.

2) Many of the supposed weaknesses of laptops in his diagram -- expense, low
battery life, etc. -- are not necessary conditions of laptops, but incidental.
Cheap, high-battery-life laptops (like netbooks) do exist.

3) One of the main reasons camera-phones replaced point-and-shoot cameras is
that people already carried phones and the things came embedded. I'd never
have bought a camera of that low quality if it didn't come attached to
something I already carry.

------
jdietrich
If I could make a point on the subject of cameras, the market definitely isn't
polarising into cameraphones and big SLRs. The most important thing that's
happening in digital photography at the moment is the blurring of the line
between SLR and compact camera and between stills and video.

Samsung, Panasonic and Olympus are attacking the incumbent duopoly of Canon
and Nikon by building cameras that have interchangeable lenses like an SLR,
but use an LCD viewfinder instead of a bulky and complex mirror and prism. By
substituting complex mechanical and optical parts for electronics, the smaller
players rob Canon and Nikon of much of their competitive advantage.

Further up the food chain, Canon and Nikon are making great efforts to take on
Panasonic, Sony and JVC (and even Panavision and Arai) by leveraging their
optical expertise to offer a lower-cost alternative to professional camcorders
and even 35mm movie cameras.

I find it very interesting that in the compact digital camera market, the
megapixel war is almost entirely finished - almost all marketing is now done
on the basis of ease of use, low-light performance or novel features like face
recognition or panorama modes. The cameraphone is certainly supplanting the
digital camera at the low end, but the digital camera is also supplanting the
camcorder.

In spite of what many might regard as a fatal blow from phone cameras that
effectively cost nothing, the market for digital cameras is thriving because
people are taking and sharing more and more photographs. I think we have a
great deal to learn from what is going on in the digital photography market.

------
niels_olson
The laptop is not the tool of choice for the consumer seeking entertainment.
The laptop is the tool of choice for the professional: the doctor (me) or
scientist (my dad) doing research after hours, the home-health therapist
writing notes (my wife), the math teacher (my mom) putting in grades, the
sysadmin (my brother), the grad student writing papers (my other brother), the
author, etc. Turns out most of the target audience of consumers seeking
entertainment can only afford them because they are also people are employed
in the knowledge economy.

------
conesus
I suspect a slightly different scenario will play out, at least at first.
Instead of folks cutting back on laptops outside of their homes--afterall,
they left home to work--we will see iPads in more places than anything before.

Laptops will continue to be used for the intended purpose, that is, mobile
computing. And suddenly we will see iPads where we didn't even see laptops
before. A laptop is 5 pounds. An iPad is 1.5 pounds. One you consciously think
about bringing, the other just comes with you anytime you have a bag.

I see this as different from the point-and-shoot to cameraphone scenario. A
cameraphone replaces every feature of a P&S, whereas an iPad does not replace
99% of the use-case for having and using a laptop. Not yet, anyway. Wait until
the apps catch up. Major apps like Photoshop, Skype, TextMate, Lightroom,
Visual Studio, anything corporate.

~~~
pyre
> _A cameraphone replaces every feature of a P &S_

Really?

> _Not yet, anyway. Wait until the apps catch up. Major apps like Photoshop,
> Skype, TextMate, Lightroom, Visual Studio, anything corporate._

Also wait until people get used to the interface. Being able to code on an
iPad is more than just having Emacs/Vim/etc running on it (which will never
happen for the iPad so long as Apple is the only one making 'Pad' devices).
You have to be able reliably type for more then just a few emails and web
comments.

------
willwagner
Right analogy; wrong conclusion.

I still use my digital camera when I want to do "serious" photography, whether
it's for taking family photos or any other event that I want to perserve a
memory. When it doesn't matter or when my digital camera isn't available, I
fallback to my iphone.

The same will be true with a tablet. It won't replace my laptop for work,
serious web surfing, research, etc, but it might be there for me when I'm
bored and just want to consume content. It will never replace my laptop, but
may be light enough and convenient enough to be replacement for for some of
today's laptop tasks.

For some people, a camera phone is a enough of a camera. For some people, a
tablet may be enough of a computer. For most people, they'll probably want
both.

------
jsz0
The computer industry is gigantic. It's nearly impossible to talk about its
entirety in broad strokes. Even if you don't work in the technology industry
lots of people carry laptops around for various reasons. It's a little
presumptuous to think their needs are always so easy to meet. So right off the
bat we need to exclude most computers used for business or most professional
users in general. We also need to exclude hardcore geeks and power users. My
guess is that leaves you with about half the market for laptop computers.
Basically the people who are buying net books today. That's the market where
the iPad is going to have the most impact. I think Apple hasn't been oblivious
to the rise of net books in the computer market. They see the potential market
for something less than a full blown computer, smaller and lighter, better
battery life, more fun to use and most importantly more task oriented instead
of a general purpose device. For those people the iPad is going to be
fantastic. For the first 50%, the geeks/professionals, the iPad might have
some appeal as an accessory but it's not going to change much. So going back
to the original premise that the world wide computer industry is gigantic the
iPad, and other tablets modeled closely after it, are a fragmentation of this
massive industry into more logical segments. We're long overdue to recognize
that there is no one-size-fits-all. The needs of the geeky power user are
massively different than the needs of a person who wants to read an e-book or
webpage on their couch. They'll happily co-exist together.

------
rbranson
I think he undersells the iPad by comparing it to a cameraphone.

Due to the fact that good lenses and flash require a certain amount of space,
and no amount of technology is going to change that any time soon,
cameraphones will NEVER be as good at ANY kind of pictures as even the
cheapest point-and-shoots. These are phones FIRST. The camera is just another
bullet point in the feature list.

A multi-touch tablet with an OS and a bunch of applications designed from the
ground up exclusively for a touch-based interface isn't a second class citizen
here. The primary purpose of the iPad is for using applications. It is, in
some ways, better than a laptop for certain tasks. It comes back from sleep
quicker, is more portable, sips the battery slower, and touch interfaces work
better for many applications.

In fact, when I think all of this is over, it might be a boon for desktops.
While it's cute to hack code in the kitchen or at Starbucks, let's face it,
you aren't getting as much work done when you're stuck on that tiny screen,
using that cramped keyboard, fiddling around with that touchpad. Laptops will
continue to be very important, but it might end up being cheaper and work out
better for many people just to buy something like a mac mini and a tablet
device.

In the end, can't we all just agree that we have different needs and that each
of us is entitled to have the devices that we choose and afford?

~~~
Zak
_let's face it, you aren't getting as much work done when you're stuck on that
tiny screen, using that cramped keyboard, fiddling around with that touchpad._

I can understand why some people might feel that 1680x1050 is cramped, but
it's enough for me to comfortably have two files and a REPL or two open in
Emacs. The keyboard and pointing stick on my Thinkpad are my preferred input
devices; if I had a desktop, I'd buy a trackpoint keyboard to go with it. I
even like fiddling around with that touchpad: it makes for a great scroll
surface.

Last time I tried to get work done on a desktop, I kept jamming my fingers in
to the giant spaces between the keys and getting annoyed that I had to reach
for a mouse.

~~~
chipsy
Yeah. I write code mostly on laptops.

Especially on the screen size thing - I have a dual-screen setup, yet I mostly
use only one screen. I run most applications fullscreened, and for a time -
when I was using Linux, I'm not right now - I tried running ion, wmii, etc.

I think it all comes down to getting into the mindset of doing one thing at a
time. It's nice that we can have more apps open at once, ready for use, but
being able to pay attention to both only translates into a helpful environment
in the particular situation where workflow requires having two things open
simultaneously.

------
pmccool
I don't see much overlap between laptop and iPad.

A laptop is a desktop substitute; it's keyboard+screen in a much more
convenient package with a bearable decrease in performance.

An iPad is a paper substitute. It fits this niche precisely because it does
not have a keyboard. It's a miserable failure as a laptop substitute because
it isn't one.

Comparing it to a laptop is like comparing a motorcycle to a bus. Once you've
said not to get one if you want the other there's not much else interesting to
say.

------
ghshephard
I disagree. I have Four Computers, Three Iphones, Two Kindles, and, in 12-14
more hours, an iPad.

Two of the computers are desktops - one of them with a 30" monitor and 8
Gigabytes of memory (That was a big deal three years ago. :-), One of the
Laptops is a four year old MBP, one of the laptops is a two-year old MBP.

I'm not including the Half-dozen Latitude D600s I use for consoling and
labwork.

I am enthusiastically looking forward to my iPad acquisition tomorrow, but I
expect it will be replacing my iPhone/Kindle application interaction. For
serious work, I _already_ use my Laptop, not my desktop. There really is very
little I need the Desktop for, with the possible exception of my always-on
VMware cluster of about 15 Unix Systems (8 OpenBSD, and about 5-7 Ubuntu) that
I use for OS and Network Simulations.

Everything else I already do on my Laptop. I can only imagine how much more
powerful a current MBP Unibody laptop would be.

There really is very little that a desktop offers _me_, except the always on
and somewhat higher/cheaper memory parameters. Oh, and the Big Disk. (Though,
at home, my TerraNAP NAS is the substitute for that on my Laptop)

So, nice idea, but, ultimately will be wrong. Laptops are not going anywhere,
though we may use them a _little_ less in the office. Probably a lot less at
home, though.

------
khelloworld
I fully agree with the author. However, the day he talks about isn't most
likely going to be tomorrow. It will either be this summer (when OS 4.0 with
multitasking comes out) or this fall (when the iPad will get a camera +
multitasking).

Before any of this happens, the iPad is sadly any thing but an iPod Touch
(albeit bigger and badder of course).

------
brandon272
I've been trying to understand how the iPad will be disruptive to any market,
but I can't. The iPad misses the mark in so many ways. What does it do that my
netbook doesn't? Nothing. Is it more comfortable to use? That's really
debatable. Better input mechanisms? Certainly doesn't look that way.

I've seen tech folks point out that the iPad must be great because it's
something that their mothers want to use. But is that a good thing? Are the
same qualities that are attracting your mother to the device the same
qualities that would inspire strong adoption? Make the device popular among
teenagers? The business community? Artists? The tech crowd?

I can't wait for the iPad to come out because I'm hoping I'll finally have an
epiphany about exactly what makes this device worth purchasing.

------
Groxx
Eh, only partially. The point&shoot -> camera phone transition does indeed
work, but there's still the entire medium-amateur market which is still buying
a fairly large amount of them. DSLRs are expensive, and camera phones _suck_.
Sure, the market's shrunk rather dramatically, but that's because there _was_
no convenient option before.

Will laptops diminish similarly? Probably a bit. But the same was claimed
about netbooks, though Apple wasn't making them, and there's still the large
amount of people who do _work_ on laptops who will guarantee a market.
Besides, there's too much crap out there, some tighter competition would
probably be good.

------
akadien
And, good riddance, I say. I now own an iPad and I see how the laptop is now
in the same class as a desktop. It's now a work machine. I can watch TV, check
email, surf the web, look up information, chat, listen to music, play games,
etc. on a comfortable screen, without a keyboard, and using a form factor that
is like a magazine. In fact, I neither need nor want a laptop anymore since I
prefer using my iMac and PC for development.

Most people use a laptop not as a computer but as an information access
device. The iPad bests the laptop for this.

------
zppx
Can we just forget about this iPad stuff and return to our everyday hacking?

~~~
conesus
Maybe not on, you know, the day the iPad is released.

------
Tichy
There is a difference, though: cameras were added to phones which everybody
needed anyway. The iPad is an extra 500$ investment.

Also, I have been waiting for years for phone cameras to become good enough,
but last month finally gave up and bought a real digicam again.

Still hope that eventually phone cams could become good enough, but not
holding my breath atm.

------
derefr
Whether this is true (I'm suspecting not), it would make for an interesting
world—the laptop would be a niche product, made for those who do a lot of
typing, even on the go: programmers and writers/bloggers. I'm imagining the
term for them would gradually revert to "electronic typewriter" :)

------
gfodor
Who ever said that there's going to, in the long run, be a difference between
the iPad and laptops? A laptop is just an iPad with a keyboard.

That wasn't so hard now, was it?

------
quizbiz
An extreme but his perspective highlights how the iPad could effect the entire
consumer electronics industry.

------
leif
Ehh, someone had to make the claim, why not Amit?

------
TheAmazingIdiot
And come to think I'm the weird one.

I've got a blackberry, an eee, an ibm laptop, multiple desktops, and a good
server. I carry my phone everywhere, so I get
email/sms/gvoice/facebook/msn/yahoo messages there. If I need a computer, I
can use my eee, which is almost always in my van, for windows and linux apps.
And to top it off, if I need raw cpu power, I can log in at my apartment to my
server and 'crappycluster' of ubuntu eualyptus testing.

As per the iPad, are there any "real apps" that offer printing via cups, ssh,
vnc/rdesktop or the multitudes that give access to a real machine? Probably
not. I'm sure there are on the 3rd party ipod app servers.... But not on the
main Apple controlled one

~~~
CamperBob
If you're asking about VNC clients, the iPhone with iTeleport (nee Jaadu VNC)
is a drop-dead awesome VNC client, and there's no reason to think the iPad
won't be even better.

~~~
TheAmazingIdiot
I guess I think of 'just a vnc client' is somehow missing the mark. The
iphone/itouch/ipad are unix devices. Samba has /dev sharing as an option. An
app should be able to do something akin to XDMCP login and make it a full
fledged computer with access to local storage as a cache to rsync.

I mean, people, this is a full touch computer that Apple has dumbed down to a
youtube viewing device... And its capable of soo much more.

