Computer tower becoming obsolete?

[Borgster]

ok we all know how most computers these days have a tower were the motherboard, hard drive, cd drive etc are kept in, do you think some day these will be obsolete and considered a 'dinosaur'? since computers are getting so small like pocketpc's, palm's, and all that other good stuff, that pc's are getting smaller and more powerful, even a pocketpc has the power of a 3 year old computer. also tablet pc's are starting to catch on, but with only a small variety available, tablet pc's might be considered the game boy for adults, like the palm pilot is. so my question is do you think the computer tower will be obsolete some day? are the computer tower's fading away like 3½ inch floppies are?

[hawkburn]

I think one day, towers will be no more, and there will be small boxes that contain drives such as hard drives and one mini cd drive.

The box will control everything in the house, the kitchen, the tv, chairs, beds, and even, the toilet.

To work on the computer, the Tablet PC I think will catch on, and the tablet will be the pc and it will be wirelessly connected to "the box"


--- My Thoughts

[nasrules]

i reckon that some day well be back to the BEEB way of having the processor, motherboard etc in the keyboard an the hd, cd/floppy drives as seperate items. jeezus i jus upgraded from a nokia 3330 to a t68i 2day, they get smaller an smaller, the ericsson is tiny!

[Krell]

"The Box " already exists. I worked on it 12 years ago, and there are a number of convergence devices out that do home automation, security, energy management, using wireless signal to communicate.

Due to cost, and competing standards, it will be a while before smart homes are common place. When my daughter was little she asked me one day "Dad, when are we going to have those cars that dont need keys?" I told her I was still working on it.

I envision a keyless cashless society in my lifetime, or boredering on it. I have waited for the processing power to say "Mother, who called today?" "Mother, what is the average daily energy cost this month?" One benefit of a personal tracking system is, you cant dispute where you were in a given time and day. So if you are innocent, you are innocent.

When we address and satisfy all the present restrictions and requirement of todays PCs, like power, cooling, connectivity, we can reduce the overall size for truely Star Trek like devices.

The towers days are numbered.

[Borgster]

it'll be funny that some day when i have kids, they will have there tiny computer and i tell them that back in my day we had a tower that stored the motherboard and all the drives, and they'll be like what is that piece of crap?! we'll pull out the old dell, or gateway from the closet and it'll be all dusty, it'll sort of be like the atari in the future.

[geffers]

so you do away with the tower, where am i supposed to put my can and ashtray.

[narz]

Well, what eva there is, little boxes, pyramids, what eva, i hope there is still the little red light that i can stare at for hours of amusement, or to at least know that somethings occuring within that little box, pyramid, etc etc.

[Tremaine]

most of this stuff we already have we have the technology to do most of this, yes everything in our world seems to be getting smaller look a the size difference of a flash memory card to a multimedia card that holds the same amount of memory big difference. we already have towerless computer's, i havent seen any pc's towerless in stores, but mac has the imac, and the emac about the size of a modern day teleivion. If your talking about the tower it will be gone but pc's will stay the same its just making different more efficient shape's of pc's to take up even less space. towers are just the modern shape of our pc's.

[AuroraAustralis]

I think you're exactly right Borgster, I have a few Commodore 64s gathering dust in the closet =P. The towers will disappear eventually, unless of course they become an art piece. But it will take some time, so maybe the doomed towers have some life left in ‘em for a while.

But I doubt they’ll be turning to packing the entire computer into the keyboard, it would bring up bad thoughts about slow computers *points to the Commodore 64 in the corner*.

[nasrules]

Originally posted by AuroraAustralis
But I doubt they’ll be turning to packing the entire computer into the keyboard, it would bring up bad thoughts about slow computers *points to the Commodore 64 in the corner*.

theyve done it quite recently, i cant remember the name but ill fish it out for ya

[collideous]

Based on my observation of American culture with its obsession to super-size everything from french-fries, TVs, SUVs, homes, to breasts and penises, I come to the opposite conclusion that the home PC of the average American home of the future will be the size of a fridge - if not bigger.

[phalkon30]

http://littlepc.com/products.htm

An entire computer in one 5 1/4" box, just add keyboard/mouse/monitor/webcam/firewire cam, etc

That sorta scares me, computers are gonna be like compaqs, you can't upgrade them unless you have midget hands (sorry for the sluur)

[chipperrox]

Originally posted by collideous
Based on my observation of American culture with its obsession to super-size everything from french-fries, TVs, SUVs, homes, to breasts and penises, I come to the opposite conclusion that the home PC of the average American home of the future will be the size of a fridge - if not bigger.

brilliant observation, and for an additional 15bucks, we can fire one of our 30,000 missles at..anyone we dont like
"watch out martha stewart"