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Apple Now the Top PC Vendor, For Some Values of PC
tsamsoniw writes "While research companies including IDC and Gartner deemed HP the PC leader for Q4 2012, Canalys has a different perspective. The analyst firm has declared Apple the top PC vendor for the past quarter, thanks in part to the booming success of the iPad and the iPad mini. By Canalys's reckoning, Amazon, too, now beats out the likes of Acer and Asus as leading PC vendors, having shipped 4.6 million Kindles in Q4."
Do tablets really count as a "PC"? If that's the case we might as well start considering smart phones PCs, since a modern tablet is basically just a scaled up smart phone.
the worst influence and bully in the tech industry hits the already much abused PC form factor.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Apple is now the top politically correct vendor. That must be because they censor apps.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
McDonalds is the top PC vendor, if you include Big Macs.
Everyone knows Apple only sells Macs, not PCs.
I'll start. Here's how I use the words:
Personal Devices (Very limited, proprietary software)
-- Feature Phone
-- GPS Device
Personal Computing Devices (Limited, Consumption-based OSes, optional other-source software)
-- Tablets
-- Smartphones
Personal Computers (Traditional OSes like Windows, Linux, etc.; uses applications not truncated "apps")
-- Laptops/Notebooks
-- Netbooks
-- Desktop Computers
If you are going to build your own tablet or smart phone I suspect you are going to want a 3d printer to make the case, which adds a significant amount to the up front costs.
Personally, I suspect one could make ones own smart phone for under 3k, but I haven't had the time to try. Would be a cool project though.
Work bio at MMWD
I'll just keep building my own computers out of parts, like I've been doing for the last 30 years or so, and I can build several computers for what Apple would have me pay for a single one of theirs.
And more power to you, but for many, cost is not the sole deciding factor. /not a Mac owner
Justification to why they are definitely NOT pcs...
Because you still have to have an actual computer for certain day to day functionalities.
For example: Try using a flash website on an iPad.
Or try playing a modern video game that requires more input than just moving your finger across a piece of fruit.
The keyboard requirement listed above is definitely absurd, but these things are defined by other limitations.
This definition died with the laptop. We've been on a downward spiral to the smartphone since. If you want to define PC's as Desktop computers and Laptops, computing devices with a keyboard and or mouse like device, it's still a bit shaky.
Mark Anthony Collins
In what universe does someone consider an iPad to be a personal computer?
Well, the Slashdot universe, for one. Well, at least they consider Android tablets and phones to be "Personal Computers"; so it should follow for (at least jailbroken) iPads/iPhones, too.
Headline: Person Says Dumb Thing.
Slashdot: Why? Why They Say Dumb Thing? I Am Mad About Dumb Thing.
Repeat forever.
I'll just keep building my own computers out of parts, like I've been doing for the last 30 years or so, and I can build several computers for what Apple would have me pay for a single one of theirs.
Good luck building that tablet!
The "tablet is not a PC" crowd will attack. And then the "tablet is a PC" crowd will counter-attack. Out of nowhere "some tablet are PC" crowd will join, but haven't shown their alliance. The "Apple is evil" along with the "Android/Chrome OS FTW" groups will join forces to fight everybody. Unfortunately, the hills may not protect us from the "Win8 will kill everyone".
First of all in iPads you can not install your own software and you can only have crippled programming environments on it (some Basics e.g.) ... at least it is a "computing platform" on wich you indeed can compute and instal your own stuff and have an accessible file system.
So everything that defines a PC is impossible on an iPad.
Android might be looking better
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
They were Personal Computers when they were on the desktop.
They were Personal Computers when they migrated from the desktop to your laptop.
They are STILL Personal Computers now that they have migrated from your lap to your hand.
They will STILL be Personal Computers when they migrate to your wrist or your ear or your glasses.
We counted Apple IIs and Commodore 64s as PCs. These new systems are far more powerful and capable, why not call them PCs too?
Apple ]['s and Commodore 64's could be opened up, hacked, modded, and have 3rd party software installed without having to battle with the manufacturer.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Oh, I'm sorry, I should have been more specific: I'll just keep building REAL computers, you know, the desktop type? I don't count tablets, e-readers, and smartphones in the same category, and for what it's worth, I haven't found anything even close to a justification for my owning a tablet, I don't like e-books thus no need for an e-reader, and dataplans from wireless companies are a huge rip-off so far as I'm concerned, so I'd rather just have a plain-old phone, not a smartphone anyway. When tablet computers are down below $100 (or I can just instruct the matter replicator to spit one out for me) then maybe I'll get one, but still I tend to not buy things I don't have a use for, and I still don't see where it'd be anything more than a shiny toy to me.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
A Kindle is a PC? Fuck this article. Astroturfing bullshit.
If you are going to build your own tablet or smart phone I suspect you are going to want a 3d printer to make the case, which adds a significant amount to the up front costs.
Personally, I suspect one could make ones own smart phone for under 3k, but I haven't had the time to try. Would be a cool project though.
But it would end up being the size of a Generation 1 "bag phone"
The Mac existed as a "Personal Computer" for several years before it was capable of compiling its own programs but nobody had any trouble calling it a "PC".
We counted Apple IIs and Commodore 64s as PCs. These new systems are far more powerful and capable, why not call them PCs too?
Taking the Apple click-bait out of the equation, this sounds about right from a broad view: Tablets and "smartphones" as PCs from a decade ago or-so in terms of computing power with funny form-factors and interfaces.
To all the apparent fanboys who think that dedicated media consumption devices should be PCs just because they perform better than something from two decades ago, there is one very obvious distinction that you are all blatantly but unintentionally pointing out:
All of these devices were still the cutting edge technology of their time, especially as far as personal productivity and capability was concerned!
Sure the very original mac couldn't compile its own code. But it also beat the hell out of a typewriter.
And the iPad's A# processors destroy the original Cyrix, 3/486, Pentiums what have you! I'm surprised we even bothered with those processors at all, pfft!
Now crawl out of the reality-distortion fanboy bubble and look at today and what do you see? These devices are far from forefront of doing anything productive, have just good-enough specs for media consumption, and are a pain to use even if you look at the most modest metrics of productivity such as responding (no, not just reading) an email, or working with a spreadsheet.
Yes, personal computers did used mean something. And I believe they still should.
I'd argue about Raspberry: it's pretty much made for PC use cases.
Tablets aren't really that limited now and they're not consumption only devices. You can do web development, create images or 3D models among other things.
Not quite every year, but since 2001 Nintendo has put out the GBA, GBA SP, Game Boy micro, DS, DS Lite, DSi, DSi XL, 3DS, and 3DS XL.
a personal computer. If its personal and it computes then its a personal computer. That my friends includes pocket calculators. If it has a CPU or processor its a computer. If its for personal use then its a personal computer. The arguement here on whether a tablet is a PC or a phone is a PC is moot. They all have processors, they all are personal and they all compute. End of story. It doesn't matter what the task the PC was designed for or the form factor for that matter (General purpose personal computing or smartphone) they all are still personal computers because they are personal and they compute. Eventually people will be able to do their general purpose personal computing on a smartphone which isn't really a phone anyway. smartphones are personal pocket computers with a radio modem and phone app.
Right now there is a very large amount of things that I just can't do on my [ASUS Nexus 7] tablet
Such as what? I too have a Nexus 7, and it's possible to either open an APK on the device to install it (if "Unknown sources" is turned on) or push one through the Android Debug Bridge. It's not like iOS, where you have to pay $650 for a second PC (assuming a Mac mini) plus $99 per year extra just to be able to compile and run programs that Apple hasn't approved. In fact, anyone with a tablet and a Bluetooth keyboard can use AIDE to develop apps right on the device.
[PCs] still have a very large ability to modify the software for almost any task. Tablets don't really do this, there are abilities that they are not going to really support, either by design or intrinsic factors.
What might these factors be, other than that 1. the Kindle Fire lacks Bluetooth to connect an external keyboard, and 2. Android doesn't yet have a manifest declaration for flexible screen size?
Good luck building that tablet!
A tablet has a mouse and keyboard that's external? Oh right...that's not a PC.
Om, nomnomnom...
Then yes, it's a PC. If it's something smaller than a Mainframe, and you can do something DIGITAL with it, then it's generally a PC.
Smartphones certainly apply, since, well, let's see, you can do everything on it that qualifies as a PC; Type notes, play games, connect to a network, transfer files, etc. Hell, my phone has more capability in the computing field than my first computer did (a Sinclair ZX-81) - and with a bluetooth keyboard, the phone is a better word processor!
If it can load a program of your choice and run it, it's in the right area as a general purpose computing device, and if it's yours, it's PC. So, yes, Apple could qualify as largest PC vendor.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
I haven't found anything even close to a justification for my owning a tablet, I don't like e-books thus no need for an e-reader, and dataplans from wireless companies are a huge rip-off so far as I'm concerned, so I'd rather just have a plain-old phone, not a smartphone anyway. When tablet computers are down below $100 (or I can just instruct the matter replicator to spit one out for me) then maybe I'll get one, but still I tend to not buy things I don't have a use for, and I still don't see where it'd be anything more than a shiny toy to me.
I thought the same thing, at first. Then I was on a trip to Las Vegas (about 5 hour flight from Boston) and a guy had an iPad that he was using to watch movies, play games, etc. What impressed me was the battery life. I barely made it with 2 spare batteries for my laptop and his tablet was still going strong. Ive since bought an ASUS Transformer and use it watch movies, backup photos, etc. when I am on trips. Its under 2lbs and the battery lasts 6 to 8 hours. My travel backpack is at least 7lbs lighter. So, if you like to travel a tablet is the way to go.
The ASUS Transformer is WiFi only, no data plans. However, I have FreedomPop for travel in the US (very cheap WiFi Hotspot with a free data plan) and use my international plan and hotspot capabilities on my cell phone when outside of the US. Of course, WiFi keeps becoming more accessible.
RT or Pro?
I think it's pretty obvious that the Surface is a tablet and the Surface Pro is a computer, even if a rather gimped one.
Funny I can ssh and code on my iPad just fine without even jailbreaking.... also my iPhone. So sorry that "consumption" category is bullshit.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
Dude; Did you ever see Mario Paint for the Super Nintendo? This was a 16-bit PRODUCTIVITY APPLICATION. It turned a "game console" into a paint program and it was was even capable of doing animation. So, yes, a game console *is* a PC -- I mean, you do realize that in Japan, the Nintendo was sold as the Famicom, and even came with a keyboard, right?????
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
By web development are we talking about drag and drop building of web pages or writing the code?
Unrestricted third-party software development. But, most users probably don't actually want or care about this.
The benefit of "unrestricted third-party software development" is to ensure that development of the best available software for a given task isn't blocked by bureaucracy. Are you trying to claim that most users don't want to be sure that they have access to the best available software for a given task?
Your data and apps will be stored on a server--either yours, or in some "cloud" provider. How you choose to interact with that data will determine which device you use.
For instance, I have both an ipad and an imac. The imac has large screens and a keyboard. The ipad, I can use anywhere-- in my kitchen,on my sofa, outside. When I need more power, or the ability to work with multiple apps at once, I use my imac. It's a little clunky. Sometimes, the data can't be exchanged transparently. But this sort of thing is probably the future.
Nonsense. My jailbroke(en ??) iPad does more, much more than my first "personal computer" - a Morrow MicroDecision running CP/M. The developer's license is a bit of a non-sequitor. Computers have required specific development software / hardware bits for ages.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Take your smartphone, tablet, kindle, whatever... that device you don't consider to a be a "PC". Now stick it in a Time Machine and send it back to 1985. Show it to the editors of BYTE Magazine and ask them if it's a personal computer or not. They will tell you that it is.
Furthermore, your "device" in 1985 would be the most powerful PC there is, and actually qualify as a supercomputer, and be restricted from export from the USA because it would qualify as a threat to national security. Think about that.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
WTF is up with many tablets not having an SD slot?
Probably tablet makers not wanting to pay their tithe to Microsoft for the use of its file system patents. Windows XP can't write to any file system that isn't FAT or NTFS. Windows Vista and later can write to UDF, but SDXC mandates Microsoft's ExFAT, not UDF.
"Can run software applications, and is not specialized to run one particular category of software" is probably a better definition - and both tablets and smartphones qualify. iOS and Android are both Unix variants, if you recall.
An iPod touch, iPhone, or iPad is specialized to refuse to run video games including realistic violence, roulette (whether chat or Russian), satire of an identifiable organization, card counting apps, apps that let the user log locations of seen Wi-Fi hotspots, apps that "download code in any way or form" such as a game maker, web browsers that implement HTML features that Apple has left out of Safari, launcher replacements, and more.
I can say all of those things about my android tablet, my nook tablet, and my raspberry pi. So these are all PCs?
No you can't - just try to install something from the OSS FDroid market on your Nook without having to root (read: break into) it.
Liar, or ignoramus? Guessing the latter.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
By your standard definition, then, do you include gaming consoles, smart TVs, Blu-Ray players, handheld gaming devices such as the DSi or PSP, DVRs, etc?
is it a really slow day or something, Slashdot?
large amount of things that I just can't do on my [Android] tablet
Such as what?
Such as any real work.
You appear to have defined "real work" as "something more involved than playing games, surfing the web, or posting to Twitter or Facebook". But I'm still having trouble figuring out what you meant. Could you give examples of this sort of "real work" that you find impractical on, say, a Nexus tablet with a Bluetooth keyboard?
Shitposting as AC then modding down my original post only proves that you belong on 4chan/b and not out here in the real world, and I know damned well that I'm not the only person who looks at tablets and smartphones as accessories and not primary computing devices or that Apple's prices are high.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
My jailbroke(en ??) iPad
When you installed a jailbreak on your iPad, it became a personal computer.
Computers have required specific development software / hardware bits for ages.
In the past, it was common to fund the development of developer tools through the sale of copies of developer tools. MPW cost money, CodeWarrior cost money, etc. But these "ages" were supposed to have ended when volunteers ported GCC and other freely licensed developer tools to anything and everything. For example, I'm under the impression that Microsoft started offering Visual Studio Express to compete with MinGW, a port of GCC to Windows. Only with the marketing of cryptographically restricted devices as "personal computer replacements" have these ages returned.
*Shrug* I suppose if you spend the majority of your life in front of one kind of computer or another then it would make more sense, but frankly I've gone from living that way to spending less and less time in front of computers when I'm not at work and more time doing other things, and I don't travel so watching movies on a plane or long trip really isn't an issue. As I've said I see the prices on tablets and that's money I'd rather spend somewhere else. If they can get the price down to around $100 then I might be tempted if I have a windfall, but it'd still just be a shiny toy, not anything I'd find a serious use for.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
Looky what I just wrote on my iPad. Saved it to dropbox, which syncs to a special directory on my apache server. I then invoked the script using Safari on my iPad.
You are using the iPad as a terminal for your Apache server. Your Apache server is the computer. I'd like to see you do that while your iPad has zero bars.
Considering you can do SSH which gives you access to vim, you can do anything you're happy to do in Vim. There's Pythonista too for writing Python.
When the computer that you carry around in your pocket is not a "Personal Computer", but the computer whose permanent home is on the floor, it's called a "Personal Computer"???
Very odd!
A server owned by an individual, such as the 486 PC in your example, is still a personal computer as long as the owner retains the ability to build, install, and run programs on it. Whether a computer's terminal is "the console" (a directly attached PS/2 keyboard and VGA monitor) or an SSH client on another machine matters little. A developer license or jailbreak would be needed to do the same on an iPad.
In what universe does someone consider an iPad to be a personal computer?
Not to sound simplistic, but it's a computer and it's personal. It's not an IBM PC, but now we're grabbing at straws for a definition accepted and used by all of Humanity.
[This tablet] has a CPU, memory, can do input, processing, and output (the Von Neumann definition)
A von Neumann machine stores the program in memory. Who can write to the part of memory that contains the instructions for processing? Can the "person" who owns the device control the "computing"? In the case of Android devices, the answer is yes, they're personal computers. Apple products, on the other hand...
It's capable of doing Turing complete things, and writing code written for it.
You say an iPhone or iPad is Turing complete, which includes the ability to act as a universal Turing machine. I read a version of Apple's App Review Guidelines that disagrees. Without a developer license or a jailbreak, it's not capable of running any application that Apple rejected, and Apple has a history of rejecting interpreters into which the user can download and run code. It even pulled a Commodore 64 game just because the (licensed) emulator could be rebooted into the ROM BASIC REPL.
It's personal, and it meets all of the definitions of computer.
Without a developer license or a jailbreak, the "person" who owns an iPad can't direct how things are "computed".
I think John Gruber's take on David Pogue's Surface review nails it:
DP: "Everybody knows what a tablet is, right? It's a black touch-screen slab, like an iPad or an Android tablet. It doesn't run real Windows or Mac software -- it runs much simpler apps. It's not a real computer."
JG: "That's the same shortsighted opinion that command-line DOS advocates had of the Mac in the '80s. Anyone who thinks OS X and Windows PCs are "real" computers and that the iPad (and Android tablets) are anything less just isn't getting it."
My dad was one of those people. Back then (mid/late 80s) "computer" meant "I can write programs on it." Every computer today looks like the Macintosh did back then: windows, icons, WYSIWYG documents, etc. "Computer" came to mean "something you can use to create documents on and play games."
Remember, once upon a time, what we call "personal computers" themselves weren't considered "real" computers at all by those who were using "computers" (i.e, big iron in schools and businesses) at the time.
Q: Who's the #1 mainframe vendor today?
A: Who cares?
So just as "computer" once meant one thing and now refers to what we call PCs, the definition of "PC" will change over time too. It's a continuum, not black and white. Does a "PC" become not a PC when you take its keyboard off? Does a "tablet" become a "PC" when you add a keyboard? Is an iPad you can hold in one hand less personal, or less of a computer, than an old Kaypro luggable?
I think I'll write a children's book: The Velveteen iPad (or How Tablets Become Real).
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
Real work involves using a copy/paste function
Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V work correctly on my Nexus 7 tablet and ZAGG keyboard.
and multiple windows.
I'm aware of this problem and anticipate that it will be solved soon. There's a feature in development called Cornerstone that was originally developed for CyanogenMod to allow the screen to be tiled into multiple windows. Google turned it down because it could cause compatibility problems with applications that expect the screen size never to change (other than rotation) after install time. I suspect the next version of Cornerstone will allow applications to opt-in to tiled window management by declaring support for flexible screen size in the application's manifest.
Bluetooth.
Perhaps you should think about things like memory, storage space (If you don't have a file server), CPU and GPU, where PCs still enjoy a considerable advantage..
I recently bought a new Asus desktop for just under $1k including tax and shipping from a big box store. 16GB RAM, quad core i7 3.4GHz, 2TB hard disk, decent sound and video. A Mac with those specs would be eye-popping expensive. Though, to be fair, it's hard to find those specs in a non-Mac PC for that price, too. Of course, it depends on what you want to do with the machine and there are other factors to consider.
And if you're going to carry around a keyboard and mouse to do "real work" with the tablet, it kind of defeats part of the reason of having a very portable all-in-one computer.
Unless someone is used to doing work on a netbook (such as myself) and has bought a tablet and keyboard as a substitute for a netbook since netbooks were discontinued at the end of last year. Eee PC has passed the torch to Transformer.
For example: Try using a flash website on an iPad.
Sigh. Will flash ever die? A more pressing issue seems to be licensing. Because the iPad is a "mobile" device, and not a computer, it's subject to different licensing regimes. Hulu runs on a PC, for free. But only Hulu+ users can use their iPads. For a brief period, this segregation of content into "mobile" and "computer" might have made marginal sense, but thanks to lawyers, it'll live on.
Rendering 3 D images comes to mind.
True, anything more complicated than what the Tegra 3 in a tablet can do probably needs a separate compute server to act as your render farm.
How well does it support gaming peripherals like a yoke and pedals?
USB gamepads work with Android 4 on my Nexus 7.
Can you run multiple monitors off of it?
I imagine the idea is that at $200 for a Nexus 7, tablets have become so cheap that you'd have multiple tablets, like having multiple PADDs in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Does it have a megapixel display?
This is actually the last of the so-called 3M requirements (which have nothing to do with Scotch tape) that the average Lenovo-compatible PC fulfilled. 1 MiB of RAM came early, in the 286 era, as extended memory broke the 640k barrier. Then came 1 Mflops once the i486DX started including an FPU as standard equipment. By the release of the first Quake, almost all new PCs had a Pentium or at least an i486DX. PCs met the last part of the workstation definition, the 1 Mpx display, once 1152x864, 1280x1024, and 1366x768 pixel resolutions became common. Only last year did WXGA (1366x768) top 1024x768. And now, the Nexus 7 has a 720p-class display (1280x800 pixels), making it a workstation too.
but how do you cut and paste between the three tablets?
That wouldn't be much of a stretch from ClipSync, a background service that keeps the clipboard synchronized across Windows and Android devices.
"General use" describes what people do with a device, not what CPU it uses or what OS it runs. There are already people who use tablets as general-use devices. And there are people who use PCs as glorified web-terminals.
This is for very limited uses of the term "general". I'd say only around 30% of my computer use can be shifted over to a tablet at this time, and my use is rather limited compared to some. For some people, and many here on /., this figure will be much smaller. For my parents, a tablet might be able to handle around 100% of their normal use. General means it can be used for almost anything, need a port, add a port, need to access the GPU, go for it, need to use it for encoding stuff, no problem. There are many things you CAN do on a tablet, but not easily (try coding on one, or processing large amounts of RAW files, or writing a novel, or playing any game more sophisticated than Angry Birds, or transcoding video, or...). This would limit its claim to being "general purpose". They are designed for media consumption, and light tasks. A PC, even a MacBook Air, and designed for a larger feature set, and by design, have ways of extending their use beyond what the designers intended.
It doesn't matter what any one individual uses it for, or what they want out of it, since that way a PC is a completely subjective term, and thus meaningless. It is the actual design of the device, and its intended uses. I can use my PC as a server right now, with very little effort, I can't do that on an iPad or Android tablet, without actually working around the inbuilt limitations of the hardware and OS.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
Let me see one comment made on slashdot that expresses that Android tablets are PCs and iPads are not.
I, for one, agree with macs4all that an Android device is a personal computer, and an iPad becomes one once jailbroken. Search this discussion for posts made by tepples, such as #41356375:
I'll just keep building REAL computers, you know, the desktop type?
So what are you going to use while you ride the bus to and from where you keep the desktop computer? I pass the commute to and from work by working on hobby programming projects on a 10" laptop that fits in my messenger bag, and now that 10" laptops are discontinued, I wonder what I'm going to use once it finally dies.
When tablet computers are down below $100
Some Android tablets by Chinese brands are under 100 USD.
Considering you can do SSH
Not with zero bars you can't. SSH doesn't make your device a computer; it makes it a terminal.
Calling an iPad a PC just shows how completely out of touch today's tech journalists and analysts are with the history of computing. The term "PC" actually has a specific meaning.
but how can you do web development on a tablet?
Pair a Bluetooth keyboard, install a file manager and a text editor, and open your HTML pages in the web browser. This way you can create and test HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Or 3D modeling for that matter?
I've done (limited) 3D modeling in an Android app called Voxel Fun. The rest is details.
Funny I can ssh and code on my iPad just fine without even jailbreaking
But what will you be SSHing to while out of Wi-Fi range, such as while waiting for or riding public transit?
No we didn't. Vintage 8-bit computers were generally referred to as "home computers". PC didn't come about until the IBM PC, and in the 80s it exclusively ment IBM PCs or compatibles. It's only in the past 5-10 years that the term acquired any degree of ambiguity.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Wait, so Mr. Mac was Mr. PC in disguise all along?
It has a hard drive, a CPU, a BSD based OS, a screen, an input device and built in nifty keyboard, internet connectivity. It runs applications, can use the internet. shares a code base with OSX. It is a PC, and should be afforded the same rights as a PC.
It *could* be a PC, *if* it were afforded the same rights as a PC.
A personal computer (PC) is any general-purpose computer
And that's the difference. The iPad isn't a general purpose computer. It runs what Apple wants it to.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Buy an iPhone, become a $99/year iOS ADC member
You forgot buying the Mac on which to run Xcode, for those 90% of households that have something other than a Mac.
And for those few people who do have those needs? What's wrong with paying $99/year?
Imagine buying a 3-year developer license and getting the device free. That's Android's value proposition.
what's wrong with them buying an Android device
That depends on to what extent Apple succeeds in suing Android out of existence.
or a PC, or a netbook
That'd be fine if manufacturers hadn't stopped making 10" laptops at the end of last year. I imagine that the supply of working used netbooks will dwindle.
How is this bad?
Ultimately, I want people to take time to consider whether iOS is right for them and will continue to be right for them over the years that they plan to own a device. Otherwise, people are more likely to suddenly run into one of the things that iOS can't do and get stuck until they've saved up for a brand new device.
There's something about using the internet for something as basic as a clipboard that just bugs me.
As I see it, that's a temporary measure because a lot of Windows PCs (and Kindle Fire tablets) lack Bluetooth.
Yes, many people will gladly limit their software options if it means no malware
Define "malware". According to the App Review Guidelines, Apple treats all these as malware: video games with realistic violence, roulette (whether chat or Russian), satire of an identifiable organization, card counting apps, apps that let the user log locations of seen Wi-Fi hotspots, apps that "download code in any way or form" such as a game maker, web browsers that implement HTML features that Apple has left out of Safari, launcher replacements, and more. Would "many people" agree with Apple's assessment?
third party updaters
Android apps are updated through the store from which they're downloaded. Apps downloaded from Google are updated through Google, those downloaded from Amazon are updated through Amazon, etc.
intrusive programs, etc.
Like iOS, Android limits an application's ability to steal focus or place pop-ups. Applications are expected to gain focus through the notification bar.
The iPad's sales figures prove it.
Nexus 7 by ASUS is beating the iPad and iPad mini combined. What does that prove?
They're not PCs. The end. Why is slashdot now a tabloid for sensationalist headline bullshit?
From their own website: Canalys: Who We Are
Canalys offers the reactivity and dynamism of a much smaller company, with the global coverage and local insight gained from offices in America, Europe and Asia. Experts in their fields, our analysts combine market knowledge and approachability to create tailored customer deliverables.
"We are a tiny, opportunistic startup, but that doesn't mean we're 'fly-by-night,' because we have two guys on the payroll that travel internationally every quarter!"
Not knowing any better, I'd guess that's what's that means. Maybe a Canalys PR agent can set me straight with some actual information that doesn't reek of weasel speak.
Our dedicated mobility services span smart phones, pads, notebooks, netbooks, security and app stores. First to incorporate netbooks and pads into PC market tracking, we also offer the most thorough smart phone data – tracking shipments into the channel, not sales or activations.
Within the IT infrastructure sector, our services encompass data centers, networking, security, unified communications, client PC markets and go-to-market strategies. Regardless of the customer segment, we maintain an unrivalled focus on technology distribution channels.
"Our continued success and growth depend on Apple's continued success, among others, and we've got a chunk in 'cloud' data centers. We are leveraged to make a profit when it all takes off."
Consider the source. This is not simply a market analysis firm, they are an infrastructure service provider.
So why does this belong on the front page? Their "analysis" criteria are a self-serving favor to stop the market blood loss in their own business. Apple has gone from $702.10/share to $468.25 in late January and has issued a dismal guidance. The favor's not been called in by Apple, but by someone whose got an unfavorable position and realizes that if the bubble bursts, they lose. Possibly their shirt.
HELLO? IS THIS THING ON?! No, a fscking iPad is not a PC. Sure, it's a computing device, but so is your Blu-ray player and some toasters. You're not going to process audio, video and do professional photo work on it. You can't do a vast subset of general computing on an iPad. Can you even compile something bigger than "hello world" on an iPad? Any PC can be, at the least, upgraded to do these fantastically powerful things and more. Perhaps slowly, but it will do it if you ask.
Please, let's not give up a walk on part in the Wall for a lead role in the Cage. The iPad is a content delivery peripheral, that requires general computation devices someplace else to be anything at all. It's all been compiled and compressed and, in some cases, stored remotely, on a real general-purpose computer. When you can process a two hour movie with special effects on an iPad, like you could with Video Toaster on a freaking Amiga, then we will call it a PC. Geez.
No. Being under the control of the end user has EVERYTHING to do with the definition of a personal computer. It's the whole raison d'etre. The PC empowered individuals to do for themselves. This often occured in conflict with the same exact kind of central planning that characterizes Apple products.
You're just a wounded fanboy upset that his overpriced toy doesn't make him l33t or some similar nonsense.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Actually, the Apple II predates the term "PC." The C-64 was not called a PC, because it was a trademark. We called them "home computers" back then, and we all knew that they were for hobbyists and if we wanted something real done we'd have to time share on a mainframe or mini-computer. The term PC came about when IBM invented it as a brand, for the IBM Personal Computer model 5150, in IIRC 1981.
With the advent of the clone market, "PC-compatible" became a term of art, and the term came to mean a much more powerful form of general-purpose computer. I think the crux of that is "general-purpose." You can compile on it. You can compress raw video on it. You can _produce_ anything digital with it, given enough time.
Look at what was done with the Commodore Amiga in Babylon 5, and tell me that the much more powerful iPad, which is more limited in what it can do with its power, is even in the same class.
No, they aren't specialized to refuse to run certain categories of apps. There is absolutely nothing stopping you from getting the SDK and developer's license (and a Mac if you don't already have one), and putting those apps on. I've had personal computers that didn't come with free development environments, and this is the same thing.
What Apple permits on the App Store has nothing to do with what the device is capable of.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
You can run an ssh server on your iPad just fine without jailbreaking? Fascinating. After you ssh into it, do you prefer to start vim or emacs for your coding? Do you compile using gcc or clang? How good are its manpages? What shell do you use? Do you prefer to elevate privileges using su or sudo? If you ssh in from an unrecognized terminal, how difficult is it to install new terminfo? How many users can ssh into your iPad at once? If you wanted to install Python for iOS on your iPad, what command would you enter over ssh to do so? After doing so, could you demonstrate for me a Python script that checks the iPad's entire storage for any software which hasn't been started in over six months and offers to uninstall it?
Or, did you completely miss the point about 'uses applications not truncated "apps"'? While I dislike the terminology, that right there really is one of the defining differences between PCs and whatever category you want to put iPads in. Software for iOS is crippled. Yes, you can run an ssh client on your iPad and consume the services of a server (or any real PC, even a Windows one). You can even use the iPad to produce stuff on that server or real PC. But that doesn't make the iPad into a PC. Consumption-based doesn't mean it can't be used to produce anything, merely that the intended uses of the OS are not focused on productivity. This is the exact opposite of PCs, which at their inception could be used for very little except productivity.
The other difference, of course, is the degree of control. A Windows machine does not come with an ssh server, but if I want to install one I can. Ubuntu doesn't allow logging in as root by default, but if I want to change this, I can. If I buy a Windows PC but then decide I'd rather have it be a Linux PC, that's as simple as re-installing the OS. If I buy a machine with Ubuntu and decide that its graphical user interface is crap, I can remove Unity and install FVWM and have it start that after login instead. None of these are possible on an iPad. Sure, you can install software... if it's Apple-approved, content to run in a sandbox with restrictions that you can't control, and doesn't require mucking with the system configuration. Even the relatively incompatible Macs of the 90s didn't actively prevent you from installing your own OS on them... marketing aside, they were PCs. iPads simply are not, though.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
suing Android out of existence
Apple has no intention to do that
Then what's this about the late Steve Jobs's "thermonuclear" anger? And was Apple v. Samsung about core functionality present in AOSP or about TouchWiz?
Then they bought the wrong thing, and will need to spend money to correct that mistake.
This hurts people who aren't in a position to spend any money, such as a child whose parents "already bought you an iPad" and don't appreciate the difference.
Wow... you said everything I was about to type.
Also, no one else is suggesting other modified definitions, so I move to vote my definitions into Nerd Law.
Who will second?
=)
All these threads on what constitutes a PC... Here's a question: Do we have a term other than PC to replace the ??? below...?
Pad: Handheld touch screen computer.
Pod: Small Pad
Phone: Device that enables communication by voice (+now also text)
Smartphone: Pod + Phone
???: Personally configurable Computer. Don't run on batteries. Most use separate keyboard, mouse, screen. Almost all contain an optical drive.
Laptop: Portable ??? that contains all or most of the parts in one casing. (Traditionally, most casings have been foldable, though that is rapidly changing.)
Ultrabook: Lean laptop that usually uses solid state memory and no optical drive to reduce size and increase battery life. (Term may have been coined by Intel, but it's becoming a general term.)
Palmtop: Tiny ultrabook (not necessarily Intel)
This definition includes Windows PCs, Linux PCs, Macs, and Android devices, especially Android devices with SL4A or AIDE installed. It does not include game consoles or iOS devices that aren't provisioned to a valid developer license.
A more rational definition is those machines that evolved from the IBM PC and it's clones. That means an CPU that evolved from the X86 line, and certain other commonalities of PC architecture. Basically if it can run DOS or Windows natively then it's a PC.
This definition includes Windows PCs, Linux PCs, x86 based Macs. But doesn't include Android devices nor iOS devices.
What category does the Microsoft Surface fall in to?
"Personal Computing Devices ".
change the classification after you can run visual studio on it.
surface Pro however is another story.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
someone would have made a mint selling you vt100's as pc's.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
terminals aren't pc's.
they're terminals.
how hard is it to get?
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
And I know a guy that made an RS-232 serial terminal out of a speak-and-spell. The ability to write code for other machines does not make a personal computer.
Yay, Macs4All is back spewing lies in defense of his favorite brand. Let me see one comment made on slashdot that expresses that Android tablets are PCs and iPads are not. Go on, give me a comment number. Trolls will be trolled Macs, I am bound and determined of that.
Please show me where I said anything about Android tablets and phones NOT being considered "Computers".
Learn to read, hater.
If it can run general purpose word processors, spreadsheets, and databases, it's a personal computer.
If people haven't bothered to create the traditional applications that defined PC's mentioned above, it's not a personal computer, it's a specialized device.
They need a way to keep saying Apple is #1 when everyone with a brain knows they are anything but.
Microsoft - Lets you run any programs you want on your device. Reviled by Apple Fanbois for being oppressive.
Apple - Tells you what you can and cant run on your device. Fluffed by Apple Fanbois for not being oppressive.
Which one seems more like the Party in Oceania?
A personal computer (PC) is any general-purpose computer
Unlike an Android tablet, the iPad isn't completely general-purpose. Apple's App Review Guidelines explicitly reject several purposes for the iPad, which I've described in this post. To turn the iPad into a general-purpose computer, you have to buy a Mac, but if you wanted a general-purpose computer, you could have bought the Mac in the first place.
Sure the very original mac couldn't compile its own code. But it also beat the hell out of a typewriter.
Furthermore, the original Macintosh wasn't purposely cryptographically restricted from compiling its own code. Anything that could produce an MC68000-compatible binary could be used to make an app for the original Macintosh. Once the 512 KiB "fat Mac" came out, compilers became practical.
remotely [...] terminal program
Consider the use case of using an application while riding public transit. (This happens to be my use case.) The transit authority does not provide Wi-Fi service on its buses. Now how should I connect to a server? Or am I expected to carry the server in my pocket?
Apple Now the Top PC Vendor, For Some Values of PC
The iPad is not designed to be a desktop replacement.
Then ultimately, not everybody agrees with "Some Values of PC".
Do calculators count [as personal computers]? I am talking about the basic one, not fancy programmable ones.
my "fancy programmable" TI-89 counts
I know someone that managed to code a game on a programmable calculator.
So do I. As I said, programmable calculators do count as personal computers.
If the criteria is "can be hacked with enough effort"
The criterion that I've been applying is whether a computing device for home or small business use can be transformed into a general-purpose programmable computing device without A. a recurring fee or B. the manufacturer attempting to reverse the transformation with a security update or a lawsuit.
we can't go around and count how many people did or are going to put a programming language on their tablet or phone.
I count people who are in theory capable of doing so.
As somebody who used to pay a good deal of money for compilers for his personal computers
Compilers were expensive until GCC put price pressure on compiler publishers. Apart from game consoles and iDevices, nothing sold as a replacement for a PC has cryptographic restrictions against downloading, installing, and running third-party developer tools such as GCC.
I'm going to argue that having to spend a few hundred dollars to program on something doesn't make it not a PC.
On which side of video game consoles do you draw the line? Anyone can move to Austin, Boston, or Seattle, do an internship for five years, start a game company, get a game concept approved, and buy the console devkit.
get a developer's license (and a Mac if you don't already have one)
A developer's license turns an iPad from not a PC into a PC. But a year later, it reverts to being not a PC.
There is absolutely nothing stopping you from getting the SDK and developer's license (and a Mac if you don't already have one), and putting those apps on.
In practice, most people who want to run one application that is conspicuous by its absence from the App Store aren't going to feel like blowing $750 extra on a Mac and the first year of a developer's license and then have to worry about renewing the developer license every year to turn an iPad into a general-purpose computer. Instead, they just lose out on a class of applications. It's like saying video game consoles are general-purpose personal computers because anyone can move to Austin, Boston, or Seattle, do a multi-year internship with a well-known game company, start his own game company, and become a licensed developer.
I've had personal computers that didn't come with free development environments, and this is the same thing.
I don't see how it's the same thing. The 8-bit microcomputers of the late 1970s and early 1980s came with BASIC, as did the original IBM PC model 5150. A development environment on a PC running one of the Debian forks is a sudo apt-get install build-essential away. And even if your PC running Windows doesn't come with a development environment, it doesn't cryptographically restrict you from installing software that one of your friends built for private distribution. It doesn't even restrict you from going to MinGW.org and downloading and installing GCC. Or does Codea's existence shoot my entire theory down?
Since the only difference between a tablet and a phone is the size of the screen, then smartphones should be counted too, which would make Samsung the "PC Leader", right?
Of course the trouble with this line of thinking is where do you draw the line? Are DVRs PCs? What about programmable thermostats? Programmable calculators? Internet-connected TVs?
Sorry, but no. Tablets, smartphones, and other gadgets are NOT PCs. Period. While I admit there is some grey area when it comes to convertible tablets and the like, which is are much more PC like than most tablets, the iPad certainly does not qualify as a personal computer.
It's still a step up from a terminal. The python code is local but in terms of web development if you're using a scripting language then you probably do work a lot more on a server. Fair enough Java and C# applications are too big and bulky for that but a good vim setup and python on a VM is just as good as doing it locally. It's better sometimes if I don't to muck around with Solr setups on my laptop.
No, he's right.
A "general purpose" tool is something that can be used for multiple purposes. There's no implication that the user has to be able to program it, let alone that the user should be able to program the machine using the machine itself. A single-purpose computer is something like the Bombe or the enigma machine. There are also analogue computers dedicated to specific tasks - it's the ability to *be* generally programmed that makes something general purpose, not the ability for the end-user to be able to program it; the distinction is small but significant.
My parents use a PC (it's a Mac, but hey) and all they ever use it for is email and the web. They could easily do that on a tablet as well. I'd humbly suggest there's a lot more people like my parents using "PC's" than there are people coding their own stuff on the very machine they bought. By sheer weight of numbers, the argument is carried in favour of the iPad (and other tablets) being PC's.
Physicists get Hadrons!
so, your tablet doesn't have LTE?
No. The version of the tablet with LTE costs more, and three years of LTE service costs even more than that. But on a laptop, I don't need it because the operating system doesn't cryptographically restrict me from what I want to do.
Can you magically debug a website on a laptop without a network connection?
Yes, by running Apache + PHP (or whatever) on localhost. Besides, not all applications are web applications. Or are you claiming that an application not completely dependent on a web service is necessarily irrelevant?
Why would you doing something like that on a bus anyway? Haven't you heard of "time management"?
Using the commute to do something productive is how I manage my time.
Many laptops are also not designed to be a desktop replacement. Does that mean they are not PCs either? No.
My netbook isn't cryptographically restricted from doing certain tasks. It can do pretty much anything that a Pentium 4-era PC could do, as Atom and NetBurst are comparable in performance clock-for-clock. It does the same things; it just does them a bit slower, which isn't a problem for things that were already fast enough due to being limited by user interaction more than by processing.
You seem to think that an Android device would need to use FAT to use an SD card, even if it were the only device to ever access it. That was my point.
I was under the impression that the user expected to be able to turn the phone off, eject the SD card, and insert it into a PC running Windows without Windows offering to erase everything on the card. This means the Android device cannot just reformat it to Ext.
fucking
Why so vulgar?
You seem to think that an Android device would need to use FAT to use an SD card, even if it were the only device to ever access it. That was my point.
I was under the impression that the user expected to be able to turn the phone off, eject the SD card, and insert it into a PC running Windows without Windows offering to erase everything on the card. This means the Android device cannot just reformat it to Ext.
fucking
Why so vulgar?
Because you are a asshole. Who else would constantly change the definition of things when he's losing an argument. " A tablet can't be a PC because it doesn't have expandable storage - which is needed only to exchange data with a real PC."
You are such a tool.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
Who else would constantly change the definition of things when he's losing an argument.
The only definition I remember using is that a personal computer is a computer that obeys the person who owns it.
A tablet can't be a PC because it doesn't have expandable storage - which is needed only to exchange data with a real PC.
I don't remember having said that. I'd appreciate seeing a link to where I said that.