Mobile Devices... everything is better?
You can hear it all over again today: "Oh, the newest smartphone is here... the PC is no longer of any use!" or "PS3, XBox and PCs... nobody needs them anymore, my cellphone is better andway..."
Before I begin: I like Android and I like my smartphone (own one of the fastest around currently) but these statements are just WRONG. Any good PC is much, much faster than any smartphone...
The more performance you need, the better a stationary computer is. "But my handy can do so much more than the PCs from 15 years ago...!" - Right... the bad thing is, they need to because the requirements are rising...
"Why should I play on a stationary device - my smartphones has great games too!" - right--- stupid Jump-n-Runs without a storyline, sense or beautiful graphics... a PC has always some big advantages over a mobile device:
1.) A PC can be built much bigger... this results in higher performance at the same technology level of both.
2.) A PC does not need to save too much energy. If you need to run a system with a battery, you need to lower the perfomance (at the same technology level) or your battery will be empty in 15 minutes...
3.) A mobil device must be protected against shocks. A PC is rarely pushed or thrown around... this is less work and less restrictions for the developer... without that you get a faster system (or with it a much more expensive one).
4.) Cooling: A mobil device has less moveable parts... because these are less shockresistent and louder... passiv coolings are less effective, especially if you need to built them smaller too. A fan and 100 cooling fins are better than 100 smaller cooling fins. (or much mor expensive)
And here is the conclusion: A PC is in terms of performance per dollar the MUCH better choice... why? Because you do not need to built better cooling systems, other materials, etc. to make it as fast as a slow stationary device.
If you buy a cmputer for 400 Euros today you will get a much faster system than any smartphone you can buy at any price...
"But my cellphone can everything and I can do it anywere!"
Is that right? Ever tried to do HD-editing on a smartphone? Even if (it is not like that) the perfomance would be enough and the needed discspace would be available (it is not... we are talking about Terrabytes here...): Do you really want to do that on a 5 inch-display? (which is a really large smartphone already) What about Imageediting, 3d graphics, 2d-graphics? What about really good 3d games with lots of story and top-edge graphics?
"Yes, but hey we got the Cloud!" Yes, you have got a cloud... Did you ever try to work with a slow harddisc? Such a harddisc it at reading rates of 40-60 MB per second (this is a slower Harddisk). Even those are bad for editing. You should use SSDs or fast RAID-Systems for that... Lets calculate what LTE, one of the fastes mobile connection systems got today... (if you have luck and it is available at your location...) You get at max something like 32 000 KiloBIT/s (and not even all the time). This is a Reading-speed of 32 MBit/s = 32 / 8 MB/s = 4 MB/s. If you really want edit HD videos you will be happy with about 80-100 MB/s... and we are talking about HD, not 4K or whatever will come in the future. So to work with that LTE must be about 20-25x as fast as it is today to edit with it... given that there are no better video-technologies tomorrow...
And just to say it again: These are READINGspeeds... not writing... divide the speed of LTE by about 6 to get those speeds... (best would be to have the same speed as reading here.)
Yeah, you are right: We are close to getting rid of PCs... *if you find ironie, keep it...*
All the hype is as always far away from the truth... a SmartPhone is really a very nice helper for mobile communication... but that is that... use it to call somebody, to surf, to use WhatsApp or to play a short game when waiting somewhere... but it will not be a full pc replacement in closer future...