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That is the future. PC/Phone/Tablet convergence with external monitor.  
Decrease the belief in God, and you increase the numbers of those who wish to play at being God by being “society’s supervisors,” who deny the existence of divine standards, but are very serious about imposing their own standards on society.-Neal A. Maxwell
You must accept 1 of 2 basic premises: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not alone. Either way, the implications are staggering!-Wernher von Braun
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Throw in TV and I think you've got it!
Da Bomb
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Hey, you can play video on your phone/monitor hookup. So yeah! Already there!
Decrease the belief in God, and you increase the numbers of those who wish to play at being God by being “society’s supervisors,” who deny the existence of divine standards, but are very serious about imposing their own standards on society.-Neal A. Maxwell
You must accept 1 of 2 basic premises: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not alone. Either way, the implications are staggering!-Wernher von Braun
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I'm not convinced.
I know how hot my PC gets when it's really busy...
And sometimes, I want to leave the PC doing something in the background while I go out.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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You leave your PC alone? At home?
I don't trust my code enough. At the very least I need baby gates and sturdy locks if the machine's staying plugged in.
As to heat: you obviously don't live in Canada. Given that Winter's coming I'm planning on running some really long numerical models and then keep my phone snug and tight against me while I race from over-heated building to over-heated building.
cheers
Chris Maunder
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...or tell 'em you are hibernating this year, and fly off back to Oz 'til April? 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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OriginalGriff wrote: ...or tell 'em you are hibernating this year, and fly off back to Oz 'til April?
May not want to do that, looks like Sydney will be 40 degrees today and it's still only November.
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I agree. My main computer is now my Surface2 Pro tablet with HDMI connection to my 55" TV. The mouse is WIFI and I'm looking for a WIFI keyboard.
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Wow, you have a Wifi mouse? Whats the latency like?
Hang on  , they actually do exist!
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I suspect it might be a mouse with a Wi-fi receiver like my trusted Logitech Marathon  one USB receiver to rule them all! (Or at least 6)
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Chris Maunder wrote: Your phone is now your PC.
No, not even halfway.
A PC is something I use for Visual Studio - I doubt that one would have some decent performance after installing Sql Server Express and VS2012 on there. Sorry, but the XBox is more desktop that your average phone.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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I'm assuming you've been using VS for a few years, and my phone is now more powerful than the laptop I was using a few short years ago, yet that laptop ran Visual Studio, and SQL Server, and IIS. Without any problems.
Your phone isn't going to be a replacement for every computer, always. That's not the point. Your phone is reaching the point where it has adequate power to be your PC if you wish. I, personally, want one of those Mac Pros with a zillion gigawatts of power and more memory than an elephant. However, when I travel I can't take a desktop with me (well I can, but that's just crazy). I want to just take my phone, and I want to be able to pop into a remote office, connect to screen and keyboard, and continue working from where I was.
For the average, non-power-user user, PCs these days are woefully over-powered for what they use it for. For most people the phone is actually perfectly adequate.
Wireless charging, wireless peripherals, wireless (and cellular) connectivity. It's happening and it will continue to happen. I'll still have a desktop or a decent laptop for when I don't feel like waiting 2 mins for a build, but I will switch to a tablet and then a phone as my travel dev machine as soon as I can.
cheers
Chris Maunder
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Chris Maunder wrote: I'm assuming you've been using VS for a few years, and my phone is now more powerful than the laptop I was using a few short years ago
Yes, and I can't make that comparison; I don't own a very recent smartphone. Still I'm sceptical whenever there's any such claim without a benchmark.
Performance matters[^] though.
Chris Maunder wrote: For most people the phone is actually perfectly adequate.
Any webbrowser-capable device is adequate for most people.
Chris Maunder wrote: I'll still have a desktop or a decent laptop for when I don't feel like waiting
2 mins for a build, but I will switch to a tablet and then a phone as my travel
dev machine as soon as I can.
Why wait? Remote Desktop into your desktop or decent laptop using whatever mobile thin client you prefer.
I'd recommend also carrying a light-weight keyboard (bluetooth) if you need to do some serious typing on a limited machine.
--edit;
Nearly forgot, but thanks for the explanation.
Bastard Programmer from Hell
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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Eddy Vluggen wrote: Why wait? Remote Desktop into your desktop or decent laptop using whatever mobile thin client you prefer.
I don't have "a desktop". I have a laptop that I carry around. I used to remote into my desktop in Toronto when I was in Australia, but you can imagine how fun that is when bandwidth is low and pings high.
I've decided I'm going to pin my hopes and dreams on the next generation of Windows Phones. They will have all the bugs fixed, the devices will be thin and light with a month of battery, they will all have 8 cores and 16GB RAM, and with each phone you get a Pony.
My hobby seems to be setting myself up for disappointment.
cheers
Chris Maunder
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Chris Maunder wrote: They will have all the bugs fixed, the devices will be thin and light with a month of battery, they will all have 8 cores and 16GB RAM, and with each phone you get a Pony.
Ah. You are a "glass half full" man.
Or more realistically "a much bigger class full to the brim with nicer liquid" I suspect
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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I tend to just remove the cork and drink straight from the bottle...
cheers
Chris Maunder
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Chris Maunder wrote: you can imagine how fun that is when bandwidth is low and pings high.
I connect using 3G to play Warcraft, so yes.
My "desktop" is sized 12x12x5cm, contains no moving parts. The future would probably meet in between.
Chris Maunder wrote: and with each phone you get a Pony.
You got a big freezer?
Chris Maunder wrote: My hobby seems to be setting myself up for disappointment.
True, pony is not a good BBQ-meat
Bastard Programmer from Hell
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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Chris Maunder wrote: with each phone you get a Pony
Just a pony? Well heck, I'm going to hold out for the baby unicorn.
Seriously though, while I too want to have a desktop-capable PC that fits in my pocket and dumbs down to being a smartphone when I'm not using it like a desktop, it isn't really that practical. I don't exactly need to write code while I'm driving home, and any data I need while mobile is probably better off living in a cloud than a phone flash drive. Heck, if I ever needed to write code on the go, I could probably already use my phone as a front end to a cloud server running a virtual machine.
We can program with only 1's, but if all you've got are zeros, you've got nothing.
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Sorry, but I disagree.
- A phone screen is much too small for useful work; at best it is good for reading/writing short emails.
- A tablet might be OK for document editing, if you had an external keyboard and a mount for the tablet (so it can stand on a desk). Otherwise, the on-screen keyboard takes up too much space and typing on the screen leads very quickly to "gorilla arm".
- If you need a desk (or flat surface) for effective work on your tablet, what is the difference between it and an ultra-portable? The fact that the keyboard is detachable?
- Lastly, can you show me a phone/tablet with (a) the RAM capacity of a portable, (b) the storage capacity of a portable, (c) the processing power of a portable, (d) and most important - at the price point of a portable?
If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.
--Winston Churchill
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Quote: A phone screen is much too small for useful work
Hear! Hear! When you get to be as old as I am, and your eyesight starts fading like mine does....
Well, a decent desktop with dual 27 inch monitors are essential!
How do we preserve the wisdom men will need,
when their violent passions are spent?
- The Lost Horizon
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You missed a fairly important point. Your Desktop is also terrible as an input device. That's why you add a keyboard and mouse to the beigeness.
The phone is not your input device (although with continuum it becomes a touchpad). You connect a wireless keyboard and moust, wireless (or wired) monitor, and have wireless (or, again, wired) charging.
The difference between a phone and an ultraportable that an you already have a phone and it fits in your pocket. An Ultraportable is a second device. If you have a setup where you have handy access to a monitor and wireless input devices (ie travelling between home and work) then you don't need two devices.
The caveat here is that if you're travelling and want a decent screen and keyboard then your phone won't cut it. But neither does your desktop. In these situations a tablet with a smartcover will get you through if you can stand using them. Or you grab an ultraportable.
Pricepoint? See above: you already have a phone. YOU may need something more powerful than a phone and a phone as your PC may simply not work. However, power, speed and capacity is increasing and there will be point where a phone will, probably, be "good enough".
Just a few short years ago a laptop was "good enough" for me, but not great. Now my Macbook Air is well and truly good enough. Phones will catch up (and are catching up) soon.
cheers
Chris Maunder
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At least you get it.
My primary work machine is a VM host that's in a room away from my office and runs all of my "real" work machines (a bunch of VMs). The "computer" at my desk can be underpowered, I don't care; I just need to be able to hook it up to my USB hub, to which my mouse/keyboard/3 monitors are attached. That used to be a first-gen Surface Pro. It's now an Intel NUC, because unlike my Surface Pro, it can do 4K. But there's nothing else running locally.
If a phone running something like Continuum and Remote Desktop can be hooked up to a USB hub, I could see using a phone being the only device on my desk in the future.
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I like how it sounds. Haven't been able to test it tho, but saw it demonstrated.
But it will never replace my main desktop (just as a laptop will never replace it).
I like to have at least 2 screens (preferably 3) when doing some serious work. And somewhere around the 24" range.
I have a laptop from work that I use whenever I work from home and always find it annoying to work on the native screen, if only I could find that spare vga cable I have somewhere so I could connect one of my screens. (have a thousand and one cables but not the one I need)
But as a traveling companion I can see great power in it.
Also (but less relevant) I doubt phones will ever be powerful enough to keep up with latest games (so I don't see the "gamers" using it).
I like where this is going and the possibilities it will bring, but I won't be rushing out to the store to get me a new phone. I like to use my phones until they break and that usually only happens once every 3 to 4 years (and my current phone is only a year old so...)
Tom
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Tom Deketelaere wrote: doubt phones will ever be powerful enough to keep up with latest games (so I don't see the "gamers" using it).
I just had this exact argument with Yuriy, and while they can certainly do awesome things with big, SLI'd cards on your PC, what they are doing on phones and tablets is not too shabby at all. There's seriously cool graphics going on.
cheers
Chris Maunder
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Yes and for 50% or so off the games it's going to be more than enough, but the games that are truly graphical intensive, I don't know.
I currently have the Nokia Lumia 1020 phone. And I love it but 2 things:
- heat: when I use the gps app (native from nokia) and the spotify app (offline) together, the phone does it beautifully but it gets so hot I can bake an egg on it. So if that phone (that's supposed to be a flag ship phone) gets so hot from 2 "simple" apps, what's it going to do when running visual studio + sql + a couple browsers + some more stuff, blow up?
- battery life: if I do nothing on the phone I might get 2 days out off it. As soon as I use it, it drops down to about 1 day (depending on what I actually do on it). And if I use the camera or gps it drops down to an hour or 2. It's so bad that when I use the gps + spotify app at the same time I can see the charge leaving the phone. Even if I plug it into my car (since that's where I usually use the gps), using the cable that came with it, since that does make a difference for some reason, the battery still drains (at an alarming rate)
And my previous phone (also a nokia windows phone) had similar issues, not as bad as this one but ...
So I'm a bit worried about those things, giving my current and previous experiences.
So yeah there is a future in it but I think they still have a way to go.
But all great adventures start with one step 
And if they can make it work with 2 screens, no heat issues and a acceptable battery life I can definitely see it replace most of the desktops / laptops (especially the work desktops / laptops).
Tom
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