Rise of the Machines: Epic battle of the ages between PCs, Consoles and Mobiles

[TriniXaeno]

and so they rise.....

[TriniXaeno]

http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/discrete-gpus-see-biggest-drop-in-shipment-since-2008/

Another disturbing development for the PC aficionados

The slow death of dedicated graphics cards

Another trend that will need bucking for PC to regain momentum

On the flipside, intel seems to think its 5200 integrated graphics is good enough for even Steam Machine duty.

So we will see soon enough if the death of discrete GPUs will usher in an era of capable on board graphics.

I've been a keen observer of the latter over the years and AMD seems set for a big push in that direction as well.

[MessiaaH]

Death of discrete gpus...




I'll leave it at that.

[IsMe2003]

I don't know why i bother as folks seem to be missing the fact that PC gaming is increasing, but continue a die hard hinging on hardware sales figures.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/09/04/why-pc-gaming-has-exploded

Anyway, see you at the PC Gaming Funeral 2015, don't bring to much beers doh case me and you might be the only ones there.

[TriniXaeno]

separate the two arguments gentlemen for they are not one and the same.

The numbers show a downward spiral in the sale of discreet GPUs (something that should be of keen interest to local industry pundits such as yourselves)

Let us treat with that.

Thoughts?

[MessiaaH]

My thoughts is sales figures go up and down all d time.

A 10% drop in discrete GPU sales, in a time when mobile at it's peak, integrated making a strong play, next gen consoles being launched (which btw have discrete gpus as well, but not sure if those even included in those figures), also form 1 source who I don't even know if to trust cause them come up with their own figures. Plus according to them is 14 mil, vs 16, etch etc etch.

If what they say is true, you sell 14 million GPUs, and that some how equates to the death of discrete GPUs? Really?

Is d same thing like the death of PC. All d hoopla bout PCs dying and on the way out. And PC sales take a hit etch etc etch. Yet still Windows 8 in a few short months have more market share than all mac OS versions combined.

The slightest little negative news in sales figures don't equate to the death of anything. Apple was at one point about to go bankrupt, and now they're the richest most profitable company in the world.

PC market share is too ridiculously huge for PCs to be dead in 2 years.
The consoles sold broke all sorts of sales records in that 1 month of release, AMD not going to stop making discrete gpus ANYTIME soon.

NVIDIA made some 6 billion $ in profit, yea..... BILLION. Most of which was off discrete GPUs. Them not going to stop making GPUs anytime soon.

The whole argument is ridiculous IMO

Technology can advance without the death of another. More advanced integrated chips, don't mean discrete going anywhere. More advance mobile devices don't mean more powerful ones going anywhere. Better looking mobile games don't mean high powered visually jaw dropping epic power hungry AAA games going anywhere.

Valve making gangbuster profits. So much so they can afford to start experimenting and trying stuff.

There will always be UPs and Downs. It by no means mean it dead. This is not the first time PC shipments, or Discrete GPU shipments went down, and it wont be the last...

http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS24293513

IDC report 300m PCs by 2017 ...lol. But it should be dead by the end of 2015?.
300.....million. Anyways. 2015 right they, we'll soon see.

[TriniXaeno]

you start off good but then devolve into the "PC death tail spin"

I was hoping you'd keep it separate for discussion sake.

That is.....the death of discrete graphics aside and apart from PC gaming as a whole. Remember, the APU and integrated graphics are increasing in power along side the scarcity of separate graphics cards.

It is like the death of the sound card, nic, modem, etc.... Pretty much gone are the days of PCs having an individual card dedicated to those tasks.

They have been slowly but surely integrated into the mainboard over the years.

The 3D graphics card has pretty much been the last hold out.

Looking at my Steam Machine, it only has one expansion slot....just one. Currently filled with a discrete card. That is very telling.

Was a time when a computer would have 6 and 8. I remember those days very well. How far we have come.

[MessiaaH]

PCs always had onboard audio. But you may find less dedicated audio cards because it have no competition.
Create Labs has been the leader for many many years. Asus is the only other player who has put up a fight in recent times. But 2 things happen in audio. 1. High end audio has made a giant serge. Back in the day you'd be hard pressed to find a decent pair of headphones, now the internets is littered with them, from low end, all d way up to $5500 headphones. Paired with that rise, is the rise of high end dedicated audio components. More men now have receivers than before. And external audio gear. Also companies like turtle beach etch have their own solutions, they take the processing/power outside of the PC, and put it into bay stations that your headphones then plug into. Then apart from that. Men like Asus, take actual sound cards, not no water-down integrated thing, I mean real sound cards, amps and all (making it more powerful than you standard card) They were able to do that because soundcards never needed any serious power, and it was too expensive to integrate the tech into affordable motherboards. But now with flagship 400$ motherboard being sold and bought, Asus is now able to put the power of dedicated soundcards into the mobo. All that to say...... soundcards ain't gone anywhere, the technology got more powerful, better, and more options.

Network cards ain't going NOWHERE! Especially in the corporate world. WiFi AC now come out, and though good, still littered with the flaws that make the technology un-reliable in a corporate environment. Your mobile devices mite start losing network ports, because having to plug in a network cable goes against the very nature of being mobile. But network cards ain't gone anywhere.

I think if you want to get internet, you still need a DSL modem, which even bigger and more powerful than the integrated ones in a pc. So yet another component that hasn't gone anywhere. Just get bigger, badder, and better.

So non of those 3 applies to the discussion at hand.

Now onto steam machines. Their are steam machines announced that cost thousands of dollars, with ENOUGH! Ports for anybody interested. Looking at the cheapest steam machine and saying it only have 1 expansion port is not saying anything Aral. It have barebone machines years now with no expansion ports. That ain't say boo. It just means customers now have a cheap option to compliment the expensive. Why put 7 ports in a machine that not even going to have the power to service all 7 ports properly, or take advantage of d cards that u mite want to put in there? If you want that, step up to the big boy steam machines.

And with things like Project Christine, the idea of free PCI-e slots could very well become a thing of the past. Because if you want new or additional gear, slot it into the free proprietary expansion ports.

I think I rebut everything yuh say. Graphics Cards ain't going anywhere. They going to get more powerful. Bigger, Bader, Better. Back in the day the idea of a 12" card would be considered ludicrous. Now them thing is d norm LoL. Anyways....

[TriniXaeno]

As always, we get lost in semantics.

So to be clear....the author of the article is specifically concerned with the downward trend in the sales of discrete graphics.

Certainly graphics processing isn't going anywhere but the issue is that more and more people are turning towards the integrated (and by large inferior) option over a separate component.

Same has happened with the sound card and network card.

We don't need a poll to know that the vast majority of PCs in the wild today are sporting integrated sound and NICs.

10 years ago the converse was true. This didn't happen overnight...it was slow and steady.

Care to check the sales of dial up modems?

Trends are very powerful things. They can be bucked...but if there is no intervention....the current trend points to a future of integrated graphics.

I've had an almost macabre interest in their development, so I'm not overly concerned personally. The last APU I played with actually completed 3dmark 2011 (score was horrid...but just running the benchmark was a success in my eyes, lol)

Still a long way to go.

[MessiaaH]

Dude seriously, u seriously asking how much dial up modem sold and want to compare it to this? How does one even argue against a point like that. That's like saying check how much kingswood selling, and claiming cars done for......

Ah mean, seriously dude? That's like asking how much CRT selling and saying PC monitors dead....

Put things into perspective please. D whole purpose of the article is to try to show that PC Graphics cards dying, and on their way out. Followed by your statement "death of discrete gpus".

I already explain the point of integrated audio. D integrated audio in motherboards these days are better than dedicated sound cards in recent years. You telling me integrated graphics going to be better than dedicated cards in a few years? HELL NO.

Is not the same thing. It's completely different. And dedicated audio cards back in the day was not a luxury item. It was required. u want audio? You have to buy one, plain and simple. Is not to say men was buying high end audio cards in droves and that's no longer the case. You bought a card cause that was the way to get audio.  Now they taking those same cards, in an even better form, and building it right in. And either marking up the cost, or subsidizing it because manufacturing of audio components of that level to the point now that it cheap to just include.

Man say count how much dial up modems selling oui.

If you honestly think Discrete GPUs need to be remotely concerned about anything then I don't know.
Did I not say that the biggest discrete gpu maker in the world made billions of dollars in profit last financial year?

*yawn*

I can't wait till 2015 nah, to witness this death of PCs. And can't wait to see discrete GPUs dead.

[TriniXaeno]

I feel we need to talk using maths yes. 1s and 0s iwmc cause English not working.

All kicks aside

Sounds as though as far as you concerned the falling sales of GPUs is of no worry.

Carry on smartly.

And do remember....the prophecy speaks of the rise of the consoles.

Take a sense check on the number of players running Ghost on PC vs those on Xbox one and ps4.

I'll wait.....

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

[MessiaaH]

No, the temporary dip in gpu sales is of zero worry.

Also, take a count of how much ppl driving Kia and how much driving Mazda 6 , ill wait....

The amount of article posted showing how PC gaming has GROWN and getting bigger, but like facts meaningless.
Consoles having a bigger userbase don't mean anything. Same applies to mobile.

New markets, more people, all can strive, don't have to be at the expense of another. All different areas of entertainment. Different markets, different ppl. Valve trying to expand the PC market into the living room. Consoles has had that market created and locked since day one. Nothing change. They created a market, carve it out, and making money, and at the same time, PC gaming is at its best.

[TriniXaeno]

Lol @ KIA and Mazda.

Better analogy would be jaguar (high end pc) and Toyota (low end pc and consoles)


And so they rise.

Steam Machines are the only real hope to abate that future IMO.

It is a slim chance but I'm rooting for 'em.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

[MessiaaH]

Apple had no hope, until a single dude, came with a single vision, of a single device, and propelled the company to the most profitable one in the world.

Never say never in the tech industry. Especially when you dealing with such gigantic players.

[MessiaaH]

There, I fixed your image for you....

Also, I have no idea where that graph come from, but hard-core PCs != PC gaming.

The "Real" Truth:



Source link and all :http://www.netmarketshare.com/os-market-share.aspx?qprid=9

Dead in 2 years? Right!

[TriniXaeno]

thanks, not sure wtf tapatalk was doing. When I edited it in the mobile browser it wasn't showing either.

Just came on my laptop to edit it myself. lol

But totally agreed @ the apple example

You know how strongly I stand behind Steam....Gabe has my vote. He will need a billion more votes and the consoles + mobile don't look to be losing momentum yet.

2014 now start, we will see how it goes.

As for Hard Core not being PC Gaming....I hear you.....but when people talk about Mt Olympus.....they not including the man sweating farmville on his IGP equipped netbook. lol

Is machines that could make top 20 on the GATT 3DMark list they referring too (and you damn well know that!)

[MessiaaH]

I think the graph you posted is skewed towards the uber high end of PCs.
There are MANY cheap pcs, that can run B4 easily. Hard-Core qualifies as the elite yes. But non-elite also don't mean Farmville alone. Case in point, 500$ steam machine. That not meant for Farmville. And also cannot remotely qualify as hard-core.

[TriniGamerShaq]

These graphs could never be taken seriously because i don't think i ever see one that ever go into detail what they define as pc gaming.

And btw messiah, seein as  you is ah man who buy a console just to play killer instinct so exactly what you define as cheap?

[MessiaaH]

The graph I posted can be taken seriously, because it is very specific, but yes, the PC gaming ones can be all over the place. Also, cheap in relation to what? What I think is a cheap PC? A cheap Phone, a cheap, console, what?

[TriniGamerShaq]

There are MANY cheap pcs, that can run B4 easily.

So cheap as in PC obviously.