The end of an era

As of 2012, personal computers no longer consume the majority of the world’s memory chip supply. According to market research firm HIS iSuppli, some time in the second quarter this year PCs accounted for 49 per cent of DRAM commodity memory chips, down from 50.2 per cent in the first quarter of the year.

The firm expects those statistics to drop to 43 per cent next year, while tablets and smartphones will account for 23 per cent of chips, an irrevocable sign that the world has embraced mobility. Manufacturers have raced to revamp the personal computer and this summer’s IFA technology showcase in Berlin saw the launch of a genre of new all-in-one PCs, including new products — and families – from Toshiba, Acer, Lenovo and Samsung.

Those using Lenovo’s IdeaCentre B340 and B345 models, which come equipped with 21.5-inch HD-touch displays, will be able to scroll documents, browse the web or flip between pictures and movies using various touch gestures. Samsung’s new Series 7 and Series 5 PCs also offer the option of controlling computers with hand gestures instead of having to touch a screen. Consumers can turn pages of a book simply by swooshing right or left, or adjust the volume of a movie by rotating their palms in the required direction.

Phablets

Mobility isn’t as simple as buying an iPhone anymore. If you can’t decide between a smartphone and a tablet, opt for a phablet. The term is used to refer to smartphones with tablet-like capabilities and screen sizes of five inches or more. While the Dell Streak pioneered this genre, Samsung’s Galaxy Note is the best-known product of this type. The need for the phablet has been heightened by the success of products such as Amazon’s Kindle and the Asus Google Nexus 7.

ABI Research has predicted phablet shipments could reach 208 million by 2015. Taking things forward are reports of a seven-inch mini Apple iPad, which should make phablets even more popular, particularly with fun-loving consumers in search of cheap devices to access entertainment and the internet. Phablets are expected to be the next battleground in the technology wars, and one of the most eagerly awaited products is Samsung’s Galaxy Note 2, premiered at IFA Berlin and reportedly expected to sell 20 million units. Other manufacturers developing these new products include LG and HTC.

A different sort of hybrid tablet was being hyped at IFA, where products based on Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 8 and Windows RT operating systems were unveiled. These systems have been developed with tablets in mind, so tablet-PC hybrids will be the rage over the next few months — a move that was to be expected after Intel released a number of reference designs earlier this year.

These new products can be computers that feature swivel screens, allowing them to be used either as notebook computer or as tablets, such as the Dell XPS Duo 12 and Toshiba’s Satellite 925t. They can be tablets with keyboards that snap on, as we have seen with the Asus Transformer, and others such as HP’s Envy x2.

Although patents for holographic keyboards have already been filed (and one such keyboard was even rumoured to be in the iPhone 5) their unavailability means tablets that use actual keyboards will continue to remain popular.

Cloudy lives

After five years of hype, the real business benefits of cloud computing are becoming clear. Enterprises have moved from using the cloud to replace outdated systems to making decisions on selected workloads to implement on cloud services and where they need to build out private clouds. Major suppliers such as Apple, Microsoft, Oracle, IBM and SAP continue to expand their cloud offerings, which will help improve cloud services for larger enterprises, says research firm Gartner, adding that smaller firms will need to find niche IT suppliers who understand their unique needs.

Enterprise mobility has truly been unleashed — but consumers also find that cloud computing helps their personal lives. You can get 5GB of cloud storage from suppliers such as Google and Microsoft, which is just the tip of the iceberg. The likes of Apple and Gartner believe online services that let consumers store, sync, stream and share using multiple connected devices will replace the PC as the centre of our digital lives by 2014. Exposure to services such as Netflix, Google Apps, Amazon Music, Microsoft SkyDrive and Apple’s iCloud in what is being called the post-PC era is driving the demand for such services.

This, in turn, is driving the adoption of trends such as BYOD, where employees bring and use their own devices in the workplace and the tracking of social influence by sites such as Klout, Kred and PeerIndex, which look for expert creators and aggregators who generate a measurable reaction.

Augmented Reality

The way in which the virtual and real worlds collide was demonstrated by fashion designer Diane Von Furstenberg during her new 2013 spring collection in September. Models at the show walked the ramp wearing Google Glasses.

The search giant’s latest accessory can take photographs and present the world in new and different ways. It is designed for sharing and to offer instant, hands-free access to information. Priced at $1,500 (about Dh5,500), the initial Explorer Edition is expected to be available to developers next year, with a refined version of the wearable computer for the general public planned to go on sale in 2014. Critics have compared the product to a smartphone you never have to take out of your pocket.

The current model packs memory, a processor, a camera, a speaker and microphone, Blutooth and Wi-Fi antennas, an accelerometer, compass, gyroscope and a battery inside the right earpiece. Google plans for the product to have a cellular radio so it can connect to the internet without using a phone connection as it does now.

The product’s success or failure will not affect the way technology itself is being used. Augmented reality superimposes computer-generated virtual objects onto our own view of the world. The technology has extended beyond gaming into the real world via the smartphone (apps are available to measure distance and find parked cars) and the tablet computer, with schools in Japan using AR-linked textbooks.

Indeed, the future holds many possibilities. For example, in medicine a surgeon may use augmented reality in an operating room to manipulate a scalpel inside a body cavity. Another is a contact lens under development for use in gaming and warfare. The US company Innovega uses transparent optics to view virtual and augmented reality images in the same way we view the real world, blending both worlds. 

— Special to GN Focus