ARM as a high-powered desktop CPU: Did not see that coming

[vidarh]

As much as I have a soft spot for alternative cpu archs, ARM has less and less of a place outside of cellphones and embedded sectors

I doubt ARM worries about that, though - analysts expects around 5 billion ARM cores to be shipped this year (fewer CPU's, since more and more of the designs are dual core).

While they may seem to have been pushed out of places like the desktop, keep in mind that the desktop and laptops make up a smaller and smaller percentage of the computing market.

Cellphones, tablets and embedded devices is where the volume is, and both cellphones and tablets are eating their way up into spaces where laptops and desktops ruled before. Look at the newly announced Motorola Atrix - a phone that docs with a laptop "shell", as well as a number of phones that now support bluetooth keyboards.

As a result, we might very well see the bottom falling out of the desktop and laptop market very soon, with both of them relegated to the high end of the market, with smart phones and tablets becoming the only computers for a lot of people. And that sector is overwhelmingly ARM dominated, with 90%+ of the cores shipped.

EDIT: Oh, yes, forgot to mention: The Atrix *does* use the Nvidia Tegra

[vidarh]

Doubtful, what is being shown is that whilst traditional big box stuff isn't selling as well, all in ones, so called life style PCs are doing rather well for a variety of reasons.

They are still being outsold massively by smartphones. Smartphones that now more an more commonly can either hook up to larger keyboards and/or TVs/monitors. It removes the need for a more complicated computers for a fairly large segment of users that only wants to download/listen to music, surf the web, check their e-mail and write the odd letter etc.

As for your figures about the number of cores sold, only a tiny proportion of them will be anything other than low end.

That's part of the point: The very low end now is so powerful that more and more people don't *need* any more. The average price for laptops sold for example has gone through the floor, and even that wasn't enough to stave off the rise of netbooks.

Still waiting for the software to catch up though.

It doesn't need to. Most users of these devices are fall in one of two categories: The ones that are light computer users only using it for a relatively small set of functions, and the ones that use it as a secondary device. Both of these are catered for by Android (or iOS or whatever floats their boat). As for the rest of the potential market? With Windows for ARM, no matter what we might think of Windows, most people will be satisfied...

Notice also how the Motorola phone also has an alternative docking station that lets you connect the phone to TV or monitor. Effectively they are targeting the rapidly growing segment that is willing to shell out far more than the average laptop price on "just a phone" but that might want the added capabilities occasionally.

If I was a desktop or laptop maker targeting the low end, I'd be very, very nervous about what's coming.

[vidarh]

Ok I'm going to need a citation for that.

These are 2009 numbers, not much in terms of 2010 numbers available yet:
Smartphone sales at 172 million vs. global PC sales at 66 million in Q2, so if we extrapolate those numbers to all of 2009, which we can't be sure is reliable, we'd get 262 million, so I guess I those numbers don't back that one up...

But these look better: Q2 2010 seems to indicate 70+ million smartphones a quarter

EDIT: Doh. Updated to reflect that the PC sales numbers was for one quarter.
EDIT2: Hah, but growing at a ridiculous rate.

Erm, entry level laptop prices have been at around the £300 mark for at least the past 5 years. You can get low end laptops and desktops that is cheaper than a netbook.

Entry level, yes, but the issue is *average* laptop prices. PC manufacturers have been increasingly squeezed as everyone outside of the Mac market buy cheaper laptops than they used to on average. This is why profits from PC sales for the major PC manufacturers gets dwarfed by profits from Apples lower sales volumes (even if you exclude their iTunes, iPod and iPhone business).

Not if their favourite programs can run on them, games especially.

The average PC users don't play high end titles on their PC's. They are at most casual gamers, and more and more of that market is being taken over by phone.

Seen it. I've played with such phones, the experience is less than stellar currently.

It doesn't need to be stellar. It needs to be good enough for someone that needs to use Facebook and write a letter and run iTunes.