Do you remember going to a video store and renting a VCR and a movie or two? Soon VCR’s were common and everyone had one. Do you remember going with your friends and their parents to rent movies on a Friday night. It wasn’t long after that when everyone just started buying the movies so that they could watch them anytime.

You likely acquired a large collection of VHS tapes of your favorite movies. Then along came this thing called a DVD. They caught on pretty quick and it wasn’t long before everyone was buying DVD’s and DVD players. Trying to find a VCR for sale now is almost impossible and a thing called Blu-ray disks are starting onto the scene. They may replace all of those DVD’s.

So, the question is posed, will desktop computers become a thing of the past? Will we decide that all we need is our laptops and phones? Our society is one that is connected at the hip to computers. Some people start to panic if they cannot access all of their files at all times. The desktop computer stays on the desk and does not come with us wherever we go. Because it does not move with our every movement, we cannot gain access to the files on that computer wherever we go.

This is a fun question to muse about, because daily there are new websites, phones, and apps to go on both that help us stay connected 24 /7. That is not to say that we will completely leave the desktop behind, but do you remember the 3X5 disk? How many people own a computer with a floppy drive in them anymore? How many files do you have on those old floppies that you have no access to anymore?

So let’s play devil’s advocate here and ask the question, what are the reasons that desktop computers will stick around? Why can we not do everything and more with the laptop that we do with a desktop? One thing that could be taken as a hint that desktops are going to stick around is the continuing manufacturing and improving of desktop computers. If manufactures saw a trend significant enough against desktops, then they would not continue to improve them and manufacture them.

Another reason why desktop computers may not be leaving anytime soon is the instinctive need people have to have a “home base”. They need a place that they can start from, even if they need to take the show on the road only a few minutes later. Also, some people just plain prefer to work on a desktop and only function from a laptop when it is necessary.

All of that said, we are still a society that is evolving into a 24/7 connected society. We like knowing what is happening as it happens rather than hearing about it on the evening news (and our friends happenings are not on the news). We like the freedom to work from wherever we please, be it at home, the park, or in the office. Employers also like connection and are finding that if they use laptops they can stay better connected to their employees, even when they are at home or on vacation because they will be more likely to be connected to the 24/7 information super highway.

Certainly network applications will use desktops as part of the main piece of a network, but desktops for every employee may someday fade in the sunset with the VCR. Only time will tell.