Does your desktop have a desktop?

Analysts have been predicting the death of the desktop PC for many years, but what do IT managers on the frontline think? Will tablets take over, or is there still a place for the beige box?

We’ve all read the headlines. Sales of traditional desktop PCs are dropping like lead balloons and our offices are transforming into hip young places full of bean bags, basketball hoops and tablet computers everywhere.

While the sales figures can’t be denied, when you speak with those who make decisions about IT infrastructure for their companies, the story isn’t as clear-cut. For while the desktop does seem to be on the way out for many users, for others it still has a firm hold.

Mark Naidoo is IT infrastructure manager for public transport company Transdev Australasia. He’s one of the ones who views desktops in decline. “At Transdev, we are currently replacing desktops with thin clients connected to a Citrix XenApp Desktop environment. Thin clients are cheaper, easier to manage and much less of a security risk compared to traditional desktops and laptops,” he says.

“We do not expect to replace desktops and laptops for all our users, as there will always be applications and situations where the XenApp environment does not suit,” adds Naidoo. “We will still need to deploy some laptops and desktops for these situations but these are minimal.

“With our next rollout in mind, we are also investigating replacing thin clients and some laptops with dockable tablets,” says Naidoo. “Tablets should be able to fill the thin client function but also give all our users the added flexibility of being able to take a tablet into meetings or attach a keyboard and use them like a laptop.

“As with thin client, we do not expect tablets to replace all our devices. Tablets by themselves are perfect for consuming data; however, in order to create something substantial, you can’t beat a keyboard.

“Whichever direction we choose, I believe we are seeing the death of desktops.”

Power users

Sydney-based firm Hostworks is a provider to the online and digital media industries. Greg Koen, general manager, product factory (infrastructure), sees a place for certain desktops still. “Tablets certainly threaten the low- to mid-spec desktop, but not the power user’s workstation - well, not yet, anyway,” he says.

“In my previous life in the finance industry, traders needed the power of workstations with typically four screens attached,” Koen adds. “Complex apps need lots of compute power and plenty of pixels; tablets aren’t able to do that. Perhaps a tablet’s form factor means that they never will.

“Multiheaded displays make it easier to monitor many systems and specific metrics while you still have your email and IM clients running - that’s a big part of our life, which tablets won’t be able to replace for us.”

Cloud and managed service provider The Cavalry, also based in Sydney, is right at the cutting edge of technology due simply to the nature of its business. Peter Low, one the company’s directors, is another who doesn’t see every desktop PC vanishing anytime soon.

“The answer for us is no - you’ll always need high-powered users, and rather than cannibalisation [of the desktop market] we’ve seen multiple devices per person. Whereas before someone might have had a computer or laptop, who now doesn’t have a smartphone and a tablet in addition to a desktop or a laptop?” he says.

This raises the associated issue of BYOD (see From the Frontline, Technology Decisions, April/May 2014). “You’re seeing a lot more devices needing management than before,” says Low. “And also the expectations of how people relate to technology are far less tolerant than they used to be. When they connect up to their cloud and their software they expect it to work.

“With the BYOD pitch, a lot of the work functions that are being provided today to workers isn’t across company supplied devices,” adds Low. “We’ve seen it in our own company. We offer our staff technology, but people come in and they’re an avid Apple supporter and they love their iPad and they want to use it. They actually refuse … they say, ‘Thanks a lot for supplying computer X, but I’d rather use my own.’

“On the desktop issue … At the moment we deploy laptops to our team. We haven’t seen a suitable device to replace a laptop with a tablet for the way we work.”

David Arkles is Motorola Solutions Australia’s general manager for enterprise solutions in Australia and New Zealand. As you might expect from a company that is a world leader in enterprise-grade mobile computing, the Motorola offices are places for innovation when it comes to workplace devices.

“We do embrace technology [and we] certainly encourage people to,” says Arkles. “My iPad for example is my own, it’s not a business one; but I don’t have any issues having it in the network - as long as we operate according to the very strictly controlled security standards to ensure that our overall network is protected. But in terms of tools to make your business and yourself more productive, we embrace those.”

But tablets and other mobile devices aren’t for everybody. Arkles cites the example of a major multinational corporation which, nine months ago, decided to move to issue its workers with consumer-grade mobile devices, partly because of staff desire. It hasn’t gone well. “They put a stop to it in the last month, and they’re now engaged with us around putting enterprise-grade Android smartphone devices in,” says Arkles.

So overall, it is a case of horses for courses. While tablets and smartphones have their place at present, and will carve out an ever-larger chunk of the desktop market as the years progress, the humble PC perched on your office desk will still be around for a while yet.

Image credit: ©Mikhail Kalakutskiy/Dollar Photo Club