Its been a while since I started a thread. At work today I had a discussion with a work colleague which actually turned out quite interesting. Basically the discussion started over consumers and how they use there PC's. He was ranting a bit about how PC's are predominantly items found in the spare bedroom or home office, my reply was "*******s" to put it mildly. Now I know alot of gamers still like to have there main PC seperate from there Entertainment centre (mainly due to there partners/family etc), which is kind of the stereotypical image for the household PC, however I think times are changing.
I can only speak about myself, so heres a brief outline of how I ended up with my main pc running everything. Living with my ex she was the old school, pc in the back bedroom, end of story. When I bought our first flat panel it came with a DVI (42 inch LG Plasma), at the time I was running XP 64 on a socket a 3200 and a radeon 9800 xt, and i found it simpler to drag the pc downstairs to watch video rather then converting it to dvd. So the PC had a seperate place in the front room, as I tweaked it and configured it for my amp and diplay panel I then boycotted sky and jut used a satelite card. Slowly but surely she came arround to it being a permanent fixture in the front room rather then stuffed in the back bedroom, as it was saving us money. We split. I stayed there, got rid of alot of the electrical crap that wasnt being used and just streamlined it, so that basically it was the PC, TV, and DTS amp.
Now when I met my gorgeous new younger model mrs, she thought it was amazing running everything off the pc, now heres the snag, shes a big gamer too, bloody WoW knows no pre-sex defined roles, hence the purchase of a laptop so we both have something to do.
My work colleague does not understand that the way we use computers have changed that much and he see's them as predominant business machines and not a viable source of entertainment and that they can be the centre of any entertainment system. He is over 60 by the way. Now my boss saw my current set up and actually got me to put together a setup similar (better TV then I could ever afford
) and he loves it.
Now heres where the flames are going to start, one of the main things I can see influence this dramatic shift in PC useage and how the younger generation are using PC's is one thing. And some are gonna hate me for saying this. But its Vista. Vista brought it together. Media Centre, reliability I could go on but I won't. It wasnt until I was running Vista beta that I streamlined my setup, mainly because the media/stability and how it integrated with my entertainment system was not as fluid in xp as it was with vista. Vista killed my VHS
....
My PC is the centre of my setup, that what my PC means to me. And my mrs thinks the same. (and my one year old finds hours of amusement in sneaking across the front room and turning it off mid soap opera or footy)
So what does your PC mean to you?????
(holy **** did I really type that much...if you've got this far you deserve a gold star)
I can only speak about myself, so heres a brief outline of how I ended up with my main pc running everything. Living with my ex she was the old school, pc in the back bedroom, end of story. When I bought our first flat panel it came with a DVI (42 inch LG Plasma), at the time I was running XP 64 on a socket a 3200 and a radeon 9800 xt, and i found it simpler to drag the pc downstairs to watch video rather then converting it to dvd. So the PC had a seperate place in the front room, as I tweaked it and configured it for my amp and diplay panel I then boycotted sky and jut used a satelite card. Slowly but surely she came arround to it being a permanent fixture in the front room rather then stuffed in the back bedroom, as it was saving us money. We split. I stayed there, got rid of alot of the electrical crap that wasnt being used and just streamlined it, so that basically it was the PC, TV, and DTS amp.
Now when I met my gorgeous new younger model mrs, she thought it was amazing running everything off the pc, now heres the snag, shes a big gamer too, bloody WoW knows no pre-sex defined roles, hence the purchase of a laptop so we both have something to do.
My work colleague does not understand that the way we use computers have changed that much and he see's them as predominant business machines and not a viable source of entertainment and that they can be the centre of any entertainment system. He is over 60 by the way. Now my boss saw my current set up and actually got me to put together a setup similar (better TV then I could ever afford
) and he loves it. Now heres where the flames are going to start, one of the main things I can see influence this dramatic shift in PC useage and how the younger generation are using PC's is one thing. And some are gonna hate me for saying this. But its Vista. Vista brought it together. Media Centre, reliability I could go on but I won't. It wasnt until I was running Vista beta that I streamlined my setup, mainly because the media/stability and how it integrated with my entertainment system was not as fluid in xp as it was with vista. Vista killed my VHS
....My PC is the centre of my setup, that what my PC means to me. And my mrs thinks the same. (and my one year old finds hours of amusement in sneaking across the front room and turning it off mid soap opera or footy)
So what does your PC mean to you?????
(holy **** did I really type that much...if you've got this far you deserve a gold star)
. My girlfriend understands what a PC means and how I base my life around it 
. Before she met me she knew that MSN loaded up and how to look on Myspace 
) That thing you can actually see where modern PCs evolved from.
