Ever since the first personal desktop
computer made its presence felt on the
first office desk, humanity as we know
it has become infatuated with desktop
computing. Over the decades the processing
speeds have gone up, the configurations
have changed, desktop computers have
become more adaptable to concepts like
the Internet and networking, but the
fundamental purpose has been the same
– that of providing affordable
computing services to every office desk
in the world!
From its initial days as a mammoth
machine that occupied a room, the
desktop computer of today has become
snug enough to occupy very little
space on your desk. Till a couple
of years ago, the desktop computers
came with huge, cumbersome desktop
monitors. These were cathode ray tube
(or CRT) monitors and took up more
space than the central processing
unit of the desktop computer. But
of late, the desktop computers available
in the market come with flat screen
liquid crystal display monitors, making
them lightweight and sleek.
The changes have been more than superficial
though. If truth be told, the very
desktop computer industry has undergone
massive changes. The original manufacturer,
Integrated Business Machines (IBM)
is still around. But they no longer
have a monopoly on the desktop computer
industry. China, Taiwan, Japan and
Korea have entered, conquered and
continue to drive the desktop computer
market in the world today. Although
price was the initial entry point
for these Asian manufacturers, over
a period of time, they have grabbed
sufficient market share and volumes
to provide dependable quality and
even product innovation in their versions
of the desktop computers.
But western manufacturers like Dell
Computers are slowly by steadily turning
this trend around. With a new concept
called built to order I the desktop
computer industry, manufacturers like
Dell are weeding out the middleman
and the associated premium costs.
By building your desktop computer
to your specifications and at the
price you deem right, these manufacturers
are able to provide great quality,
at a price that will be difficult
for the makers of the branded desktop
computers to match. Additionally,
by not using storage space for their
desktop computers, by eliminating
the need for sales personnel and by
even dissolving inventory, these manufacturers
are winning back the market share
for desktop computers that had almost
entire evaporated to Asia.
Internet websites like www.tigerdirect.com,
www.geeks.com and www.buildurpc.com
offer the do-it-yourself crowd several
options to build their own desktop
computers. In fact, when customers
order their own parts and assemble
their own PCs, they tend to get machines
with higher configuration, better
processing power, more memory and
overall at a much more reasonable
cost than the branded desktop computer
manufacturers can offer. But then,
building a desktop computer from scratch
is not the easiest of options, even
for those with a basic hardware education
and should be left to professionals.
But if you are game for some trial
and effort, have a lot of free time
on your hands and are courageous enough
to take up the challenge, then maybe
building your own desktop computer
is something you might be interested
in.
