I believe we don't have to worry about that. From what I can tell they will be available for the foreseeable future. They just work bettter and faster than laptops it seems, and people like to be able to replace or add to it easily. Some of them now, though, have too much built together giving the owner less ability to change and upgrade parts. I bought one of those not knowing any better. It's been great though; I'm still using it six years later.
... after they become "built in" to office furniture, perhaps. Of course, even then only if the "built in" computer can be easily upgraded by someone at the business.
Antique stores? Probably in s-hole cities like Baltimore, I guess. Maybe Detroit.
This post was edited by WM BARR . =ABSOLUTE TRASH at October 2, 2019 10:19 PM MDT
A long time I hope, for those of us who either professionally or at home need them for any serious purpose - which apparently excludes by implicit confession, the Baltimore-disliking Whistles.... !
Rather, though, the volume occupied by the computer does not count. What matters are the peripherals - screen, keyboard, cursor-driver, printer, scanner or plotter.
You cannot carry out serious visual tasks on a very small screen. I know people manage to do so, and I have had to do so at work, but the word there is "manage". The lap-top and tablet are portable, and take little room anywhere, but those are about their only advantages.
I did not try to open any Internet account sort on the "smart"-'phone I owned briefly before rejecting it (and selling it to my sister!), mainly because it would not have provided me with anything more useful than perhaps the time of the next 'bus - obtainable in advance! I am of course aware many choose to use a "smart" 'phone as a portable radio, but that's not my choice.
I don't know the largest lap-top sizes, but my 19" monitor seems about right for CAD drawings, photo-editing, spread-sheets and complicated documents. It gives plenty of visibility within easy eye movement, of sprawling and often highly-detailed images accompanied by very comprehensive tool-bars. It's also necessary for e-post and file-listing functions that tabulate long names in sets of wide columns.
You might be used to lap-top and tablet keys and pointers, and the tiddly little physical or digital keys on a portable telephone - but not all of us have fingers like anorexic spiders, and more importantly, sometimes need the full range of keys as well as preferring the large operating area, of a full-size keyboard. Watching some 'phone users, I wonder seriously if they risk eventual serious tendon or joint inflammation, even arthritis.
The "mouse" or equivalent is vital for many applications. Heavy use of the conventional mouse, touch-pad or roller-ball, typical in image-manipulating programmes, e.g. photo-editing and CAD, but also too easily a common habit in using complex documents and spread-sheets, is a recipe for physical problems. These led to the Occupational Health people at work recommending column-type devices for quite a number of us; not joysticks but resembling them. I have carried this on at home, and in retirement.
So long live the proper computer set - even if the computer itself is reduced to a tablet size, as long as it has at least the same abilities. (I don't know, incidentally, if you can use a proper keyboard, pointer and monitor with a tablet.)
Benedict Arnold 