I honestly think that things will get faster before they get bigger. The massive 128GB RAM is actually already available in some workstation type PCs, but I see DDR5(or even faster) coming to mainstream RAM before the average user even has more than 32GB of it. Also, the dual-channel RAM system had been around for a pretty long time before the new i7 processors finally came up with triple-channel access, and then it was a pretty short time(relatively) that suddenly we now have quad-channel access. Honestly, I see that also changing before RAM gets above 32GB in the average PC as well, say octo-channel RAM, heck, many MOBOs have 8 slots as it is.

As far as processors, by 2015 I'd expect to see more of the same. I'd love to see something radical, but 2015 is too soon I think. Intel will have some new architecture running on less power and at less "raw Ghz" but yet being much more productive. Also, I don't think that anything beyond 8 cores will be common by then, rather quad-core will probably still be in the mid to low range, with hex and octo-cores being the high end. This is because even intense games tend to not really be able to take advantage of so many cores.

For hard drives, the thing I would think would be more common would be the "hybrids" where the have a bit of SSD working like a massive cache, and a traditional spinner for real space storage. I think that this may indeed become much more commonplace, although I'm wondering if instead they might come up with "mini-RAM" that would fit in HDs as a cache instead. This mini-RAM would be something like DDR5 speeds, and would have maybe 4GB total size(similar to the RAM in today's high end graphic cards), and HD access would be much faster, even than SSD drives. But, to accomodate this, MOBOs would have to have a much faster connection than simple SATA3 cords we use right now.

For video cards, who knows? The naming convention used will probably change by then for both NVidia and ATI by then, and the RAM will probably be much faster(duh!!), and the processors will be faster, but beyond that I think 2015 is too soon for some massively radical change, similar to my opinions on CPUs.

[quote name='MrJoshL' timestamp='1353176941' post='5001800']
1920x1080 monitor

Why restrict your speculation to decade-old technology, especially when there's already a host of gaming machines (iPads, iPhones, etc) with better than 96 dpi tech?[/quote]I've wondered why we've seen resolution-obsession on Android etc devices, but not PCs. But there are some points to consider:

* Production costs may berelated to absolute number of pixels rather than dpi (which is a poor measure for saying one is better - e.g., my Galaxy Nexus has higher resolution and larger size than an iphone 4S, both of which are stats I prefer; the fact that the dpi is lower doesn't really mean anything to me).

* You need the GPU power to drive the larger number of pixels, and there's a higher standard of expectation on PCs, than "gaming machines" where Angry Birds is considered cutting edge.

* There's more pressure for certain companies to increase random specs in pursuit of marketing, whether or not there is practical use in doing so.

True, if we're talking of a hypothetical top of the range gaming machine, why not have a higher resolution with multiple monitors. But I don't think that Full HD is bad, or comparisons to cell phones and media players is necessarily entirely meaningful, and the OP did say "average" and "mid-high". And even if we think that companies should be increasing the resolutions, based on what they can do for other devices (just look at the Nexus 10's amazingly high resolution, for example), that doesn't mean they will for PCs. Personally I'm still waiting for netbooks to crawl past 1024x600...

I think a better thing to look at would be what's already available now for PCs, rather than phones - e.g., the 1440p monitor that someone linked to. SimonForsman makes a good point about making it easy to scale full HD content.

"Retina" monitor: it'll be normal then!

Retina is an Apple trademark, so something you won't be seeing anywhere else - it is simply their name for their resolutions, and not about any particular technology. As I say above, comparing on densities rather than actual resolutions doesn't make sense most the time (and indeed, the standard industry terms are to use terms to describe actual resolutions - e.g., 1080p, 4K).

Whilst 4k seems the obvious next step, I'd be surprised if this became dominant for computer screens within 3 years, given the average upgrade routes. Even for TVs, when I last checked a few months ago (in the UK at least), you have to spend quite a bit to get 4K, and many TVs (even say around the £1000 mark) are still 1080.

[quote name='samoth' timestamp='1353328818' post='5002324']
[quote name='Hodgman' timestamp='1353288437' post='5002189']
In 3 years time, a lot of people will have the same PC they have right now, so don't get too optimistic.

This, or an iPad.

I'm more concerned about PC becoming less and less common than what silly specs it will have. Who needs 32GiB for a game? Few present games truly need something bigger than a single mid-class graphics card and few use the major part of memory on present day machines.[/quote]Well in that sense, PC gamers (or PC gaming machines) are already a subset of most people, but I don't think that means they're going to stop being PC gamers - we've been hearing about how ipads will change everything for years from the media, but we're still waiting. If Android tablets etc (which are predicted to outsell the ipad platform) become larger than PCs, I don't think that means gaming PCs disappearing, anymore than it did with the growth of Android phones, consoles, or whatever. Also consider that tablets are only useful for some genres of games.

I mean, we might as well say than in 2015, people will instead have a Samsung Galaxy or a Wii U. An ipad is just one of many products. I doubt every tablet will be an ipad (or every console a Wii U, or every phone a Samsung Galaxy), nor will it mean that PC gamers stop buying PCs (they might buy a tablet as well as a PC, just any many have a PC as well as a phone and/or console).

Also consider that with hybrid PCs, the distinction becomes a bit meaningless - if ones "tablet" is actually something that is a PC too, it doesn't really matter

On a related note, desktop PCs are already less common than laptop PCs, and this trend will continue. But then, laptops are becoming more powerful as gaming machines too. So it might be that more gamers move to laptops, such that the average spec doesn't increase as far as one might think, but there is the increased advantage of mobility.

Well, right now, it's starting to look like the "next gen gaming pc" won't actually exist (or at least, not in it's current form)

The problem with market share analysis is forgetting to view stuff in context.

Tablets rapidly out selling main PCs, and gaming PCs are becoming a small minority of the market? This means the PC market is dead right? well, no. This means the PC market is where it has been, and the Tablet market has exploded.

I have a PC suitable for gaming. Dual screen, looking to update to a triple head display sooner or later. I also have a tablet, and will likely buy another tablet before fully upgrading this PC, and will most likely be buying tablets at a rate of 3:1 vs the number of times I have to do a major overhaul/replacement of my PC. If you look at those numbers for myself alone, then 'obviously' the tablet market is Three times the size of the PC market!...

Only, it isn't. I spend about 50 times as much money on my PC's software as I do on stuff for my Tablet. In part because there is such pisspoor quality in software for the tablet, and stuff that is decent seems to be all nickel and time Freeimum stuff.

Everyone who I knew 5 years ago that had put $1000+ into a PC gaming system still has kept a $1000+ system reasonable up to date today. Most have bought one or two tablets at least, and all still continue to use their PC (or console in a few cases) as their primary gaming platform.

I have not met a single person who had a history of purchasing AAA PC titles in the past and who has now abandoned the PC gaming market. If anything the market continues to grow with regards to customers. What doesn't continue to grow is the willingness to shell out $60 some dollars on yet another clone of what we've already played.


So, PCs of 2015? Likely much the same as we have now, with more cores and slightly higher clock speeds. Ram averages are likely to jump, but requirements aren't likely to sky rocket with them. I don't know about everyone else, but I will be keeping optical drives kicking around my case for another while.