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Comment by bane | Hacker News Reader

I thought (and still think) the phone as single computing device is going to replace desktops and laptops via some kind of dock of some sort. There's been a few attempts at it by Dell and Microsoft and a few others, but none really satisfactory.

I think the most successful to date is the Nintendo Switch.

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I thought this as well. I'd love to plug my phone into a laptop-looking-thingy...and instantly have a keyboard, screen, and maybe a battery (to keep the phone charged up).

What about the Intel compute stick and similar?

Can't use it as a phone. The all-purpose compute device is the shtick they want

Samsung is advertising that usage when promoting the current Galaxy phones

You're right, here it is.

https://www.samsung.com/us/explore/dex/

There actually was an Android based device that did this years ago. 2011/2012, I think; you could connect the phone to an external device that gave you a mouse, keyboard, and screen. The only problem was that the external device was something like $300 on top of the phone.

Edit: https://www.amazon.com/AT-Laptop-Dock-Motorola-ATRIX/dp/B004... - Motorola Atrix Lapdock

I don't think the desktop is going anywhere - only the use case will shift around. Because at the time when smartphones will be able to beat today's desktops in performance, desktops will have evolved as well - it's always possible to pack more performance into a desktop case than into a smartphone case, with the technology available in any given moment.

Sure, but pretty much any modern phone can provide enough horsepower for most users, even games. The problem really comes down to the UI and IO modes.

The Switch works because it limits the options to just games. But for general purpose computing, even my slightly older Android phone can open dozens of tabs, play games, video, drive a high-res display, and so on.

If it had a dock that immediately connected it to some monitors a mouse and keyboard and the UI changed a hair I'd be a perfectly happy computing user and I get to carry around my primary device with me.

In fact, it has similar specs and a better GPU than many low-end laptops that millions of people are reasonably content to use on a daily basis.

If part of your reasoning is it follows the pattern of computers getting smaller (as in The Innovator's Dilemma), in a way, this kinda sorta has happened, in the form of Chromebooks that use smartphone hardware, firmware and software.

Of course, it doesn't imclude the crucial "dock" part (except in the sense you can plug in a fullsize keyboard and monitor as you can for a laptop).

Not sure of the situation recently, but at one time they were topping amazon lists.

I bought into the Kickstarter for the Ubuntu phone and was honestly kind of relieved it didn’t go through.

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