What is your main computing device?


What is your main computing device?  

74 members have voted

  1. 1. What is your main computing device?

    • Desktop
      56
    • Laptop
      14
    • Smartphone
      2
    • Tablet
      2
    • Other
      0


Recommended Posts

Lately, I've been hearing a lot about how more and more people are ditching traditional PCs for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. Coupled with seemingly constant news stories about how mobile browser and OS market shares are rising and PC sales are dropping, I'm wondering what the majority of Neowin users are using as their main/most often used computing device.

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1118872-what-is-your-main-computing-device/
Share on other sites

Hmm, I would say I use them all the same. I have a desktop at work, My phone when I'm mobile, My tablet for when i'm at peoples houses, at home or out somewhere I can sit down and my laptop which is really only used for business and never moves off my desk at home. I can't say which I use the most but the ones I used for the most tasks are a tie between my Android phone and Tablet.

My main computer is a deaktop computer. I used to use it for everything.

I bought an iPod Touch 4gen 1 year and an half ago. I found myself using the iPod for everyday use (check mails, check weather, cheak theater schedule, etc) more and more. The problem with the Touch is the screen is too small to browse the web and read books. So i'm thinking about getting a tablet. Probably a Nexus 7. I can definately see myself using my PC to work and play games only once i will own a real tablet. Tablets are just more convenient for every day use. They are small. Really portable (sorry but some high end laptops are not that much portable imo). And the touch screen is sort of working perfectly for tasks like getting mails and browsing the web. I really like having my touch close to my bed to check the weather and news when i'm waking up. Would like to have a tablet with a bigger screen than the touch. But i'm not willing to spend 400+ on a tablet that's why i'm looking at the Nexus 7.

Desktop <3

I'll be replacing mine as the main computing device for the first time by the end of the year, as I'm moving and want to keep it portable, so I'll be getting a laptop. But as soon as I settle for a longer period of time, it's a desktop again.

It's really hard for me to answer this question. I'd say I use my phone just about as much as anything else, but I don't think I'd say it's my main computing device. I guess I'd have to say my MacBook, but then, it's screen is broken and the battery went bad, so it's actually more like a desktop now... I can't decide which to pick :( Definitely not tablet though. I have an iPad but I only use it for playing around now and then. If I wanted to do something quick and mobile, I'd use my phone. If I wanted to do something that required a bigger screen than my phone, I'd use my MacBook (plugged into a 37" LCD).

I am pretty much in the same boat as AJ.

I use a Desktop at work, have a Desktop at home, but hardly even turn it on anymore now that we have a Macbook, but we use it plugged into the 24" monitor 98% of the time. I also have an iPad that I use for reading magazines, articles, play draw something, etc, but I use my phone 99% of the time.

I guess as far as primary, it would have to be my phone since I use it all the time, and I think most people are going to be the same now if we think about it.

My Desktop @ home, everything is a subset of the desktop, my phone is a copy of the data on my desktop (i.e. music and photos) even the cloud i would put into the subset as it is a copy of my desktop's data.

Although having everything around the desktop does make me feel old, that i can feel that i am of the previous generation, as i can see in the future that the cloud is the center and that all devices will be a subset, from tablet, mobile phone and desktop/laptop.

However i then switch on my Xbox and play a bit of skyrim and say roll on innovation and pushing the envelope! :D

A computer is the only "computing device" I know. People can spit whatever they want about their mobile gadgets, but they are just so: gadgets. With a remote kill-switch I WILL NEVER ACCEPT to be put up my ass by anyone. Capeesc?

A computer is the only "computing device" I know. People can spit whatever they want about their mobile gadgets, but they are just so: gadgets. With a remote kill-switch I WILL NEVER ACCEPT to be put up my ass by anyone. Capeesc?

Funny. My Surface seems to be a computer by definition. So are iPads, and other tablets. They all compute. They all do work. Care to try again?

At home, it's a combination of desktop/netbook/tablet/smartphone. I primarily use the desktop for normal surfing/gaming, netbook for RDP'ing into work, tablet/smartphone for couch surfing. At work, it's just work laptop/desktop.

My shiny new desktop of course! :) I have always used my desktop as my main system. I have a laptop and smartphone as well, but can't justify squeezing all of my tasks into a tiny screen and less powerful system (laptop).

I use my desktop mostly. I gave my laptop to my mum when I picked my current machine up. Occasionally I use my phone for some light web browsing but not for heavy-duty tasks.

Funny. My Surface seems to be a computer by definition. So are iPads, and other tablets. They all compute. They all do work. Care to try again?

I agree anything that has a processor/hard drive, etc is a computer. Its just which category as in Mobile or not honestly, so The King of GnG is wrong in his opinion for sure

when I am home I spend 90% of my awake time sitting in front of my desktop however, if I am in the living room I have my tablet with me (which i can use to remote connect to the desktop If i need to)

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • Meta will now use data from outside businesses to personalize AI responses by David Uzondu In an update that's rolling out globally (except in a handful of countries), Meta will use your data from outside businesses to personalize your AI responses and your primary feeds. Meta already utilizes your shopping activity to target ads, but the company now plans to expand this tracking to personalize other "parts of your experience" like feed algorithms and AI assistant chats. The company is replacing the two settings ("Your activity off Meta technologies" and "Activity from other businesses") that currently let you disconnect off-platform activity with a single, renamed setting called Activity from other businesses. If you don't want Meta to manipulate your feed and AI responses using your outside history, you can just turn the Activity from other businesses setting off in your account settings. This toggle resides within your Accounts Center, applying your choice to every connected profile. Turning this off will not stop companies from sending your data to Meta. The company will still collect your web interactions, but it only uses them to train products, while still accessing external accounts you connect. When The Verge spoke to Meta spokesperson, Emil Vazquez, the representative said that this update will exclude several locations at launch including the European region, the UK, Brazil, Thailand, South Africa, Turkey, South Korea, Ecuador, Nigeria, and Kenya. The new update comes at a time when the social media giant is recovering from a major PR disaster involving generative AI. Last week, there was a huge security issue on Instagram where attackers figured out a way to exploit a prompt injection vulnerability. Hackers managed to trick Meta AI into handing over account ownership (even if the victim had 2FA enabled). Some of the affected accounts include the dormant Obama White House profile, cosmetics brand Sephora, the Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force, and security researcher Jane Manchun Wong. Internally, the company also had to scale back plans on its Model Capability Initiative (MCI), an employee-monitoring program designed to train corporate AI models by recording worker keystrokes and screen activity, after employees raised privacy concerns and complained about severe battery life drain.
    • JetBrains is working to cut false positives in RustRover 2026.2 by David Uzondu Recently, JetBrains released the fifth EAP build of its dedicated IDE, RustRover 2026.2, bringing improvements like a Run gutter icon for criterion_main! macro benchmarking and a feature that alerts you when there are unused traits in your current scope. Now, the company is out with a blog post addressing one of the "most common" complaints from users: false positives. In RustRover, a false positive occurs when the editor incorrectly highlights something as an error even though the project compiles and runs successfully. This mismatch flags a gap between the IDE's internal intelligence and the actual compiler. When the editor flashes red warnings over perfectly valid code, developers lose trust in the tool, which stalls momentum. Traditionally, RustRover runs cargo check to detect compiler errors and warnings, but it also relies on its own code analysis engine to power real-time features. To provide quick feedback, this engine parses your source code into a syntax tree while inferring types and resolving names as you type. Because this engine must work on broken, half-written code and react instantly, its logic sometimes diverges from the compiler's, producing false positives that do not exist in the compiler's eyes. JetBrains said that it has a "dedicated task force" focused specifically on identifying and fixing false positives by analyzing user reports and examining large-scale open-source projects. To speed up this process, the team built an internal system modeled after Crater, the famous Rust project that compiles and runs tests for every single crate published on crates.io. This automated pipeline compares the diagnostics from RustRover's analysis with actual compiler output to catch discrepancies before they reach users, ensuring smoother workflows. RustRover, for those who're unaware, is a dedicated IDE designed specifically for Rust developers. It's been around for a couple of years now, providing features like built-in debugging via LLDB, seamless cargo integration, advanced macro expansion, and HTML support. JetBrains distributes the app under two licensing models: a paid commercial subscription and a free option for non-commercial use.
    • Last year I bought the 2TB variant for $114 on Amazon. That's crazy that the 1TB is now 67% more expensive for half the storage, even with the newer T9 already on the market. And that's considered a good deal.
    • You can disable all non needed features from Brave. There is also Brave Origin which removes them entirely and it is free for Linux.
    • I wish I could use Brave but the tab suspension feature is horrible. It doesn't suspend them like Edge does. Even after 2h open with 70+ tabs (same as Edge), it has 2GB more consumption than Edge for no reason.
  • Recent Achievements

    • One Year In
      Primer1st earned a badge
      One Year In
    • Experienced
      JayZJay went up a rank
      Experienced
    • Reacting Well
      Sir_Timbit earned a badge
      Reacting Well
    • Week One Done
      rubentuben8 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Week One Done
      ARaclen earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      512
    2. 2
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      229
    3. 3
      Edouard
      135
    4. 4
      ATLien_0
      87
    5. 5
      Steven P.
      81
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!