desktop computer a stylized illustration of a desktop personal computer consisting of a case containing the motherboard and processor a monitor a keyboard and a mouse a desktop computer is a personal computer designed for regular use at a single location on or near a desk or table due to its size and power requirements the most common configuration has a case that houses the power supply motherboard a printed circuit board with a microprocessor as the central processing unit cpu memory bus and other electronic components disk storage usually one or more hard disk drives optical disc drives and in early models a floppy disk drive a keyboard and mouse for input and a computer monitor speakers and often a printer for output the case may be oriented horizontally or vertically and placed either underneath beside or on top of a desk history origins apple ii computer on display at the private muse bolo prior to the widespread use of microprocessors a computer that could fit on a desk was considered remarkably small the type of computers most commonly used were minicomputers which were themselves desksized early computers took up the space of a whole room minicomputers generally fit into one or a few refrigeratorsized racks it was not until the 1970s when fully programmable computers appeared that could fit entirely on top of a desk 1970 saw the introduction of the datapoint 2200 a smart computer terminal complete with keyboard and monitor was designed to connect with a mainframe computer but that didnt stop owners from using its built in computational abilities as a stand alone desktop computer growth and development apple ii trs80 and commodore pet were first generation personal home computers launched in 1977 which were aimed at the consumer market rather than businessmen or computer hobbyists byte magazine referred to these three as the 1977 trinity of personal computing with the thirdplaced commodore amiga having some success in the mid1980s but declining by the early 1990s ibm 5150 personal computer early personal computers like the original ibm personal computer were enclosed in a desktop case horizontally oriented to have the display screen placed on top thus saving space on the users actual desk although these cases had to be sturdy enough to support the weight of crt displays that were widespread at the time over the course of the 1990s desktop cases gradually became less common than the moreaccessible tower cases tower was a trademark of ncr created by ad agency reiser williams deyong that may be located on the floor under or beside a desk rather than on a desk not only do these tower cases have more room for expansion they have also freed up desk space for monitors which were becoming larger every year desktop cases particularly the compact form factors remain popular for corporate computing environments and kiosks some computer cases can be interchangeably positioned either horizontally desktop or upright minitower influential games such as doom and quake during the 1990s had pushed gamers and enthusiasts to frequently upgrade to the latest cpus and graphics cards 3dfx ati and nvidia for their desktops usually a tower case in order to run these applications though this has slowed since the late 2000s as the growing popularity of intel integrated graphics forced game developers to scale back creative technologys sound blaster series were a de facto standard for sound cards in desktop pcs during the 1990s until the early 2000s when they were reduced to a niche product as oem desktop pcs came with sound boards integrated directly onto the motherboard decline while desktops have long been the most common configuration for pcs batterypowered portable computers had just 2 worldwide market share in 1986 around 109 million notebook pcs shipped worldwide in 2007 a growth of 33 compared to 2006 in 2008 it was estimated that 1459 million notebooks were sold and that the number would grow in 2009 to 1777 million the sales breakdown of the apple macintosh have seen sales of desktop macs staying mostly constant while being surpassed by that of mac notebooks whose sales rate has grown considerably seven out of ten macs sold were laptops in 2009 a ratio projected to rise to three out of four by 2010 the change in sales of form factors is due to the desktop imac moving from affordable imac g3 to upscale imac g4 and subsequent releases are considered premium allinones by contrast the msrp of the macbook laptop lines have dropped through successive generations such that the macbook air and macbook pro constitute the lowest price of entry to a mac with the exception of the even more inexpensive mac mini albeit without a monitor and keyboard not surprisingly the macbooks are the topselling form factors of the macintosh platform today the decades of development means that most people already own desktop computers that meet their needs and have no need of buying a new one merely to keep pace with advancing technology notably the successive release of new versions of windows windows 95 98 xp vista 7 8 10 and so on had been drivers for the replacement of pcs in the 1990s but this slowed down in the 2000s due to the poor reception of windows vista over windows xp recently some analysts have suggested that windows 8 has actually hurt sales of pcs in 2012 as businesses have decided to stick with windows 7 rather than upgrade the postpc trend has seen a decline in the sales of desktop and laptop pcs among pc form factors desktops remain a staple in the enterprise market but have lost popularity among home buyers pc makers and electronics retailers have responded by investing their engineering and marketing resources towards laptops initially netbooks in the late 2000s and then the higherperformance ultrabooks from 2011 onwards which manufacturers believe have more potential to revive the pc market than desktops in april 2017 statcounter declared a milestone in technology history and end of an era with android operating system more popular than windows the operating system that made desktops dominant over mainframe computers windows is still most popular on desktops and laptops while smartphones and tablets use android ios apple products or windows 10 mobile types allinone media all and apple 20 imac intel core duodell inspiron one 23 touch aio desktop pc an allinone desktop computer integrates the systems internal components into the same case as the display thus occupying a smaller footprint with fewer cables than desktops that incorporate a tower the allinone form factor was popular during the early 1980s for personal computers intended for professional use such as the kaypro ii osborne 1 trs80 model ii and compaq portable many manufacturers of home computers like commodore and atari included the computers motherboard into the same enclosure as the keyboard these systems were most often connected to a television set for display apple has manufactured several popular examples of allinone computers such as the original macintosh of the mid1980s and the imac of the late 1990s and 2000s some allinone desktops such as the imac g4 have used laptop components in order to reduce the size of the system case like most laptops some allinone desktop computers are characterized by an inability to customize or upgrade internal components as the systems cases do not provide convenient access to upgradable components and faults in certain aspects of the hardware may require the entire computer to be replaced regardless of the health of its remaining components fullsized these desktops are very common and quite budget friendly compared to others in the market it comes with separate display component and processing component the components are connected by cables or wireless connection to execute command from each other these computers are easy to customize and upgrade as per user requirements home theater these desktops are connected to home entertainment systems and typically used for amusement purpose they come with high definition display video graphics surround sound and tv tuner systems to compliment typical pc features compact these desktops are comparable to fullsized desktops but reduced in physical proportions compact desktops can be difficult to customize and upgrade comparison with laptops laptop disadvantages desktops have an advantage over laptops in that the spare parts and extensions tend to be standardized resulting in lower prices and greater availability for example the size and mounting of the motherboard is standardized into atx microatx btx or other form factors desktops have several standardized expansion slots like conventional pci or pci express while laptops only tend to have one minipci slot and one pc card slot or expresscard slot procedures for assembly and disassembly of desktops tend to be simple and standardized as well this tends not to be the case for laptops though adding or replacing some parts like the optical drive hard disk or adding an extra memory module is often quite simple this means that a desktop computer configuration usually a tower case can be customized and upgraded to a greater extent than laptops this customization has kept tower cases popular among gamers and enthusiasts another advantage of the desktop is that apart from environmental concerns power consumption is not as critical as in laptop computers because the desktop is exclusively powered from the wall socket desktop computers also provide more space for cooling fans and vents to dissipate heat allowing enthusiasts to overclock with less risk the two large microprocessor manufacturers intel and amd have developed special cpus for mobile computers ie laptops that consume less power and lower heat but with lower performance levels laptop computers conversely offer portability that desktop systems including small form factor and allinone desktops can not due to their compact size and clamshell design the laptops allinone design provides a builtin keyboard and a pointing device such as a trackpad for its user and can draw on power supplied by a rechargeable battery laptops also commonly integrate wireless technologies like wifi bluetooth and 3g giving them a broader range of options for connecting to the internet though this trend is changing as newer desktop computers come integrated with one or more of these technologies a desktop computer needs a ups to handle electrical disturbances like short interruptions blackouts and spikes achieving an onbattery time of more than 2030 minutes for a desktop pc requires a large and expensive ups a laptop with sufficiently charged battery can continue to be used for hours in case of a power outage and is not affected by short power interruptions and blackouts a desktop computer often has the advantage over a comparable laptop in computational capacity overclocking is often more feasible on a desktop than on a laptop similarly hardware addons such as discrete graphics coprocessors may only be possible to install in a desktop x86 desktop replacement computer legacy ports operating system software single board computer home computer wikibooks has a book on the topic of how to assemble a desktop pc computer tour of major components of a desktop computers at howstuffworks vtecomputer sizesclasses of computersmicrocomputerpersonalcomputerstationary workstation desktop home personal supercomputer portable tabletop smart tv interactive kiosk game arcade cabinet system board home console microconsole sff nettop plug smart speaker mobilelaptop desktop replacement 2in1 subnotebook netbook smartbook ultrabook ultramobile pc tablet ultramobile pc 2in1 phablet tabletop handheld handheld pc palmtop pc pocket computer pda electronic organizer mobile phone feature phone smartphone phablet pmp ereader handheld game console portablemobile data terminal calculator scientific programmable graphing wearable digital wristwatch calculator watch smartwatch smartglasses smart ring midrange server minicomputer supermini large super mainframe minisuper others microcontroller nanocomputer singleboard computer smartdust wireless sensor network 