If you're building or buying a new desktop PC, we take it for granted these days
that'll probably take the form of a tower. Perfect for fitting in a chunky graphics card,
lots of storage and plenty of cooling. But do you remember the days where horizontal desktop PCs
were common as dirt? I'm talking about those computers that looked like large beige VCRs
that you typically sit your monitor on top of.
It seems like that would save space. So why are they so hard to find these days
outside of home theater PCs? The question becomes more interesting
when you consider that today's PCs are descendants of the original IBM PC from 1981,
which used a horizontal chassis. Back then, the base model of the IBM PC
didn't even come with a hard drive, meaning you were dealing with swapping out floppy disks
whenever you wanted to run a different program. And given that you were fiddling with floppy so often,
it was very convenient to have the floppy drives right in front of you within ARM's reach.
On top of that, the CRT monitor that shipped with the original PC
wasn't all that big at only 12 inches, meaning it was advantageous to have the PC chassis
act as a monitor stand to make the screen easier to see.
And although tower computers were present throughout much of the 1980s,
the advantage that they could be moved off of a desk and onto the floor wasn't always useful
if you weren't running a more powerful workstation.
Towers could often fit more disk drives and expansion cards,
but this wasn't the paramount concern of the average user
for whom the horizontal form factor was probably more practical.
So when and why did towers become more popular?
Even though it wasn't the first tower PC,
the IBM PS2 is sometimes credited with popularizing the form factor.
Ironically, not all that different from the similarly named game console
that would come out 13 years later. And also, I can't believe that's just a 13 year gap.
That's crazy. A couple of the original PS2 models were designed as towers
because they were meant to hold more drives and cards, as previously mentioned, but both IBM's market power
and the fact it was the first time we saw an Intel CPU
inside an IBM tower meant that it seriously got people
thinking about buying a computer that was built to sit on the floor.
A few years later, Apple came out with its first tower PC,
the Macintosh Quadra 700. Launched in 1991, the Quadra 700
was unsurprisingly aimed at creatives, much like today's Apple products still are.
Back then, the Macintosh lineup already had a reputation
for being popular among desktop publishers and performing visual design on a computer
means that larger monitors have obvious advantages.
But this was, of course, well before the era of the flat panel display
that's relatively lightweight, even at bigger sizes. Instead, the Quadra 700 was paired
with a gigantic CRT monitor that weighed 79.6 pounds
or 36.1 kilograms. Big boy.
That kind of weight didn't exactly lend itself well
to the monitor living on top of the computer case. That monitor that we mentioned earlier
that paired with the original IBM PC was only 12 and a half pounds.
So that would be like stacking six of these on a single case, plus a little extra.
So yeah, Apple decided to make the Quadra 700 a tower
so the absolute chungus of a monitor wouldn't be placed on top of it.
And even if you weren't getting the biggest monitor out there, larger, heavier screens were becoming more common
for average users. Simultaneously, by the early 90s, we'd come a long way from the days of needing to insert
and remove floppies quite as often, meaning the extra flexibility and space savings
of a floor-standing tower eclipsed the older-style horizontal PC in popularity.
So of course, now it's ironic that tower PCs are now commonly kept on desk as statement pieces,
at least if you're a gamer. But of course, towers still do usually offer more space
to build in than horizontal cases while having a smaller footprint,
contributing to their continued status as the go-to option for a freestanding PC.
However, case manufacturers still do make horizontal cases.
I'd just be a little leery about relying on a piece of tempered glass to support the entire weight
of your fancy, ultra-wide. Thanks for watching, guys. If you liked this video, check out our other video
on the evolution of computer cases. Comment with video suggestions,
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