During his stay in the capital for a week, Lin Qi basically wandered around the market, eating, drinking, and taking a look at the prices and consumption in the market.

Understanding the current consumption level in Beijing will help Lin Qi better understand the domestic market. After all, Beijing already belongs to the city with a high level of consumption, and if consumers in Beijing generally feel that it is expensive, then the pricing must be really expensive in the domestic market.

Many international manufacturers have failed in China, in essence, without understanding the essence of the Chinese market. The failure of its products is to put it mildly, and to put it bluntly, most of them are because the price is too expensive. The price is not a problem, the problem is that the market competitors have goods with the same configuration and performance, which are far lower than yours!

In addition to many blind whites who blindly follow advertisements and brand brainwashing, a considerable number of consumers in the Chinese market are absolutely cost-effective obsessive-compulsive.

There are many products in foreign markets that can be popular by relying on concepts, but they don't work in China. As far as computers are concerned, the first reaction of Chinese users is "configuration", and they need to compare the performance parameters many times before they can choose the most cost-effective and reputable products. Many consumers in developed countries do not look at the overall configuration, but only part of the "concept", such as the concept of battery life and camera...... Even, some merchants only advertise the functions and concepts of the machine, but not the specific configuration.

Newly started electronics companies have never given priority to the gross profit margin of products, but to give priority to market share. Therefore, from Lin Qi, the boss, they all attach great importance to the feelings of consumers, and the first principle of commodity pricing is to always make consumers feel "cost-effective".

Compared with seven years ago, the income and consumption level of Beijing has indeed improved significantly. Televisions, refrigerators, and the like are not rare items for a long time. In addition to televisions, the most popular consumer electronics on the market may be VCDs, CD players, tape recorders, radios, and handheld computers.

Although the price of Pangu computers is relatively close to the people, it is also thousands of yuan, so most of them are used for school teaching or office purposes. At the same time, there are also some commercial "Internet cafes" in Beijing, and of course, only a very small number of scientific research units or universities in China have access to the Internet. Moreover, most of the Internet is now for academic exchanges and research, and the Internet era, which is more suitable for ordinary people, has not yet really come. Therefore, these computer-based places are called "computer rooms".

"How much does the computer room charge?" Lin Qi walked into a large computer room and asked gently.

"The Pangu machine is 5 cents an hour, and the Xiaobawang is 1 cent an hour. The owner of the computer room said, "You can choose what game you want to play, and in addition, there is a complete set of game guides on the market." How long does it take, pay a deposit first. If you are not satisfied with the time, you will get off the plane and refund the deposit. Exceed the time, make up the money. ”

The escort gave the boss 10 yuan, and after that, the boss turned on Lin Qi with a smile and brought out a box of games for selection.

After Lin Qi got on the machine, he casually chose the game of Go, and said with a smile while playing chess with the computer program: "I think the attendance rate is okay, seventy percent is full, business should be very good, right?"

In today's Go games, there is naturally no alpha dog, only a very simple algorithm. Basically, anyone who is new to Go can abuse computer programs. This is because these computer programs are not artificial intelligence at all, and only play against players according to simple rules. Of course, although Lin Qi has a chess in his name, it really stinks when he plays chess, and even the current computer can abuse him.

After a few minutes of playing, the smile on Lin Qi's face gradually disappeared.

Could it be that the chess game with me is not an ordinary program, but an alpha dog that has traveled through time and space?

"It's okay. There are many students in Beijing, especially college students, who have limited time on the computer in the school, so they often come to the computer room to practice. The boss said, "At first, I was the only one, but now there are more and more competitors." Business is actually not as good as it was three months ago, when it was almost full every day, and there were very few empty seats. ”

"It's time to upgrade your computer. Lin Qi said indifferently, "You are still a single-core 16-bit Pangu console, right? The model that has been discontinued, and the performance has long been unable to meet the requirements of new games at this stage." ”

"No, it's advanced. The boss argued, "To be honest, although this computer is only worth 1,500 now, even if it costs 10,000 yuan for 286, it may not be better than it." ”

"The PC is already in the 386 era, and the Pangu console will gradually eliminate the 16-bit model. The single core is eliminated, and soon the dual core will also be eliminated. Next, the 16-bit model is completely eliminated, the host of the XRM32 chip, gradually becoming the mainstream, and the future programs and games all need better CPU chips, larger memory and video memory, 16-bit computers, and the performance has reached the limit. Lin Qi smiled, "I see that these games of yours are all old games from a few years ago." The latest games, such as "Counter-Strike", must not be able to be brought in, right? If you can play high-end games like "Counter-Strike" in your store, but other machines can't play it, I'm afraid business will be big, right? And the monitor, too, will have to be replaced. Your monitor screen is only 14-inch CRT, and the refresh rate is less than 60, right? For the sake of the gaming experience, at least you have to replace it with a plasma professional computer screen from a new startup. ”

"How much does that cost!" the owner of the Internet café shook his head repeatedly, "Moreover, I bought a new machine, what will I do with these old machines?"

"The size of Moore's Law, every two years, the performance of the computer is doubled. These old machines, taking advantage of the opportunity to sell second-hand, should be sold as soon as possible, otherwise, they can only be left in the home warehouse as heirlooms. The computer room, with the computer as a selling point, if you want to maintain a competitive advantage, you must need to configure higher than the mainstream of the market. A steady stream of depreciation of old machines are sold to other users, and then replaced with new equipment. Lin Qi smiled and said, "If the old computer is depreciated and sold, it can recover part of the cost, and the cost is not as much as you think." ”

"What a pity to sell at a discount?" the owner of the computer room thought for a while and said, "My location is relatively good, so I will buy a new machine and continue to operate here." If the old machine is taken to the low-end and the rent is lower to open a branch, even if the old computer is used until it is decommissioned, it is better than directly selling the second-hand machine for replacement. ”

"It's not impossible. Lin Qi talked about business to the current computer room owner on a whim, and he was just a good teacher.

In addition, the computer room also plays a role in expanding the computer user base, although most of them are definitely used to play games. However, there will always be some users who are studying technology in the computer network and laying the foundation for technology mastery.

A large number of users have mastered the basics of computer operation through the computer room, and these computers are basically Pangu systems. In the future, when they have money to buy computers, most of them will continue to be loyal users of the Pangu camp because of inertia.