Sure, my family still uses the old desktop computer at home—even with everyone grabbing their phones first thing in the morning. Phones are great for quick stuff, like texting my wife when I’m picking up groceries or watching short videos while waiting for water to boil. But when it comes to real home tasks, that computer’s still our go-to.
First off, my wife uses it almost every evening to handle our bills and family budgets. She says typing numbers into Excel spreadsheets on a phone is a nightmare—one wrong tap and she has to start over. On the computer, she can see all the columns clearly: rent payments, utility bills, how much we spend on food each month. She even saves PDF copies of receipts in a folder, so if we need to check something later, it’s easy to find. Last month, she noticed our electricity bill was higher than usual, and she pulled up three months of data on the computer in five minutes—something she says would’ve taken twice as long on her phone.
Then there’s my 14-year-old daughter. She needs the computer for her homework almost every school night. She can’t write long essays or edit PowerPoint presentations for her science projects on a phone screen. A few weeks ago, she had to make a poster about environmental protection—she used the computer to find pictures, resize them, and type up facts. She said the phone’s screen was too small to see how the whole poster looked, but on the computer, she could tweak every detail until it was just right. Sometimes, she even video calls her classmates on it to work on group assignments—they can share their screens and talk at the same time, which is way harder to do on a phone.
For me? I use it on weekends when I have some free time. I love watching old action movies, and the computer’s bigger screen makes it feel like a tiny theater—way better than hunching over my phone for two hours. I also look up recipes sometimes. Last weekend, I wanted to make braised pork for the family, but I forgot the steps. I pulled up a recipe on the computer, and I could keep the screen open on the kitchen table while I chopped ingredients—no more pausing a phone video every 30 seconds because my hands were greasy. Oh, and I use it to back up photos too. I take lots of pictures of my daughter at her soccer games with my phone, but I’m scared I’ll lose them if the phone breaks. So every month, I plug my phone into the computer and save all the photos in a folder—now I know they’re safe.
Phones are definitely convenient, but our home computer’s like a reliable old friend. It doesn’t have the latest apps or a fancy touchscreen, but it helps us take care of our family stuff—bills, homework, even making dinner. We couldn’t do without it, honestly.