Oddly enough, the power user is often not seeking a lot of power from their computer. I'm quite happy with a reasonably large display and full size keyboard, plugged into a cheap 10" laptop that I can walk away with.
I think there will always be a divide between "create" and "consume" uses of computers, of any display size. For me, the dividing line is that I need a keyboard to create stuff. As a secondary issue, I have to be able to position the display to avoid eyestrain and neck fatigue, limiting my ability to use a laptop for real work. That could just be a concession to old age. But my creative apps -- code editors, compilers, and Jupyter, require very little real computing power.
They went chasing television viewers with 16:9 glossy screens and all the productivity types held onto their old machines and wept for the future.
I don't want a paper thin Netflix viewer. I have a tablet and a huge tv for that. And I sure don't want to do work on a tablet PC.
I want to see some context on the code I am editing or view a PDF full page. Sure you can go side by side on a huge 16:9 screen but on a compact laptop my vision can't do it even at retina levels.
I get sick of squinting at everything through a mail slot.
Lets get back to productive screens and keyboards and sensible designs that aren't going to sacrifice battery life or functionality to be the thinnest and shiniest.
Dell and HP are going to be the last places to look for innovation. I suspect 90% of what they do these days amounts to slapping a badge on a generic Chinese machine.
Most of the innovation seems to be from Microsoft, Apple and Google. The future of PCs will likely come from Surface, Pixel and whatever Apple does next.
Maybe AR optimized for productivity would be a useful innovation in the space. Higher resolutions (with possibly lower fields of view if necessary) and maintained visibility of keyboard/mouse should be possible with slight modifications to the VR / AR coming out now (like Microsoft's offering) - then you've got "infinite" virtual monitor space.
Considering that the cloud is a PC customer, I'm not sure what needs to be fixed. Furthermore, as "PC core audience" I completely agree with you: I want nothing to do with this Spectre. It has to compromise on power and PC has never been about that. It sounds just like a tablet.
My educated guess is that this won't win over the masses who love tablets and it will further alienate the PC core audience.