Hasta La Gadget!

If you count iPads as computers, Apple could now be said to have the largest market share of any computer maker in the United States.

“The iPad,” writes Deutsche Bank’s Chris Whitmore, “is driving a rapid, unprecedented shift in the structure of the computing industry.”

Apple had a great year relative to the rest of the PC industry, with desktop and laptop sales growing by 24.1 percent when most of its competitors’ revenues shrank or stayed flat. The growth in sales and share is even more impressive when you add in the launch of the iPad, which brings Apple’s year-over-year unit growth to 250 percent.

In a note for clients issued Monday, Whitmore took PC share data from the International Data Corporation’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker and added in figures for iPad sales. The result is the chart above. Apple’s nearly 2 million PCs sold in Q3 gave it the number 3 spot among computer makers in the U.S., with a 10.6% share of the market. Adding the iPads it sold in Q3 boosts it into the top spot.

The number of iPads sold in Q3 will be unknown until Monday afternoon’s earnings call, but estimates put it somewhere between 2.4 million and 6.2 million.

Part of what’s happening here is a struggle to define “personal computer” in a world of convergent and crossover devices. IDC’s data for PCs includes desktops, laptops and mini notebooks, but doesn’t include handhelds or servers. The iPad and other tablets count as handhelds, along with smartphones, e-readers and media players. Even though tablets and ultraportable netbooks fall in the same price range, perform many (although not all) of the same tasks and compete with each other for buyers’ attention and dollars, they’re not grouped in the same category.

Deutsche Bank’s graph isn’t quite fair, because the iPad is the only nontraditional computer added to the dataset. It’s not clear what the numbers would look like if you factored in all tablet computers and smartphones, not just Apple’s. And there may be good reasons, from different form factors to different operating systems, to keep PC and tablet sales separate. In fact, by keeping the numbers separate, you can see just how well Apple’s PC business has done on its own. It’s still behind HP and Dell, but is showing recent growth while some competitors, such as Acer, are losing ground.

But three things are clear. First, the market for tablet computers is enormous. Second, Apple has essentially created that market and currently owns it. And third, if the iPad is cannibalizing sales of PCs, it’s not Apple’s PCs that are getting cannibalized.

All of this makes this week’s upcoming Apple event — and the possible presentation of a new device somewhere between a laptop and an iPad — just that much more interesting.

What If the iPad Were a PC? [Fortune Tech]

See Also:

• Despite Runaway Popularity, iPad Isn't Hurting PC Sales
• Chipmakers Feel the Pain as iPad Eats Into Notebook Sales
• Rumor: Apple to Introduce 11.6-Inch MacBook Next Week
• New MacBook Air Will Come in 11 and 13-Inch Flavors
• Apple's Going Back to the Mac on October 20th
• Best Buy Chief: iPad Cuts Laptop Sales in Half
• Could the iPad Save the Desktop Computer?

3-D could just be a fad and consumers may be already losing interest. Sales of 3-D TVs have not been growing as fast as TV-makers expected this year, says research firm DisplaySearch.

High price of the devices and the unavailability of good 3-D content have contributed to the lack of consumer enthusiasm for 3-D TVs, says the company.

Just about 3.2 million 3-D TVs are expected to be shipped worldwide this year. Of these, just about 1.6 million will be in North America.

“While TV manufacturers have bold plans and a lot of new products, consumers remain cautious,” says Paul Gray, director of TV electronics research at DisplaySearch.

3-D TVs were billed as the breakthrough consumer electronics product of the year. Spurred by Hollywood’s success with 3-D movies such as Avatar and Alice in Wonderland, TV makers rushed into launching big-screen 3-D TVs. Almost every major TV manufacturer including Sony, LG, Panasonic and Mitsubishi showed 3-D TVs at the Consumer Electronics Show this year.

Earlier this week, LG introduced a 72-inch 3-D TV, claiming it is the biggest 3-D commerical TV available to consumers currently. In the U.S. big retail stores such as Best Buy and Costco have started selling 3-D TVs.

But so far, consumer reaction to 3-D TVs, has been muted.  Consumers haven’t entirely bought into the value of having 3-D content in their living room. Eyestrain, fatigue and nausea in some people who watch 3-D content has also dampened enthusiasm for 3-D TVs. (See: Four things that could keep 3-D TVs out of your living room)

What TV makers haven’t also solved is the problem of special glasses required to view 3-D. Despite the introduction of the Nintendo 3DS, a 3.5-inch handheld 3-D game console that doesn’t require any special glasses, glass-free technology is years away for the big screen.

But even for those consumers who are ready to don a pair of glasses to watch the TV in their living room, it isn’t easy. 3-D glasses are engineered so they will work only with the brand of TV with which they’re shipped. That means glasses that work with Sony’s 3-D  television won’t work for watching Monday night football at a friend’s place on his Panasonic 3-D TV.

Meanwhile, 3-D content remains scarce. Channels such as ESPN, DirecTV and Discovery have promised 3-D channels that will begin broadcasting only in 2011.

DisplaySearch says it is hopeful some of the constraints around 3-D TV can be solved and 3-D TVs will catch on. Prices of 3-D TVs are likely to fall, says the firm, even as the technology gets better.

Sales of 3-D will TVs grow from 2 percent of all flat panel TVs shipped this year to 41 percent, according to DisplaySearch’s forecast.

See Also:

• 4 Things That Could Keep 3-D TV Out of Your Living Room
• Toshiba Crams Supercomputer Guts Into 3-D, Web TV
• Wired Explains: How 3-D Television Works
• 3-D PCs Will Make a Splash at Computex
• 3-D: Coming Soon to a Cellphone Near You

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

We’ve mixed feelings on 3D as a whole, and it seems that the vast majority of consumers do as well. We’ve seen quite a few lovely implementations, and there’s hardly a better way to watch sports away from the field, but those dreaded 3D glasses are likely keeping most people an arm’s length away. According to a new report from DisplaySearch, 3DTVs will make up just two percent of all flat panels shipped in 2010. Paul Gray, Director of TV Electronics Research, noted that “while TV manufacturers have bold plans and a lot of new products, consumers remain cautious,” continuing by stating that “consumers have been told that 3D TV is the future, but there still remains a huge price jump and little 3D content to watch.” In particular, “North American consumers appear to be playing a waiting game,” and in Western Europe, the sales of 3D glasses to sets has failed to hit 1:1. That said, the report feels rather strongly about the future, noting that 90 million 3DTV sets are expected to ship in 2014. Of course, if we’ve only got two or three 2D options to choose from by then, the estimated skyrocketing makes a lot more sense…

Continue reading DisplaySearch: consumers playing a ‘wait and see’ game with 3DTVs

DisplaySearch: consumers playing a ‘wait and see’ game with 3DTVs originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 13 Oct 2010 09:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Like any two technology behemoths, Adobe and Microsoft have certainly had their ups and downs. But now that Google and Apple are looming over them in a number of ways, it seems as if the two may be courting one another in order to help re-level the playing field. According to a New York Times report — which was crafted after collecting reports from “employees and consultants to the companies who were involved in the discussions that took place” — Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen recently met at the latter’s headquarters for a closed-door meeting. Purportedly, the meeting went on for over an hour and covered a variety of topics, with one of ’em being Apple and its newfound dominance in the mobile market. Shockingly enough, a “possible acquisition of Adobe by Microsoft were among the options” of stopping the skyrocketing growth. The report accurately notes that such a deal makes entirely more sense now that Redmond isn’t exactly the 800 pound gorilla that it was before Android and iOS hit the mainstream, though details beyond these assumptions were few and far betwixt. Whatever happens, no one can blame Steve Jobs for not giving Adobe every possible reason to hit Apple with everything it’s got — even if that involves buddying up with Ballmer and co.

Microsoft and Adobe CEOs meet, purportedly plan world domination originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Oct 2010 16:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oh, IE, it pains us to do this to you. You who once so mightily won in the battle against Netscape Navigator now seem to be losing your war against a battalion of upstarts, relatively fresh faces like Firefox and Chrome. According to StatCounter, IE’s global usage stats have fallen to 49.87 percent, a fraction of a tick beneath half. Firefox makes up the lion share of the rest, at 31.5 percent, while Chrome usage tripled since last year, up to 11.54 percent. Two years ago IE had two thirds of the global market locked down, and even if Internet Explorer 9 is the best thing since ActiveX, well, we just don’t see the tide of this battle turning without MS calling in some serious reinforcements.

Update: If you needed more proof of Chrome’s increasing popularity, we got a tip on this report from Softpedia confirming that Chrome is the fastest growing browser of the moment. Firefox is more or less flat and, well, you know all about how IE is faring.

Continue reading Internet Explorer falls below 50 percent global marketshare, Chrome usage triples

Internet Explorer falls below 50 percent global marketshare, Chrome usage triples originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 05 Oct 2010 07:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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