Win8 gains edge in a shrinking PC market

October 12 news, Windows 8 will become the savior of the PC market? Reports from both Geithner and the Internet Data Center (IDC) show that Windows 8 has a strong rebound in the market, but Apple's notebook Mac has failed. Is this just a momentary phenomenon or a general trend?

The overall sales reported by IDC are slightly more optimistic. Compared with the same period of last year, although overall PC sales fell by 7.6% in the third quarter of this year, due to a slight improvement in business prospects, this decline was lower than the previously expected 9.5%.

Surprisingly, Windows 8 supports the PC market. IDC said in the report: "Although PC sales were very weak during the early third quarter, many merchant customers' purchases picked up the market, and the Windows 8.1 system's computers played a significant role in September."

PC sales in the United States unexpectedly soared by only 0.2% from last year. Leading PC makers including Lenovo, HP, Toshiba, and Dell all enjoyed encouraging sales. what is the reason? Most of it is due to Windows 8, and Windows 7 also contributed a part.

IDC said: "Emerging product categories and a large number of products loaded with Windows 8 system is the main source of rising sales. Users who converted from Windows XP to Windows 7 platform also make a slight contribution to the data."

At the same time, Apple suffered heavy losses in the United States. IDC said that sales of Apple PCs in the United States were 2,146,000 units in the third quarter of last year, compared with 1,906,000 units in the same period of this year, with a decrease rate of 11.2%. The PC sales of most other PC manufacturers have increased to varying degrees, as shown in Table 1.

Geithner's data is less optimistic. In the third quarter of this year, the total PC sales in the world fell by 8.6%, which is the most sluggish starting quarter since 2008. However, this report also shows that the contraction in the PC market may come to an end, at least in the US market. Geekawa's chief analyst Kitagawa Mikako said:

“The US PC market has been declining since 2010, and the data for the third quarter of 2013 shows that the US market may be able to come out of decline. PC sales have also passed the most serious downturn because structural changes are accelerating. Tablet PCs will continue to have an impact on the PC market, but the US PC market will not only decline in the next two years, but will usher in steady growth."

Geithner's report also pointed out that the sales of PCs from Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Lenovo, and Toshiba, the PC makers of the US Windows system, have all increased, but Apple PC sales have declined. But Geithner said that Apple's Mac sales have fallen by only 2.3%, far below the IDC's 11.2%. However, this is not good news for Apple. Table 2 is Geithner's data.

Are these phenomena temporary or a sign of future trends? Perhaps the latter is more likely. At this moment, iPad is consuming the sales of its own brother, Mac, but it has little effect on the PC industry, at least in the US market. As for Windows 8, although it has many disadvantages, if a user wants to buy a PC, he will usually install Windows 8 first for the PC. This is one of the reasons why the Windows 8 system PC can revive the market.