back to article Market watcher heralds 'Age of the Notebook'

More laptops shipped in Q3 than desktops, the first time this has ever happen during a given quarter, apparently. So said market watcher iSuppli today, though a close look at its numbers show there's not a lot in it: 38.6m notebooks to 38.5m desktops. What's a 100,000 units among friends? Laptop shipments were up 40 per cent …

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  1. Jerome

    Netbooks?

    Are netbooks included in these figures? Apparently 5.6m netbooks were shifted in Q3 this year; that's a significant chunk of total notebook sales. If anything, I'm surprised the netbooks didn't make up a larger percentage. When you can have a computer that's actually portable enough to carry around, while still doing everything you really need, and pay half the price of a normal notebook for the privilege, what's not to love?

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Horns

    Nothing new

    I don't know about the rest of the world, but that's nothing new in Europe, the first time I read about this was back in 2005... And I remember Gartner or GfK also publishing on it later on. Here's the original publication, for reference (lucky I archive everything):

    Tuesday, 2nd August 2005

    NOTEBOOKS OVERTAKE DESKTOPS IN MAY 2005

    Notebook sales have overtaken desktop sales in Europe’s top eight economies in May 2005 with 51.3% of the market, according to figures published by Context, with the UK the latest to see notebooks eclipse desktops. Italy still leads the way with 62.2% of notebooks.

    Context’s SalesWatch research, tracking sales of business and consumer technology products through indirect channels of distribution in Europe, revealed that as notebook sales increased by 18.4% compared to a year ago, desktop sales fell by 12.1% over the same period, raising the proportion of notebooks from 43.9% to 51.3% in May 2005.

    The UK joined the group of notebook-dominated markets with 55.4%, compared to 38.5% a year ago, while Italy is still ahead with 62.2%. The Netherlands and Sweden could follow soon with less than 55% of desktops in May 2005, but France remains behind as desktops still accounted for 61.2% of total PC sales.

    Bill Gates, because you can't buy a PC laptop without Windows, although tied sales are illegal... Gotta be good news for somebody!

  3. Pete "oranges" B.
    Happy

    Does this mean...

    Maybe we'll see a few notebook designs with cases that don't bend, warp, crack, flex, deform, etc. during normal use?

  4. BioTube

    More like

    The age of the fool! Except for notebooks, portable computers are worthless - attempts to marry performance and portability are damned to fail.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Psion and Netbooks

    I think they own the TM to them or something like that, so who knows, laptots might be in vogue, though UMC is still available :)

    Sure, a desktop is for those doing heavy computer work, most people hardly work nowadays, lazy lot, and a laptop suffices.

    And for those who do work and use a laptop, then a laptop desktop replacement suffices.

    But, I love my <del>command cent</del> desktops and I will always have one.

    What would be nice is the ability to build your own laptop, and it is coming along, but it will be great when you can just wander around picking out all the components, and having a multitude of flexible plural of chassis in which to house them.

  6. Brian Whittle

    its down to price

    Laptops (notebooks) have got down to the price of Desktop pcs and if you only do a bit of browsing and such are more than adequate.

    They still don't cut the mustard if you have a more intensive use for a computer though and have the inherent problems of computers that don't use standard parts (Dells/Mac/integrated computers) its a bin job when a laptop has a hardware problem apart from the hard drive, unless you want to spend nearly the price af a new one getting it repaired

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