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Apple Now the Top PC Vendor, For Some Values of PC

Posted by timothy on from the is-it-personal-does-it-compute dept.

tsamsoniw writes "While research companies including IDC and Gartner deemed HP the PC leader for Q4 2012, Canalys has a different perspective. The analyst firm has declared Apple the top PC vendor for the past quarter, thanks in part to the booming success of the iPad and the iPad mini. By Canalys's reckoning, Amazon, too, now beats out the likes of Acer and Asus as leading PC vendors, having shipped 4.6 million Kindles in Q4."

7 of 577 comments (clear)

  1. So tablets at PCs now? by erotic_pie · · Score: 5, Informative

    Do tablets really count as a "PC"? If that's the case we might as well start considering smart phones PCs, since a modern tablet is basically just a scaled up smart phone.

    1. Re:So tablets at PCs now? by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Informative

      Do tablets really count as a "PC"?

      Well, let's see .. it has a CPU, memory, can do input, processing, and output (the Von Neumann definition). It's capable of doing Turing complete things, and writing code written for it.

      It's personal, and it meets all of the definitions of computer.

      we might as well start considering smart phones PCs, since a modern tablet is basically just a scaled up smart phone.

      By any meaningful definition, a modern smart phone is more of a computer than what we had 20 years ago -- by a huge factor.

      So, tell us, what aspects of a phone or tablet make it not a computer in your mind? They'll both run rings around an old 486.

      We're no longer talking about things which are hardware specific to a task, and you could easily port any programming language to that platform. The absence of a physical keyboard or mouse don't make you not a computer (because they used to have neither).

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    2. Re:So tablets at PCs now? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Then we should treat game consoles, both home and portable, as PCs too. So that makes, for example, Nintendo rather significant PC vendor.~

    3. Re:So tablets at PCs now? by cellocgw · · Score: 5, Insightful

      damn straight smartphones are PCs. They just happen to be small-format computers with a cellular link chipset added in.

      Now, just to make both you and me look like the idiots we are, can anyone come up with an accepted, standardized definition of what constitutes a "personal computer" ? I know I can't.

      --
      https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
  2. Hmmm. by msauve · · Score: 5, Funny

    Apple is now the top politically correct vendor. That must be because they censor apps.

    --
    "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
  3. Wrong by Barlo_Mung_42 · · Score: 5, Funny

    McDonalds is the top PC vendor, if you include Big Macs.

  4. Run for the hills!!!! by BLToday · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The "tablet is not a PC" crowd will attack. And then the "tablet is a PC" crowd will counter-attack. Out of nowhere "some tablet are PC" crowd will join, but haven't shown their alliance. The "Apple is evil" along with the "Android/Chrome OS FTW" groups will join forces to fight everybody. Unfortunately, the hills may not protect us from the "Win8 will kill everyone".