Slashdot Mirror
Sales Of PCs, Laptops, Tablets Continue to Fall, Hit Lowest Point Since 2011 (canalys.com)
According to the latest numbers provided by marketing research firm Canalys, the shipments of PC devices -- which includes desktops, notebooks, all-in-ones, two-in-ones, and tablets -- amounted to 101 million units in the first quarter of 2016. The number underscores a 13% decline from the same period a year ago, and it is also the lowest volume since the second quarter of 2011. Apple led the chart among PC OEMs, moving 14 million units (suffering 17% fall), followed by Chinese conglomerate Lenovo. HP assumed the third position, with Dell and Samsung closely following it. Tim Coulling, Canalys Senior Analyst said in a press statement: The global PC market had a bad start to 2016 and it is difficult to see any bright spots for vendors in the coming quarters. The tablet boom has faded in the distance and the market is fully mature. Global shipments declines are expected to continue unless vendors bring transformational innovation to the market. Apple and Microsoft are propping up shipments in established markets with their detachables, but price points make them less affordable in low-income countries. Although other vendors are coming to market with cheaper alternatives, they are unlikely to have a big impact on volumes in the short term. The number of people looking to buy their first PC is at an all-time low and 2016 is likely to bring yet more turmoil to global PC vendors.
after a while (probably soon) any win10 based pc will NOT have drivers for anything lower in the MS domain.
there may even be issues with linux. I preduct that MS is waging an all out war on linux+osx and will use all their pressure to increase the UEFI secure boot stuff and make it so that we can't disable it. only the higher end boards will allow overriding secure boot. even then, I suspect MS will try their best to force those vendors to turn off that switch, too.
MS sees the writing on the wall. so does intel, which is why intel is laying off 10k people!
I used to upgrade my own set of pc's every year or so. I have a stack of mobos here dating from the mid 90's (really hard to throw out working hardware, even if its ancient) and yet I have not bought a new system or board in years. all my systems do what I need and given the tight economy, I can't justify keeping the pc vendors in profits when money is so tight these days.
tablets have run their course. they simply are not replacements and are definitely LUXURY items. I have no tablets and no plans for any.
corp america does a pc or laptop 'refresh' every few years for their employees. and people who break their systems need replacements. but people doing non-urgent upgrades are few and far between, these days.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
When the OS starts costing more than the CPU....
Yep. I'm typing this on an Alienware M17x, which came out in 2009 and still does everything I need it to do beautifully as effectively a desktop computer.
One can actually thank the advent of tablets for making the use of older computers with newer software possible, a lot of scaled-down mobile devices use variants of what had been desktop or higher-end laptop components years earlier. As software companies are forced to write for less horsepower to have good applications on the mobile devices the side-effect is supporting slower, older computers.
They're trying to counteract that with rules as to what chipsets and processors new OSes will run on, but if they're not careful they'll end up with a fractured market like cell phones.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Smartphone sales growth continues to be explosive."
Maybe we should just add smartphones to the definition of "PCs" (a device you can carry in your pocket does seem to be a "personal" device, anyway) and go on with life?
Innovation didn't stagnate, it just is being focused on a new form factor.
Sdelat' Ameriku velikoy Snova!
I remember my first CD-ROM drive, a Mitsumi double-speed CD-ROM drive, came with a CD of crappy demo games and applications. One of them was a VRML world. That was in 1995 or there abouts. I've been waiting for "VR-ready" since then. Or maybe since Lawnmower Man in 1992...
Oh, that's because Apple's computers in 2016 are less powerful then Apple's computers were in 2012. It's pretty hard for them to sell "upgrades" when they're not as good as what the customer already has.
But hey, Apple's doing great. Look at those margins when you can sell 5 year old tech at premium prices. Who cares about unit sales, it's all profit per machine, right?
Yep, computers are "good enough" for most people now. Heck, I'm still running my quad core from 2008. It still works fine and compiles quickly, I see no reason to upgrade. Even if I did, I'd have to deal with EFI and a bunch of other new things so I'm not in a hurry to upgrade. My laptop on the other hand is getting old and slow (it's probably 10 years old now.) However, I don't use it as much as I used to, so again, not in a hurry to replace it. I use my Nexus 7 (2012) still for most things I'd use the laptop for, and even that is starting to get slow. I'll probably have to replace the tablet soon, but the desktop and laptop will still last for a while.
I figure when my main PC dies (which will probably be years from now) I'll upgrade.
You can't chalk all of it up to Microsoft fear/hate, certainly, but that might be one factor.
One of my own small businesses is a clear example. We would have bought a handful of new laptops and desktop workstations for various people at least 2-3 years ago, but the usual complaints about Windows 8 put us off and we were waiting for 10 to fix the problems. Since 10 is a complete non-starter for that business because of the privacy and robustness concerns (dealing with potentially sensitive information = instant compliance violations if we can't fully control our equipment) we're still making do with 5+ year old machines.
That's increasingly painful, because we're talking about laptops that now have sub-2 hour battery life if they're not plugged in, several machines that have small, spinning disk storage, and so on. We would drop thousands on new PC hardware in a heartbeat, if someone would just give us anything close to what we actually need, which is basically modern hardware + Windows 7 + a couple of the updates that newer Windows versions do offer to support that modern hardware (USB3, hi-res screens, etc.).
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
I think this is a symptom of the ongoing economic issues in the world. People talk about the vicious circle that is expected as American companies offshore good paying jobs overseas for cheaper labour. Newsflash: It's here. Companies make more money at first, but who will be able to afford to buy their products in America? Home computers as much as we like to think them essential, aren't. People can get by without them. They can buy goods at stores, get books from the library (but don't we also complain that people aren't reading as much anymore anyway?), and do many things offline. Some people (me included) think that getting offline more is a good thing. If you are ditching your TV for Netflix, you don't need a powerful computer. Only something enough to run a browser (but heck, most TVs have streaming service clients built into them anyway). Other than games, computers from almost ten years ago are good enough to run a word processor. So who is going to buy a new computer or tablet (for hundreds of dollars) when their job has left for Bangladesh or China and McDonald's is putting in automated kiosks? This is no surprise.
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
Looking at my non-technical family and friends, 5-10 years ago many people had home PCs so they could send emails, order stuff from Amazon and read the BBC's website. A smartphone now meets all their requirements so they no longer need the PC.
I know several people who've dumped their PC and now rely solely on their phones. They don't even bother with a tablet. Those folk are part of these statistics.