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The global PC market shrank 11 percent during Q2 2013

by Mark Tyson on 11 July 2013, 13:15

Tags: Lenovo, Hewlett Packard (NYSE:HPQ), Acer (TPE:2353), ASUSTeK (TPE:2357)

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In a new report market research firm Gartner has said that global shipments of PCs fell 10.9 per cent during Q2 2013. Similarly figures put out by research firm IDC, on Wednesday, pointed to a PC market shrinkage of 11.4 per cent. The latest figures are evidence of the fifth straight quarterly decline in a row, which makes this the longest decline in the history of the PC. Most of the reduction in PC popularity is put down to the ascendancy of the tablet market and the failure of touchy-feely Windows 8 to avert that.

Gartner analyst Mikako Kitagawa explained "We are seeing the PC market reduction directly tied to the shrinking installed base of PCs, as inexpensive tablets displace the low-end machines used primarily for consumption in mature and developed markets." More optimistically, analyst Jay Chou wrote in IDC's report that "With second-quarter growth so close to forecast, we are still looking for some improvement in growth during the second half of the year."

The new league tables of PC sellers from IDC shows that PC makers sold 75.6 million PCs in Q2 2013, whereas in the same quarter last year 85.4 million were sold. Drilling down the figures we see that Lenovo has taken the crown from HP and become the world's leading PC maker with a share of 16.7 per cent of the market. With respect to PC shipments Acer and ASUS have fared particularly badly in the last year.

Now that we have started the second half of the year, are there some new compelling reasons to upgrade your current PC? There's a lot of hardware and software action taking place in the coming months. More and more PC makers are updating their laptops with Intel's new Haswell processors. These Haswell laptops promise a lot more battery stamina from your portable computer, a pretty important and enticing statistic. Also we have Windows 8.1 becoming available in the next couple of months, this might attract people to upgrade as the end of the security updates for Microsoft Windows XP systems looms on the horizon.

Many of the PC makers have developed tablets of various kinds for the first time during the last year, with varying degrees of success, so bets have been hedged for many manufacturers.

HEXUS Forums :: 9 Comments

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Posted by lowers93 - Thu 11 Jul 2013 17:38
I get the feeling this is happening simply because of the way the industry is treated. So many new technologies just don't warrant the upgrade for a lot of people who don't care about the extra 5 or 10% and so they don't bother for a good few more generations. The majority of people i know only buy a new laptop when the last one dies or is just unusable. Hence, the level of PC sales is not sustainable at the level it was. Notably in the average commercial laptop range which i would say is where most people i know shop nowadays. I haven't seen a significant change is AGES that would be attractive to me or anyone i know for a new laptop. It's just different combinations of old HDD's at ever more completely unnecessary sizes, adequate processing power, average ram, average battery life and poor graphics every single time just with a different design (and often sold at crazy prices for anything even the slightest bit good).

Haswell and maybe even ultrabooks might well change this and i hope it does for the sake of uninformed customers getting the battery life they like and ssd's that will give them noticable and longer lasting speed instead of that classic average bump in performance that has stopped people thinking any new laptop is worth buying.

Does anyone else feel this way?
Posted by NecronomicoN - Thu 11 Jul 2013 18:24
You summed that up pretty well Lowers93. The new tricks aren't nearly enough to warrant new machines. And I'd wager that tablets have done more to hurt television sales than they have PCs. Tablets are primarily an entertainment product, with an auxiliary use as vocational aids. PCs are for getting work done. There hasn't been any game-changing progress in PCs since SSDs. And graphics performance is a minority market factor.

I don't see Haswell changing things. It isn't enough. Unless new applications for the PC come into being, sales will continue to fall.

Us who build our own machines (gamers, folders, enthusiasts) account for less than 10% of the market, but I'd like to think that even with so small a percentage, we can keep the platform alive. Big business though, different story.
Posted by kalniel - Thu 11 Jul 2013 18:32
Well it's phones innit? Performance hasn't been a reason for the vast majority to buy a new computer for years and years, so I doubt that's anything new. But now people don't need a home computer for email.
Posted by ScoTTisH-GingeR - Fri 12 Jul 2013 10:06
PC tech is getting stagnant, anyone with an intel sandybridge has had no reason to upgrade really, AMD tech has been to far behind intel since before the sandybridge and doesn't seem to be catching up anytime soon.

For a general home market pc i find my old 939 setup running fine for general facebook, downloads, hexus visits, etc so why change a whole pc when no need (did upgrade to a small SSD cause you know)

For the business world they lease the equipment most of the time and a core2duo is still the mainstay in a lot of offices i have worked in, short of something that will save them money in the long run like an ARM based workstation to drastically save on power consumption there is no need to change whole PCs when the fastest upgrade you will see a boost from is an SSD.
Posted by CAT-THE-FIFTH - Fri 12 Jul 2013 10:20
I know plenty of people who are using AMD CPUs for desktop gaming rigs who have know reason to upgrade TBH. Its not like Intel has a uniform advantage for CPUs under a Core i5 anyway,and there are certainly far more people who don't have Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs TBH. I remember going to a largish LAN and I was surprised how many people had AMD and Intel CPUs under a Core i5. It seems only on tech forums that SB(and newer) Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs are “common” as it certainly is not my experience even with gamers I met.

The same goes with graphics cards,most gamers I met have cards which cost under £200 anyway,with most having cards clustered around the £75 to £150 mark.

Moreover,computer enthusiasts tend to measurebate the most of all gamers I know,so I suppose that might explain it! ;) :P

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