Tablets in, netbooks out, forecasts analyst
Most of them iPads
Apple will have shipped 4.2m iPads during Q3, rising to 5m in Q4, market watcher DisplaySearch has forecast.
In all, the Mac maker will sell around 13.2m of the tablets in 2010, DisplaySearch's numbers show, before almost doubling that total to 24.8m in 2011.
That's not to say, that Apple's rivals, like Samsung, LG, Motorola, Toshiba, Asus and co, won't do too badly. DisplaySearch reckons some 8.7m non-Apple netbooks and tablets will ship in Q3, rising to 11.2m in Q4.
DisplaySearch didn't say specifically how those numbers will split between netbooks and the new Android tablets, but it's clear that it doesn't believe the former will account for a declining proportion of the whole. It made a point of stating that during Q2 netbook sales were down 14 per cent sequentially and 13 per cent year on year.
"Clearly, there was an 'iPad Effect' in the portable PC market," it said. "The effect might have been even more pronounced, but Apple struggled to fill demand, with shipment times listed as 7-10 business days for all of Q2, and shipments into Japan and China were just beginning at the end of the period."
The prognosis is not good. "We expect tablets like the iPad will continue to take market share from [netbooks] and the ultraportable segment in regions where PCs have high penetration rates," it said. However, netbooks will continue to sell well in emerging economies to first-time PC buyers, it added.
That may well be how Acer Taiwan president Scott Lin felt able this week to say that the netbook isn't doomed to be out-evolved by the tablet. Lin said he believes that this year some 40m netbooks will be sold, about 20 per cent of the notebook market as a whole.
That's slightly higher than the 36m netbooks and non-iPad tablets DisplaySearch has forecast will be sold in 2010, but not so very far off. ®
COMMENTS
Perhaps Netbooks need an OS that does not cost 33% of the price.
That is all
No thanks
Quite happy with my netbook thanks very much. Why would I want to cripple myself by buying something less capable like an iPad?
Keyboards, entertainment and procuctivity...
I deal with tech support and continue to see people need that keyboard net books have that tablets do not. People need that ultra portable net access that lets office work get done on the fly without the heft and bulk of typical laptops getting in the way. Once the initial "oh shiny" effect of a new product being introduced has passed I think tablets and netbooks will continue to both come along nicely. In the end tablets seem suited for entertainment and netbooks better suited for productivity work. Both those needs are not going away. I think both are hear for the foreseeable future.
"Perhaps Netbooks need an OS that does not cost 33% of the price."
Mine's always had one
Not books
I don't know how we ended up with a "net book or death" demographic, other then the apparent inability of a noisy subsection of geekdom to manage more than one kind of technology at a time, but Jesus people, can you either get over it or go and get your autism properly diagnosed.
The things that most people use net books for are easily done by a tablet, and the UX on a tablet is considerably better than a lappy for the average user. Let's be honest, the things YOU do on your net book, which are porn, browsing, email and whining into the internets could also easily be done on a tablet.
Oh, you'll whine on about how you'd just die without 12 USB ports and a command line, but we don't believe you. Stop it.
