No Flame Wars!
Discuss technical issues, software, and hardware.
Don't attack people!
Apple #1 PC Maker? Ping!
If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.
Posted on 08/23/2010 4:29:31 AM PDT by Swordmaker
The answer to the question depends on how iPad is classified and how the shipments add up combined with Macs. Is iPad a PC, like Windows tablets or low-powered netbooks? The definition is sure to generate controversy because of what's at stake -- which manufacturer is market share leader in the United States.
Late yesterday, I contacted Gartner and IDC, which both measure global PC shipments. But only Gartner responded to my question about how iPad is classified. It is clear from preliminary second quarter PC shipment data that neither analyst firm calculated iPad with PC shipments (Gartner explicitly explained so in its press release: "Gartner's PC group does not track media tablet sales in this PC shipment data, so iPad sales are not included in these results.") A Gartner spokesperson responded to my question about classification: "We don't have data for this category yet. We hope to have some stats for this category at some time shortly."
But what category is that? Media tablets? Windows tablets have been shipping for years, then there are slate netbooks. Don't these devices count as PCs? If so, then why not iPad? Apple's tablet has a microprocessor, graphics processor and storage disk, runs an operating system and third-party applications and connects to the Internet. That sure sounds like a personal computer to me. There's a touch keypad, or the user can attach a physical keyboard by Bluetooth. If PC classification requires a mouse, well, iPad doesn't have one of those. But should no mouse make iPad no PC?
So I'll ask you, before showing why the classification is so important: What is a PC? Please answer in comments.
In mid July, Gartner and IDC released preliminary worldwide PC shipments. Final numbers should be soon coming, now that Dell and HP announced quarterly results (yesterday). Both analyst firms placed HP No. 1 during second quarter for global PC shipments. HP and Dell ranked first and second, respectively, in the United States. Their rankings were based on estimated shipments. The analyst firms should have had final data from most other PC manufacturers before making the preliminary announcement.
Global Top 5, Gartner
1. HP, 14.455 million
2. Acer, 10.796 million
3. Dell, 10.283 million
4. Lenovo, 8.31 million
5. ASUS, 4.318 million
US Top 5, Gartner
1. HP, 4.608 million
2. Dell, 4.236 million
3. Acer, 2.028 million
4. Apple, 1.749 million
5. Toshiba, 1.565 million
According to Apple's fiscal third calendar-quarter earnings announcement, 3.472 million Macs shipped during calendar Q2. Apple also shipped 3.27 million iPads. If iPad counts as a PC and the numbers are combined, then Apple shipped 6.742 million personal computers during second quarter. That's high enough to raise Apple to No. 5 in global PC shipments.
Figuring US placement is dicier, because publicly-available information is incomplete. Apple announced 2 million iPads sold on May 31, which effectively means through the 30th -- or two days after international sales started. During the last month of the quarter, iPad was available in 10 countries. Apple hasn't released a geographic breakdown of sales and probably won't. The first million units came before Apple opened international sales, which is more than enough to push Apple ahead of Acer and snatch away third place.
But how much of that remaining 2.27 million units went to the United States? If 1.487 million (plus the 1 million for certain), then Apple would match Dell. If 1.859 million (plus the 1 million for certain), then Apple would match HP -- based on Gartner's preliminary data. To match Dell, international sales would be only 783,000 and 411,000 to match HP. However, IDC puts Apple unit shipments lower (1.618 million) and HP and Dell higher (4.721 million and 4.408 million, respectively). Based on those figures, it's unrealistic that Apple would rank any higher than third place. Again, the numbers are not exact. Gartner and IDC released preliminary shipments, and Apple's data stops two days before the quarter ended.
But what about third quarter? Could Apple top Dell or HP? The answer would depend on how iPad is classified. Is it a PC? If, yes, then based on analysts projections for PCs, Macs and iPads, Apple almost certainly could sell more units than HP or Dell in the United States. I've seen Wall Street analysts' iPad shipment estimates range from about 4 million to over 5 million units. Macs: Hovering above 3 million units. Assuming even half the combined Macs and iPads were sold here, Apple would be in striking distance of topping either HP or Dell.
In several previous blogs, I've asserted that iPad is the cheapest Mac that anyone can buy. But should iPad be counted as a PC? Netbooks are PCs, and ASUS recently reduced netbook shipments because of iPad competition. Apple's tablet certainly competes with PCs. Should it be counted as one? You tell me. In comments.
If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.
An iPad is more like an “appliance” than a PC. An 8-bit CPM box from 1981 has a more accessible operating system. If it is a PC, then so is an iPod Touch.
...and so do most smartphones today, but we do not count them as PCs!
The lines are blurring between products, which is good for everyone, and will continue to blur as time goes on.
To get caught up in minutae like "who is ranked highest" is like a big penis contest among children.
Heck, as long as you’re going there, why not call a smartphone a PC? Apart from size, there’s not much difference between an iPhone and an iPad.
Just about any car today has more computational power than early PCs. Many have hard drives for the nav function. Some have Internet connectivity. Why not call a car a “PC”?
This is semantic silliness.
Let’s count calculators too. Or how about microwaves and remotes controls?
What is the point of this trite fanboy article? Some sort of call for some type of tech affirmative action so Apple fans can pretend that they make up the majority of something?
It seems that these guys spend all day either making excuses for Apple screwing them over on something, or trying to piece together stats to make it seem like everyone is using macs.
>> Some sort of call for some type of tech affirmative action so Apple fans can pretend that they make up the majority of something?
I don’t understand why exactly, but I do understand that it’s super-serial important to them.
Almost cult-like. Fascinating.
Careful.
You’ll be accused of spreading “noise”.
Personally, I like the iPad for a lot of things, but cannot see it replacing a PC. Great for performing a lot of manipulation-oriented tasks and some of the apps (and games) are incredible.
In a sense AAPL answered the question in the negative a while back, when it dropped "Computer" from its corporate name.OTOH isn't iOS an operating system? What else but a computer runs under an operating system?
I guess maybe the "PC" is dying. If you define the "PC" in terms of the traditional keyboard and mouse . . .
They’d be counting it as a PC if it ran Windows. It’s also around the price of a mid-range PC, so it’s above the regular “media tablet” market.
Apple's been trying to create a "computing appliance" ever since the first Mac.
And also every single smartphone out there.
It is a legitimate assesment. Did your PC in 1987 have a WYSIWYG word processor?
The market is more fragmented than ever, but this and that industry player gets puff pieces printed with the definition of computer twaeked to make it seem as if they are some kind of dominasnt force in the market.
The more the lines blur, the more meaningless the holding of a title like "market share leader" becomes.
What's the point of being the"market share leader" when nobody really knows what "market" you're the share leader of? It becomes meaningless advertising hype, which as near as I can tell isn't good for anyone except whoever it is that's making the claim.
Almost everything runs under some kind of OS these days. Embedded Linux and VXWorks are in probably billions of tiny devices, from your GPS and your set top box or DVR, to your wireless router. The days of basic circuitry running electronics devices are waning.
Now that I've thought about this a bit I have to disagree with the author. An iPad cannot be counted as a PC for one reason: it is dependent on a computer for setup and synching. That makes it a satellite device along with PDAs. I'll change my mind when you can pull an iPad out of the box and start using it without first plugging it into a computer.
We've got ATMs that run Windows, but I doubt anyone's going to count them as PC's.
As a matter of fact, yes; since 1984. ;-)
I sit by the pool with my iPad, VPN into my server at work and then use VNC to connect to my desktop. I then can do anything by the pool that I can do at my desk, only I am dressed differently. I can sit at the beach and do the same utilizing the 3G network. Find me an 8-bit CPM box from 1981 that can do that.
I have one iPad. Its fantastic - as an entertainment device. It awesome to play games on, Freep, surf the web, heck I even have logmein ignition so I can remote control my PC’s and servers that I manage. Sometimes I even sit down at my laptop and start trying to drag things across the screen.
Will it ever replace the 4 pc’s I have at home or any of the 200+ PC’s and servers I manage at work??? Nope...
I cut my PC teeth on Apple’s Macintosh system and, over time, really grew to like it. However, I had to give in to convention and go with Windows and, for many years, I thought PCs with Windows were ok.
Increasingly, however, I am becoming very disenchanted with Microsoft routinely changing their OS after proclaiming that each OS release is the last OS you’ll ever need. IMO, they have made each successive OS release worse than the last one.
With Apple, I found myself trapped in the “init” wars between Apple’s OS and a publisher’s application. When an application didn’t work after I installed it, the publisher would point to Apple’s OS as being the problem. When I called Apple, they would point to the publisher’s init as the problem. I was out the money, couldn’t take the software back and had an application that didn’t work.
Between the two of them today, either one is a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea!!
My sister’s husband has all of his flight manuals, maps and NOTAMs on his. Pretty cool device for flight training.
For kids, amazing.
One sister has two nominally autistic kids, and they were able to use it without problem.
Agreed, though.
I can’t imagine that I’d ever replace my PC.
Was gonna buy one, but bought a treadmill instead ;)
Maybe in the next incarnation.
Exactly.
I buy and install handheld RF terminals that run Windows components, but none of them would ever be called a PC.
However, I’ve run PC tablets and they were definitely PCs. Wish they were more capable, though.
I would hate to try to work on a spreadsheet or Quickbooks using a smart phone.
What is essential that is not in an iPad?
Nobody uses ATMs as computers. People use iPads as computers, there's even an office suite available. But as I said, as long as they remain slave devices to computers they can't be called computers in their own right.
Some of the problems with Windows are because Microsoft would be nice to you and suck it up. Even though it was the application's fault (IMHO it usually is), Microsoft would write a hack into Windows to make that one application work. Windows is (at least was) full of such hacks.
WordWriter on the Atari ST.
The Xerox Alto and Star had WYSIWYG in the 70s.
Do PC makers count netbooks as “PCs”? If so, then I see no problem counting the iPad as a PC - as it basically reflects Apple’s idea of a netbook.
Most of us consider “fanbois” or any derivative of that to be an attempt to start a flame war.
What about your post contributes to the conversation?
Your vain attempts to disrupt around here is duly noted.
The words “Apple fanbois” is a term of endearment. Like that gay movie “The Boys in the Band” ——>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_in_the_Band
Thin skins make good lampshades.
Hey, you forgot to whine to the mod about my post #8. Remove that one and I’m gone without a trace. No more opposing viewpoint! It’s another sunny day in Cupertino.
I know how important that is to you guys, so go for it.
Uh, actually, they DO count those among total PCs sold and shipped.
Well actually I think they already do, they call them cash registers.
:lol:
What’s next, classifying the ipod as a personal computer? What about an iphone?
When you can’t beat em, change the rules.
Can you tell me who "they" are, that are doing this?
But to activate Windows you need to use the Internet or a telephone, so you have some missing essentials there as well.
I think a case could be made for the iPod touch and the iPhone... indeed also for the Android phones and many other smartphones as "personal computers." However, not the more dedicated devices of the straight iPod/Zune/Creative/Samsung multi-media/game players.
The availability of the software on iPad/iPhone/iPod touch/Android is the only limiting factor of what can be done with them, not their capability. Certainly, third party peripherals might be considered a limiting factor, but WIFI and Bluetooth peripherals as well as peripherals that are accessed by the 30 pin USB/charging port are already available for all three devices in the Apple eco system from simple stereo sound systems all the way to automobiles. Some of these peripherals interface wirelessly... transparently. The iPad/iPhone/iPod touch interfaces and can control digital xRay machines, cameras by Bluetooth, both WIFI and Bluetooth computer peripherals such as printers, keyboards, mouses, input devices, etc. My iPad came with a hardware connected keyboard that interfaces via the 30 pin connector. That keyboard works with my iPhone just as easily. Both will sync to my Mac's BlueTooth keyboard. Both the iPad and the iPhone can output 720p HD video content to my 47inch High Def TV with a 30 pin to HDMI adaptor I purchased from Apple... just as my iMac will (actually the iMac will do 1080p). I'm told the iPod touch will do the same. The iPhone and the iPod touch, can do almost as much (and more in some areas for the iPhone, since it does have the built in hardware phone capability which the iPod touch and iPad do not, although both can make phone calls using third party software such as Skype) as the iPad. Size and form factor are the only major differences between the tablets and touch screen and keyboarded smartphones and the iPod touch.
Content creation is completely within the capability of the iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch lines, and indeed many are doing it. Programing is merely another aspect of content creation that simply requires additional software that Apple has chosen not to make available directly, again for marketing reasons. Such programing tools ARE available for jailbroken iPhones and iPads. Again, that shows the devices are completely capable of doing what a PC is capable of doing.
For those who are claiming that the iPad requires connection to another computer, that, too, is a choice made by Apple merely for activation and updates because of the tie in to the Apple iTunes store and the Apple Eco system. Once the activation has occurred, all Apple App Store apps are downloadable over 3G or WIFI from a stand alone iPad. There is no physical reason, except marketing, why the iPad requires connection at any time to another device... any more than a PC or Mac requires connection to another computer over a network for updates. The only other time I have ever plugged my iPad into my Mac was to update from iOS 3.0 to iOS 3.1, then to 3.2 and then 3.2.1, and 3.2.2. Each time I did the updates, my iPad was backed up as well. That's it. Apple could have made the choice to do updates over WIFI... they did not... but that is not an inherent incapability of the iPad. Merriam Webster's Dictionary defines a Personal Computer, a PC, as:
"Definition of PERSONAL COMPUTERWikipedia defines it as follows:: a general-purpose computer equipped with a microprocessor and designed to run especially commercial software (as a word processor or Internet browser) for an individual user
A personal computer (PC) is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end user, with no intervening computer operator. ...
The University of Melbourne Library resource defines it as:
A small, relatively inexpensive computer designed for an individual User, although PCs are commonly linked together to form a network. In terms of power, there is great variety. At the high end, there is little distinction between PCs, Laptops and Workstations.
Of course, none of those is an economic market definition... but iPads, iPhones, Android smartphones, and iPod touches all meet those general definitions of a "Personal Computer" and, I think, would fall under the broadest definition of the economic market of personal computer... but then be subdivided down within that market in to sub-markets.
Yes. :^)>
Dusty, I would agree that 11 years ago, INITs and getting their order correct could be an absolute nightmare. Sometimes just identifying which INIT was the culprit could take hours and multiple restarts as you worked your way down the list looking for the non-cooperative combination... and hope that just re-ordering the start-up sequence of INITs would solve the problem.
However, that is ancient history. A Modern Mac has no such problems. INITs are gone into the dustbin of computer history. They do not exist anymore. Apple OS9 and under and Apple OSX have no code in common... and are totally unrelated except in name. OSX is UNIX.
But, given the opportunity, didn't.
Looks like 12.4 million US Windows PCs vs 1.7 million Apples. Have they shipped 12 million ipads?
My GPS receiver has all these as well.
When classifying or comparing devices I prefer to go with the state as sold. You introduce far too many variables when you start hacking stuff. Remember that iPhone virus a bit back? Yeah, irrelevant to the question of Apple's security since it only affected hacked iPhones.
There is no physical reason, except marketing, why the iPad requires connection at any time to another device... any more than a PC or Mac requires connection to another computer over a network for updates.
Yet they do. A personal computer is supposed to be independent. You buy it, you plug it in (if necessary), turn it on, set it up, and you're rolling. It is capable of being your only computer. In other words, can a person who doesn't own or have access to a PC buy an iPad, turn it on, set it up, and then have a working personal computer?
Apple tying it to a PC means it is a satellite device. But I don't expect that to last forever. The iPad already has iTunes, OTA update technology is the norm these days, and Apple can easily offer a free subset of Mobile Me keeping it backed up*. Open the box, turn it on, let it guide you through getting on a network, set it up with Apple over the Internet, and you have your independent tablet computer.
Android devices won't require tying to a computer though. A 10" Android tablet can be everything a computer is, including the ability to be your sole computer. While I can't get an iPad due to my kids' and wife's addiction to certain Flash content, one would be perfect for my grandmother if it weren't for the requirement of a computer. No, I don't live close enough to sync it off of mine.
* Apple wouldn't need up to 64 GB for the storage for each of millions of iPads. Much of the content on an iPad would be iTunes content, and for that Apple just needs a pointer to the appropriate item in the store, not the media file. If you have iTunes-ripped music on it, one song file ripped by iTunes and unaltered thereafter is the same too, requiring only keeping an original and pointers to it. This would basically be implementation of the file-level de-duplication common on more advanced storage systems these days.
You have to have itunes on a computer to set up the iPad? Apple support has never been able to help me get itunes running on my Vista or Win 7 boxes. The installs fail every time.
I was going to get an ipad. Oh well.
Apple doesn't have to beat the total. This is NOT an operating system comparison. It is a comparison of hardware manufacturers. Apple just has to beat the #5 worldwide ASUS to get on the worldwide top 5 list. They just have to beat #1 domestic HP to top the domestic top 5 list.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.