Canalys ( A Company ) loses the plot and claims PCs are dying

Analyst outfits are falling into a logical la la land which states that PCs are completing with tablets and smartphones. Yesterday the analyst outfit Canalys claimed that Windows and Intel will continue losing market share to tablets and smartphones. The assumption is that it is comparing like with like.

Canalys claimed that Wintel machines will have 65 percent of the computer market this year, down from 72 percent in 2012. But in the fourth quarter of last year, combined shipments of desktops, netbooks and notebooks declined about 10 percent from the same period in 2011. Pin-Chen Tang, an analyst at Canalys made the somewhat silly claim that wintel PCs were becoming less likely as an individual’s first choice of computing device for everyday tasks, such as sending e-mail or Web browsing.

If I were a CEO of Canalys. I would lock Pin-Chen in a room with a tablet and tell him since that is what he wants, he can only do his business on it. I think when we let him out a couple of hours later he would be a dribbling loon having not written anything on his glorified Psion organiser. The belief that tablets, smartphones and PCs are competing against each other is a myth which was first started by Steve Jobs in Apple and parroted by those who do not have the brains to come up with a contrary opinion.

Jobs tried to sell the idea is that PCs and notebooks were being replaced by tablets and smartphones as part of a mobile revolution. The proof to this fallacy is that PC sales have declined while smartphones and tablet sales have increased. But car sales have also declined. Does this mean that tablets and smartphones are replacing cars? McDonald's sales have also declined, does this mean that people are tucking into tablets instead of two all-beef patties and special sauce with fries?

PC sales are slow, as they always are during periods of economic trouble. While more than 40 percent of US homes might have a tablet, they still have PCs and laptops too. Most of a tablet's functions are still that of the organiser. Most of a smartphone's functions are used doing traditional old phone work and messaging.

Thanks Ernest.

Analyst outfits are falling into a logical la la land which states that PCs are completing with tablets and smartphones. Yesterday the analyst outfit Canalys claimed that Windows and Intel will continue losing market share to tablets and smartphones. The assumption is that it is comparing like with like. Canalys claimed that Wintel machines will have 65 percent of the computer market this year, down from 72 percent in 2012. But in the fourth quarter of last year, combined shipments of desktops, netbooks and notebooks declined about 10 percent from the same period in 2011. Pin-Chen Tang, an analyst at Canalys made the somewhat silly claim that wintel PCs were becoming less likely as an individual’s first choice of computing device for everyday tasks, such as sending e-mail or Web browsing.

Succinctly put, the author is nuts.

Of *course* desktop CPU sales growth have stagnated, and sales will be in decline indefinitely because portability is more prized than overall capability. Convenience is not measured only by overall ease of use (I absolutely loathe the "smart phone" interface, iPods, tablets, Kindles, you name it, and likewise loathe that scratch pad POS that is on literally every laptop/notebook computer) it is also about portability. Before the pads came out, anecdotally speaking, people I know even a little bit spoke about how they still had desktop CPUs at home, but more and more did their email, chat, and social media crap on their "smart phones".

When TVs start to come with integrated apps normally associated with CPUs -- browsers, other online clients, and office software -- the portable market isn't the one which will suffer, if anything the portables will get a major boost.

Agreed. The User Interface has to improve a lot before this will happen. Touch screen keyboards and auto complete are awful IMO.

The only reason they exist is because you can’t stuff a laptop in your coat pocket and you are willing to suffer with the UI on a small display because it is ultra-portable.

You don’t need that kind of portability in the home or at work.

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