Pinboard (guardiantech)

The irrelevance of Microsoft >> Benedict Evans

guardiantech — 2013-07-21T17:45:28+00:00

Microsoft survived and thrived in the PC internet era, despite appearing to be irrelevant, by milking its victory in the previous phase of the technology industry. PC sales were 59m units in 1995 and rose to over 350m in 2012. Of course, that's now coming to an end.
Though it looks like we've passed the tipping point, this process isn't going to be over quickly. PC sales aren't going to zero this year. But the replacement cycle, already at 5 years, will lengthen further and further, more and more apps will move to mobile or the cloud, and for many people the PC will end up like the printer or fax - vestigial reminders of an older way of doing things.

Tablet PCs expected to surpass notebook sales in 3Q12 >> Digitimes

guardiantech — 2012-08-22T21:29:43+00:00

Tablet PCs are expected to surpass notebook sales in the third quarter as new models are about to hit the market, according to industry sources. Sources said the tablets have price advantages over notebooks, especially white-box ones, making them popular choices for consumers.
It is estimated that as many as 20-30 million low-end tablets will be sold in the third quarter alone, which will influence ultrabook sales, said the sources.

With notebooks making about half of the 90m PCs shipped every quarter, that's a lot of tablets.

It's true: iPads are starting to replace business PCs >> InfoWorld

guardiantech — 2012-03-21T06:26:48+00:00

The survey, conducted last month, is yet another confirmation that no company comes close to matching the iPad in the enterprise. Indeed, the iPad wannabes are barely on the radar. While 84% of the companies that plan to buy a tablet in the next quarter said they will go with Apple's iPad, up from 77% in November, just 8% said they will buy one from the No. 2 brand, Samsung, compared to 10% in the previous survey. But Samsung, a highly diversified company, can better withstand a poor showing in the tablet market than can Hewlett-Packard and Dell. "Those companies need to win a toehold in tablets as PCs become less important, and they're not doing it," [Changewave research director Paul] Carton says. "We're very bearish on them."

Michael Dell Advises Hewlett-Packard >> New York Times Bits Blog

guardiantech — 2011-10-05T07:22:15+00:00

"'There are many reasons to stay committed,' said Mr. Dell, who did not need to mention H.P. to make the distinction to the tech-savvy crowd. He said that 5 percent of the world’s microprocessors go into servers and storage and 95 percent go into PCs. The same is true for disk drives and other components, he said."

Do the Math >> Microsoft.com

guardiantech — 2011-05-05T21:24:09+00:00

"Surf the web or surf Hawaii", says Microsoft in this dangerous new "comparison" page between Windows PCs and Macs.

Why dangerous? Because it makes it look like that Microsoft takes Apple as a serious competitor, worthy of being featured on its own site. And it's not even as if the Windows machines come out best on every comparison either.