“The popularity of Apple Computer’s iPod digital music players is helping it sell more Macs, but so far it hasn’t been enough to spark a rise in the company’s share of the personal computer market,” Kasper Jade and Katie Marsal report for Apple Insider.
“According to research firm Gartner, worldwide PC shipments totaled 57 million units in the first quarter of 2006, representing a 13.1 percent increase over the same period last year. But in that time, Apple’s share of the worldwide market slipped from 2.2 percent to a mere 2.0 percent,” Jade and Marsal report. “Similarly, Apple’s share of the personal computer market in the United States also remains relatively flat at 3.6 percent. Although this figure is down from 3.8 percent in the first quarter of 2005, Gartner’s data indicates that Apple gained one tenth of a percent in share over the fourth quarter of 2005.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Q1 2006 (and Q2, too – no figures for that quarter, yet) were in the heart of the Intel transition. Let’s see what happens from here on out.
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Hello all.
Just a thought here. Dell does not sell all those other computers. Neither does HP, Compact, Leveno, or anyone else. I really think that there are just two things to remember.
1) Apple is selling more each year percentage wise. Many of the other guys are selling the same (more or less) and they fight each other only on the basis of cost. Its all they got.
2) With all these new young people buying iPods and becoming new Mac buyers, give them a few years and they will be buying for business. You start at the roots and work your way up.
I don’t think Apple will ever be the top dog in sales. There are just too many people out there that do not care to think. I have seen them over and over and over.
One last thing (OK three total
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”grin” style=”border:0;” /> ). Apple is working its way into the home entertainment market. I do not know if you missed it but during the Apple home stereo thing, a Mac Mini polled all the other computers in the house (including one in the audiance) wirelessly, easily, automatically to play on the stereo. You don’t have to do everything, just the right things.
Apple, cause life is too short and frustrating enough as it is.
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N.
I’m waiting for the Merom release. Then I’m getting a nice, new, shiny MBP. 😀
All goes back to the time-honored saying, usually attributed to one Mark Twain, nee Samuel Clemens, but who was just quoting Benjamin Disraeli:
“There are three kinds of lies: Lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
This is Gartner’s version. There are 100,000 other “versions” of what could be termed “market share” out there, and all of them are totally unique and special in their own way, and NONE of them paint a truly broad, sweeping, accurate picture of what is truly going on – most of them are pure bunk.
If anyone group or company attempted to provide a “definitive answer” that would be accepted as a universal standard, by the time they finished and reported their results, that data would be out of date and instantly obsolete – much like just about any computer you buy these days – including Macs. I should know – I haven’t been fortunate enough to purchase a Mac that wasn’t replaced with a new model that was Faster, Newer, Better! within three months by Apple. Darn it.
I’d have to say that Macs market share has to be increasing. The majority of my family have dumped their PCs’ & switched to Macs, and the other 2 are looking very seriously (longingly, drooling…) at switching.
People in my work place have friends/families switching to Macs due to their frustration with constant Windows viruses/spyware/malware. Some switching because the new Intel Macs will run Windows OS if they need to (thumb in mouth sucking while grasping security blanket tightly), which feature they’ll use less & less after using OS X.
It took me a bit to work out the actual numbers – based on the information provided.
Queezzie was mistaken when he said: Cubert and me – you guys are trying to make something bad look good.
Now, less market share is a bit of a downer, but actual units sold increased by nearly 5%, if my math and the provided numbers are anywhere near correct. And my math is correct more often than these market research guesstimates.
Other Factors to Consider:
=> what are the numbers for Personal Computers (not corporate)
=> what are the numbers for systems in use
– = > Macs tend to have longer useful lives than their PC counterparts
=> how much of this drop represents pent-up demand
– = > people waiting until their favorite app/game gets updated
Oh, and when did Apple drop out of 5th place one the list of PC makers? Or, who is this Siemens they mention?
Just once I’d like to a measurement of consumer market share. I’ll bet Apple’s share of the home market is a pretty sizable chunk.
the other Mark said: The battle over dominance is over. The real question is can Apple survive as a niche marketer?
I don’t know. They sold over a million computers last quarter and their profit margin is higher than any other computer maker …?
My math on this could be really bad, but it looks to me like Apple’s earnings are about half of Dell’s. And Dell sells seven times as many systems?
Just once I’d like to a measurement of consumer market share. I’ll bet Apple’s share of the home market is a pretty sizable chunk.
________________
What difference would it make. The bottom line is there are four major markets for computers.
-Home
-Corporations
-Education
-Small Buisiness
Macs have the smallest marketshare percentages in ALL OF THE ABOVE.
But i reality, WHO CARES. Apple is profitable.
I would like my Mac more if Apple had a 25% market share.
I could be more creative on my Mac if Apple had a 35% market share.
I could get more women to date me if Apple had a 45% market share.
The music on my iPod will sound worse if Apple´s market share of music players drops 10% or more.
My life revolves around Apple´s market share. I worry about it day and night. You should, too.
Spellcheck your headline, MDN. Unbelievable how many errors you guys make.
You guys don’t know the history of market share. Tom Cruise does!
Tom?
I am not so sure about Apple gaining any market share in India from my Dad’s experience there.
A couple of months ago I persuaded my Dad to go for a Mac Mini and he got a quote from Apple reseller (Lasergraphics) at Kochi (Cochin), Kerala, India. They took the order and he patiently waited for a full one month to get the machine by which time the contract had expired. The bottle neck was the external USB modem without which he cannot get online as they do not have any broadband in his town. They asked him to wait for another 2 weeks when he finally cancelled the order and went and bought a Lenova machine.
Apple just lost one customer because they could not ship an external USB modem on time!
Yeh, I realized I screwed up on my post where I said
“In other words, until that time, Apple was selling everything they could get shipped from Intel. Now they can.”
Grrrrr! Before posting, I was editing my post in a word processor and changed the sentence from stating that they could not ship what they could not get, but now they can. That statement is also wrong. I changed the first part, but left in the last, so it was wrong in another way.
Here is what I was trying to say:
Until late April Apple could not get enough product from Intel, so their sales were pinched by supply shortages. So only after that time were sales unconstrained by vendors.
Sorry, my error. And I did read the entire article before posting.
It’s going to take a little while for the numbers to work through the system….
MEANING–unless EVERYONE in the world throws their Computers away and buys new in the next year (impossible) then it will take a little while for the true market share to shine through.
It’s a good thing…enjoy the minority.
A lot of gyrations going on here. Some of the interpretations I’ve read regarding these numbers are reasonable, but others are the usual ‘Apple can do no wrong – they are always in the best position possible’ drivel. Look, being a Mac fan is one thing, but being an all-accepting RDF zombie
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”surprised” style=”border:0;” /> is something else.
The fact is that these numbers are ultimately not good, and do indicate there was a substantial slowdown in Mac sales in ’05, after a banner ’04 year. Don’t like the term “Osbourne Effect”? Fine – call it the Fred Mertz Effect and be done with it. Whatever the name it did happen, and static-to-shrinking sales in a growing market is never a good thing. Also, it bears noting that such a circumstance would not, in all liklihood, have occured had there not been a transition. All of this needs to be accepted.
Second, transition induced sales slowdown be damned, the expectation was that once the Macintels got rolling things would pick back up again. Unlimited chips & chipsets, low-low prices, cool running CPUs in brave new formfactors … these aspects were what would make the whole project worthwhile, we were told. Unfortunately, while sales may pick up for other reasons (Leopard being f**king out of this world, primarily), few of these hardware based aspects are panning out. Cool CPUs leading to boffo formfactors has been a total bust; aside from the MacBook – which looks really good, but is not anything that couldn’t have been made with a PPC inside – everything else Apple has rolled out has been pretty much ‘same ‘ol, same ‘ol’, and heat has been a real problem. Apple’s new Intel kit didn’t come in unlimited numbers either, and supply-induced slowdowns have occurred (Intel has more capacity, but it also has more/bigger customers to satisfy). Worse, Intel parts are much more expensive than what they’ve replaced – so much so that average Mac unit prices have gone UP during a time when the prices of Apple’s competitors have gone DOWN. This last aspect especially is going to slow, maybe even scuttle, any sales comeback in the future.
Lastly, all this talk about Apple being ok as a small niche player … are you people serious? Maybe Apple can make a living that way (more on that in a minute), but is anyone going to make the claim that having Windows run 95% of the world in the meantime is a GOOD thing?? We all became Mac fans because we found out that Macs are better. Is the argument now that Apple should stay ‘small-time’ just so we can maintain our elitist status?! No wonder so many PC people hate us.
Check it: Apple getting bigger means OSX gets closer to displacing Winblows as the world’s standard OS. And as far as I’m concerned, for as long as computers are such an integral part of modern life, that project should trump everything else we want Apple to do. Period.
But in more concrete financial terms, now that Apple has ditched a much cheaper computer architecture, with a wider variety of suppliers, to go with a single x86 supplier, then it is absolutely imperative that Apple growandgrowandgrow NOW. As along as they are small fry in this huge x86 pond they will never be assured of preferential pricing vis a vis their much larger competitors, and the fact of a persistant cost disadvantage will be set in concrete. Intel is bestowing a honeymoon period upon Cupertino for now, but once the present arrangment has expired only a fool wouldn’t prepare for a more normal (i.e. even MORE expensive) arrangment. And the only possible way Apple can be sure to stave off that possibility is to become a much bigger purchaser of chips and chipsets. And that, my friends – all the above and ohsomuch more – means more than a shrinking, or even just slightly growing, 3.6% share.
Apple needs to get it in gear.
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The figures are a little skewed because last year Mac sales grew at three times the industry rate – so the Mac is coming off a higher base than the PCs, and still showing respectable growth.
>”Now, less market share is a bit of a downer, but actual units sold increased by nearly 5%, if my math and the provided numbers are anywhere near correct. And my math is correct more often than these market research guesstimates.”
—> Your math is irrelevant in this case I am afraid. Actual Mac units sold can increase as much as they want. Bottom line (AGAIN): MORE PCS ARE BEING SOLD THAN MACS. PERIOD. Those are the hard numbers. Accept them, quit trying to make excuses for them, and just enjoy your Mac.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/31/78659_23OPcurve_1.html?source=rss&url=http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/31/78659_23OPcurve_1.html
Intel pulls a no-show: Spring Processor Forum is prime strutting ground for chipmakers, so where was Intel?
By Tom Yager
May 31, 2006
“Intel’s present drumbeat around the upcoming Core Microarchitecture, multicore technology, and low power utilization is intended to give Intel a major PR boost in the CPU battle with AMD. A fresh coat of paint on a retreat to a mobile architecture must be the best Intel had to bring to the party, because when the party was held at the Spring Processor Forum they just stayed away.
I can’t blame them. The keynote was given by Chuck Moore from AMD, who flattened the audience (me, at least) by breaking AMD’s months-long silence on the question, “What comes after Opteron?” Now we know. AMD’s major next-generation CPU will be no blast from the past. All of the fantastic plans that AMD CTO Phil Hester related at the Fab — chip manufacturing plant — 36 grand opening in Dresden, Germany, is gelling into silicon at a far quicker pace than I expected.
… Chuck Moore laid out a mind-blowing future for AMD64 in his description of K8L, the architecture that will follow the current K8. It’s obvious that AMD started work on K8L the day after Opteron shipped. K8L’s modular, on-board, dual-channel memory controllers and 1,600MHz Hypertransport bus are the sort of incremental improvements you might expect, but AMD is also taking up a bunch of big-iron features to carry x86 way past its Intel roots. K8L will feature pooled Level 3 cache, a feature that x86 servers have needed from the start. The Hypertransport bus is getting a kick to Hypertransport 3, which is capable of handling 5.2 billion transactions per second. Remember, like K8, K8L will have multiple Hypertransport channels on each CPU. And you haven’t heard the half of it.
No wonder Dell flipped.”
Uh oh, Apple …
@FYI
—-> AMD just dropped a bombshell! FNA! I particularly liked this blurb from the article:
“The specifications for AMD’s new dual-core Opteron include on-chip dual-channel DDR2 memory controllers, a 1,600MHz full-duplex Hypertransport I/O bus, a dedicated Direct Connect bus link between cores, 1MB of Level 2 cache per CPU, and an advanced power management solution that not only adds a deeper level of sleep to the CPU but chills the bus as well. I’ve told you that AMD had a long head start over Intel on power efficiency.
Pardon me. Did I say “Opteron”? Shoot. Those are the specs for AMD’s new notebook chip, the Turion 64 X2. The specs for AMD’s Athlon 64 FX-62 power desktop CPU are similar, and these beasts are rolling out of the Fab as I type. Rev F Opterons will be along presently.
People always think that Apple is the only company to “innovate”, and Apple seems to promote that vision as well.
Reality has it, that Linux is becoming extremely user friendly, while remaining powerful. Windows is becoming more useable, and commands a vast array of specific software.
If all you want to do is get an Apple Intel computer in order to run Linux or Windows, you don’t have to buy Apple hardware, which is, mildly put, technically extremely mediocre.
You can of course “afford” yourself a Mac, and OS X is undoubtedly “nice” – but if push comes to shove and pocket calculators come out, other companies win easily over Apple.
Only if Apple starts to produce …
– very robust and sleek/small notebook
(students; occasional users),
– very high end notebooks with 2 harddisks,
1900 x 1200 screens, etc (power users),
– very sleek small unobtrusive media centers
that allow free choice of processor (Intel,
AMD, ..), up to 6 GB of RAM, two harddisks,
TV / video module et cetera for a very
competitive price (home users),
– large modular very powerful high-end desktop
..and all of them with the free option of Mac OS X, Windows >or< Linux, will you see a marked rise of that market share.
Additionally, they need to urgently release..:
– OS X for servers including a very easy set-up for OS X array / clustering, including a range of non-Apple servers;
– OS X for workstations, including very easy set-up for OS X array / clustering setup;
.. which they could have done already with IBM on their PowerPC architecture (or “why isn’t AIX more graphical? Where was Apple when that happened?”).
Lots of untapped potential, almost too much of it!