iPad helps Dell overtake Acer

eWeek.

Helping Dell, said IHS iSuppli, was the same device partly blamed for sluggish PC shipments the quarter before: the Apple iPad.

The iPad and competing tablets, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab, are hurting sales of netbooks and notebooks - Acer's bread and butter. According to IHS iSuppli, Dell's fourth-quarter PC shipments remained completely flat.

It didn't move ahead so much as Acer fell back - by 12.9% - hurt by a loss of consumer interest.

However, the firm's findings also show that reports of the PC's pending demise may be a little premature, notes Hardware Central.

In fact, sales of new PCs hit a new high last quarter. In the fourth quarter of 2010, sales of PCs, including desktops, notebooks and netbooks, topped 93 million units, up from 88.9 million in the same quarter of 2009, according to iSuppi.

For all of 2010, PC makers sold 345.4 million units, up from 302.4 million in 2009. That's a gain of 14.2% year over year.

HP continued to boast the top spot in the latest PC sales report from iSuppli for the fourth quarter of 2010, writes Internet.com.