PC market returns to growth – just

Not bad, considering

It says something about the strength of the PC market that it's experiencing any growth at all right now. The growing assumption that tablets are set to cannibalise the lower ends of the notebook market mean the main driver of PC sales volumes remains suppressed.

Meanwhile the European sovereign debt crisis is threatening to engulf Italy, and maybe the whole of the Euro-zone. And the previously inconceivable possibility of US debt default has led the Moody's credit rating agency to review America's AAA rating.

Amid all this uncertainty, it takes a brave person to splash out on a new PC. But the latest quarterly figures from IDC show that we continue to do so, and in sufficient numbers to reverse the year-on-year decline of Q1, albeit not by much.

Worldwide PC shipments increased by 2.6 percent year-on-year in Q2, which was also a tiny sequential increase. IDC observes that year-on-year growth is significant as the PC market was still experiencing double-digital growth a year ago. The slump kicked-in in the second half of last year, so relative growth should improve in the latter half of 2011.

"These preliminary results continue to reflect pressure from competing consumer and business products as well as cautious spending," said Jay Chou, senior research analyst at IDC. "Nevertheless, product refreshes and promotions in the second half of the year as well as easier year-ago data should boost growth in the second half of the year."

Regionally, the West continued to contract, while the East provided the growth - especially China. Among the vendors Acer continued its nightmare year, suffering a ten percent decline and losing the number three spot to Lenovo. It was only a year ago that Acer was predicting it would take the number one spot from HP before long. ASUS overtook Toshiba at number five.

(Units Shipments are in thousands)

Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker, July 13, 2011