Gartner reports PC shipments went up in Q4 2014, but IDC says otherwise
Both the Gartner and IDC research firms have submitted their PC shipment numbers for the fourth quarter of 2014, but this time they appear to be in a disagreement. Gartner says that worldwide shipments of PCs went up by 1% during the final quarter of 2014, while IDC counters that with a 2.4% decline.
Gartner claims that there were a total of 83.7 million PC units shipped during the fourth quarter, with the U.S market experiencing the largest growth. It states:
IDC, on the other hand, claims that only 80.8 million PC units shipped during the fourth quarter. The 2.4% decline year-on-year was lower than their original 4.8% decline prediction. However, the company agrees with Gartner that the US market saw the largest growth in PC shipments, adding:
Both IDC and Gartner state that Lenovo was the biggest company for PCs worldwide, while HP continues to be the largest PC hardware maker in the US market.
It should be noted that IDC includes shipments of Chromebooks in its report and excludes Windows tablets, including those that have a detachable keyboard. Gartner does not include Chromebook shipments in its data, but does include Windows-based tablets. That would suggest that IDC did not include sales of Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 in its estimates but that Gartner included them.
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