Tablets Aren’t Necessarily Cannibalizing Laptop Sales

Earlier this week, my PCWorld co-worker Tony Bradley brought you the news that tablets purchasers are abandoning their laptops in favor of their other devices, according to a study from Nielsen.

Well, that may or whitethorn not be true, according to where you like to get your studies. A new study of iPad owners from the NPD Group says the rate at which tablets are cannibalizing notebook or netbook gross sales is declining.

NPD's research into the usage habits of iPad owners comes up with the Revelation that only 14 percent of early iPad owners have dropped their microcomputer pro the new gadget. And that number is dropping, with just 12 percent of users WHO bought their tablet later on the holiday temper kicking their Personal computer to the hold in.

NPD makes the argument that piece PC sales are down, the biggest point for computers is in the sub-$500 laptop field that stands to lose the most to tablets. Such machines grew away 21 percent over the last quarter of 2020 and the first quarter of this year. Meanwhile, sales of Windows consumer notebooks over $500 dropped by 25 percent.

So, while NPD agrees that laptop sales are depressed, it suggests you shouldn't compass point the finger's breadth at the iPad. Instead, the research firms suggest that PC sales simply aren't succeeding in safekeeping yard with the halcyon days of calculator refresh caused aside the launch of Windows 7 and the egression of the netbook as a powerful new category–two big factors that led to computer sales going through and through the roof.

In fact, the investigator says that 75 percent of those WHO purchased a pill did non plan to buy any new technology all over that timeframe, suggesting that "iPad sales added billions of dollars to the industriousness's coffers after years of [average selling price] declines draining the market." Information technology's hard to indicate that the iPad probably does bear better margins than does the netbook–information technology is from Apple, afterwards all.

Even if the iPad is king of tablets, don't write off laptops just yet. — Equal if the iPad is B. B. King of tablets, don't write down laptops just yet.

Another notes from the NPD study:

The large majority of iPad buyers–83 percent– bought at least one accessory with their device, with cases the virtually popular. So clearly the iPad is following the trend set dead by the iPod and the iPhone in terms of creating a broad saving for accoutrement-makers.
Consumers are for the most part just fine with Wi-Fi-only devices, and don't really care for the additional expense of a 3G-enabled iPad.
And in lightly-armed of that previous bullet train, this one shouldn't personify a surprise: The base model, the $499 16 GB WiFi-only iPad, is out and away the most popular model, accounting for almost one third of complete iPad sales.

If you're confused by these dueling findings of studies, don't worry–so are the research firms conducting them. Sporty days after releasing the aforementioned study of iPad owners, NPD has released the findings of a alike survey of Canadian tablet owners, arguing that "unlike its smartphone predecessor, the oft-talented tablet seems to cost less of a complementary color device and more of a successor device."

"In point of fact, 65 percent of those who are preparation to bargain a tablet say that other devices will no more be required," the research firm wrote. They come about to note of hand that e-book readers and smartphones are more frequently beingness ditched in favor of the tablet–just yet, IT's a dramatic counterpoint from the U.S. study.

Perhaps Canadians' buying and usage habits in truth are that different. Or perhaps Samuel Langhorne Clemens had information technology far whol along.

Robert Dutt is a oldtimer IT journalist and blogger. Atomic number 2 covers the Canadian IT technology solution supplier scene daily at ChannelBuzz.Golden State . You can also uncovering him on Twitter .