DailyTech - Tablet Shipments Outpace Netbook Shipments in Q2 2011

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Gadgets Tablet Shipments Outpace Netbook Shipments in Q2 2011
Tiffany Kaiser - October 25, 2011 9:24 AM

5 comment(s) - last by vision33r.. on Nov 5 at 4:37 PM

(Source: tabletography.com)

The report noted that media tablet shipments exceeded netbook shipments Q2 2011 with 13.6 million tablets shipped and 7.3 million netbooks shipped

For the first time in 2011, tablet shipments have exceeded netbook shipments, and analysts do not see this changing any time soon.

ABI Research, a marketing research firm based in New York, released a new report called "Tablets, Netbooks, and Mobile CE Market Data," which offers predictions for all ultra-mobile devices (UMDs).

The report noted that media tablet shipments exceeded netbook shipments Q2 2011 with 13.6 million tablets shipped and 7.3 million netbooks shipped. In Q1 2011, netbooks were ahead with 8.4 million shipments while tablets were at 6.4 million shipments.

"This is a trend that we do not expect will reverse," said Jeff Orr, group director of mobile devices at ABI Research. "As they are different segments, this is not a direct replacement behavior, but a changing leadership for the most interesting device type."

Throughout 2011's entirety, the expected number of shipments for netbooks is 32 million while the expected number of shipments for tablets is 60 million. According to Orr, the ease of use is what is driving tablet sales over netbook sales.

"Media tablets are perceived to be easy to use, compared to the keyboard and mouse interface of a netbook computer," said Orr. "Those who have avoided PCs because they are difficult to use -- think the Baby Boomer generation and older -- see media tablets as an opportunity to re-engage with Internet access. Cost, however, is certainly not a reason driving tablet interest, as the average media tablet costs approximately $600 and the average netbook is only about half of that."

According to the report, Apple's iPad 2 is king of the tablets accounting for 68 percent of tablet shipments in Q2 2011. Other reports have offered similar information, such as comScore's study released earlier this month saying that iPads accounted for 97.2 percent of U.S. tablet traffic in August 2011 alone.

Source: ABI Research

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By Visual on 10/26/2011 7:34:20 AM , Rating: 2

To me, netbooks of old will naturally evolve into x86 windows tablets. And they will have great success as soon as one with active digitizer, decent GPU and decent battery life is released.

Right now when people say 'tablet' they more often than not refer to a puny phone-powered ARM crap that can not run much beyond a web browser. I'm never going to buy such a thing at a price higher than the kindle fire.

But I am looking forward to a decent x86 tablet.

The Asus EP121 missed the mark with the useless Intel GPU. If they had went with at least a sandy-bridge variant, I'd have bought it. Battery life was bad and price was high as well, I'd have ignored those flaws though.

The Acer W500 seemed great, and MSI 110W improved on that with some programmable buttons and a mouse trackpad on the bezel. But both skipped on active digitizer support. That is a deal-breaker for me after having been spoiled by my TM2.

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