Apple made big gains in Q4 2010, increasing Mac shipments by a whopping 23.7 percent — the highest gains of any PC maker in the U.S.
And if you factor in the iPad, the gains would have been even bigger.
Meanwhile, the overall PC industry grew only 3.1 percent during the holiday quarter, according to the latest estimated numbers from the market research firm Gartner.
“U.S. holiday sales were not fantastic for most PC vendors, but the professional market did show healthy growth during the quarter,” said Gartner analyst Mikako Kitagawa in a statement. “Media tablets undoubtedly intensified the competition in the consumer market. These devices do not replace primary PCs, but they are viewed as good enough devices for these who want to have a second and third connected device for content consumption usage. Mini-notebook shipments were hit the most by the success of media tablets.”
Of course, when she says “media tablets,” she means Apple’s iPad specifically.
