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PC price war good for business

Dell back on top

Consumers flocked to pick up lower priced PCs in the second quarter, as worldwide sales jumped by the largest margin since 2000.

"The PC industry performed better than expected, and suggests that market conditions are improving," said Charles Smulders, a vice president at research firm Gartner.

PC price-wars tend to favor Dell, which has managed to hold onto its perceived place as the premier low-cost vendor. True to form, Dell regained its place as the top vendor in worldwide sales, capturing 17.6 percent of the market with 5.8 million units shipped. Dell also had by far the largest increase in growth for the period.

HP claimed the second spot with 16 percent of the market and 5.3 million units, Gartner said.

IBM, Fujitsu and NEC rounded out the top five with 6.7 percent, 4.0 percent and 3.1 percent of the market, respectively.

Overall, worldwide shipments increased to 32.8 million units up from 29.8 million in the same quarter a year ago, Gartner said. The 10 percent rise in shipments is the first double-digit increase since the third quarter of 2000.

Strong laptop sales helped drive U.S. shipments higher by 11 percent.

Dell maintained its large lead over HP in the U.S with IBM, Gateway and Apple completing the top five list.

Despite the near-term gains, Gartner warns that budgets remain crimped. In other words, it's not time to celebrate a recovery just yet. No surprise there.

Research rival IDC agreed with Gartner that the market is "moving in the right direction," but was more conservative on the recent quarter. IDC showed worldwide sales increasing by 7.6 percent year-on-year with 33.2 million units. ®

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