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Apple to 'Take Control' of Laptop Market in 2006

Apple to 'Take Control' of Laptop Market in 2006

by , 4:45 PM EST, December 19th, 2005

Projections by the Topology Research Institute show Apple shipping 3.27 million laptops worldwide in 2006, a 42% jump over the 2005 number and enough to take its global market share in that category from 3.9% to 4.7%.

Jason Tan, writing for The Taipei Times, quoted Topology analyst Simon Yang as saying: "Compared to other makers which will post only moderate growth, Apple's performance is significant and worth paying attention to."

Mr. Yang expects Dell, HP, Toshiba, Acer and Lenovo "to maintain their respective positions as the world's top-five notebook makers next year," with Dell and Toshiba the only ones losing a slight amount of market share. Overall worldwide laptop shipments are expected to grow 17.8% to 69.5 million units, an increase that Mr. Yang attributes to lower prices and Intel's new dual-core processors.

The Inquirer and Macworld UK both provided links to that article.

Observer Comments

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Close Name:Guest
Mon Dec 19, 2005 6:02 pm Subject: Control

4.7% market share... yep, that sounds like control to me.

But seriously, for me to even consider a Mac laptop, and I'm a Mac user, it would have to be able to perform as well as a desktop, particularly in the graphics department.


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Close Name:MacTad Posts: 338 Joined: 05 Dec 2001
Mon Dec 19, 2005 6:21 pm Subject:

Quote
Guest wrote:
4.7% market share... yep, that sounds like control to me.

But seriously, for me to even consider a Mac laptop, and I'm a Mac user, it would have to be able to perform as well as a desktop, particularly in the graphics department.


Wouldn't that depend on how serious you are about your graphics? A Powerbook will definitely do a good to great job with Photoshop and probably do very well with Final Cut Pro up to a point. You need to ask yourself what you want a laptop to do and then make a decision. Do you really want a render farm such as that at ILM? Or will smaller graphics tasks do the trick?

MacTad


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Close Name:Biff Posts: 1479 Joined: 08 Apr 2004
Mon Dec 19, 2005 7:23 pm Subject:

Quote
Guest wrote:
4.7% market share... yep, that sounds like control to me.
Hehe yeah thats what I thought too.
Quote
Guest wrote:
But seriously, for me to even consider a Mac laptop, and I'm a Mac user, it would have to be able to perform as well as a desktop, particularly in the graphics department.
Well there is always going to be a difference between desktops and laptops, regardless of who makes them. If you're not in the market for a laptop at all, then it doesn't really matter if you'd choose a Mac laptop or not.


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Close Name:Jonkun227 Posts: 238 Joined: 02 Mar 2004
Mon Dec 19, 2005 7:59 pm Subject:

Exactly.

For the longest time I waited and waited to switch back to a Mac because I wanted a 17" laptop with a nice graphics card, big hard drive, lots of memory, etc. (The portability was a huge factor for my needs.) I could buy a desktop with roughly twice the power for the same price. (That's the nature of laptops vs. desktops; there are always compromises for making a machine so small, lightweight, cool-running, and low-power-consuming.)

Anyway, my wife finally bought me a 12" PowerBook. It wasn't even the most up-to-date model, it was like 6 months old (but a new package). I've been running my photography business on it for the past 9 months. When I need a bigger screen I hook it up to my 19" CRT. When I need it portable, it is.

I can run Photoshop, Illustrator, iTunes, Mail, and Safari at the same time, on 2 screens, without any real trouble. (1 Gig of RAM) Obviously it performs better if I'm only running Photoshop and only the 12" screen.

Anyway, don't underestimate the power of a PowerBook, even the 12" model.


- Jon


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Close Name:metavurt Posts: 163 Joined: 16 Jun 2003
Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:18 pm Subject: Powerbook More Than Enough

I'll second the above statements in that my Powerbook has saved my ass countless times at contract jobs where I've been assigned a crap-ass desktop machine to do heavy Photoshop work. Without my trusty laptop, not only would I have taken possibly twice as long to accomplish what I did, but I'd also be writing to you from a small padded cell somewhere in the middle of nowhere.

Unless you plan on running 5 - 8 heavy apps and using them all the same time, there is no reason you can't depend on a Powerbook as a desktop replacement.

I've got a 15" 1.6Ghz w/ 1G ram.

It's also my main gaming machine, as I have a really bad bad habit of staying up late playing Unreal Tournament 2004. The only time it lags is when the server I'm playing on lags. Otherwise, I'm right there in it with other PC users with "gaming" machines.


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Close Name:jslins Posts: 4 Joined: 25 Apr 2005
Mon Dec 19, 2005 11:21 pm Subject: iBook more than enough

I've been using my iBook G4/1.2 ghz for almost a year now, and it has been more than adequate for my needs. I haven't used it for graphics, but I did use it as a sales rep, running VPC Windows XP Pro to remotely access my company's AS/400 system. Often my "virtual" terminal ran faster than the Dell machines in the office.

I think the key is maximum ram - I put the 1 gb chip in as soon as possible.


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Close Name:stuartea Posts: 327 Joined: 08 Aug 2005
Tue Dec 20, 2005 8:34 am Subject: I'll be a girl

If they make their laptops lighter. I don't see why women should be the only ones not having to break their backs.


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Close Name:Aftermac Posts: 42 Joined: 25 Sep 2001
Tue Dec 20, 2005 3:12 pm Subject: I'll second that

Quote
jslins wrote:
I've been using my iBook G4/1.2 ghz for almost a year now, and it has been more than adequate for my needs. I haven't used it for graphics, but I did use it as a sales rep, running VPC Windows XP Pro to remotely access my company's AS/400 system. Often my "virtual" terminal ran faster than the Dell machines in the office.

I think the key is maximum ram - I put the 1 gb chip in as soon as possible.


I bought my iBook G4 in February and use it very heavily, often having 5 - 10 apps open. It is (pretty much... there is the 733 Digital Audio that serves 400 Gigs of movies to my EyeHome) my main machine, and I do use it for UT 2004 and Photoshop.


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