For the second straight quarter, Hewlett-Packard beat out Dell as the No. 1 vendor of PCs in the world, according to research firms IDC and Gartner. In the fourth quarter of 2006, HP shipped more than 11 million PC units worldwide, while Dell shipped about 9.5 million, according to the two reports that were released Jan. 16. In the third quarter of 2006, IDC and Gartner both said HP had beat out Dell, thus claiming the top spot for the first time since 2003.
For the entire year, HP and Dell appeared tied for the top spot among PC vendors. According to the IDC study, HP and Dell were each responsible for 17 percent of the total number of PCs shipped worldwide, while according to Gartner, the two PC giants were tied at 15.9 percent each. All the results from IDC and Gartner were considered preliminary. Overall, the PC market grew during the fourth quarter, although not as much as expected. Gartner research found that the market grew 7.4 percent, while IDC found that the market grew 8.7 percent, which was 1.4 percent below the firm's expectations.
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News source: eWeek
