After two years of declining computer sales worldwide, things have finally flattened out. That may mean the industry is in for a turnaround, but it may not.
I figured computer sales would slump because many people are switching to tablets. For the typical human, a tablet (or phablet or phone) can do the work they otherwise did on a PC. Computer sales had to go down as those folks made the switch.
Also, you have to consider that today’s PC is much better made and more reliable than systems of the 1990s, when the industry experienced insane, year-over-year growth. Back then, I’d buy a new system every two or three years. Now I average about 5 years for a PC, sometimes longer.
One item that may be playing into the increased sales in a tangential way is Microsoft’s drop of support for Windows XP. That decision motivated a lot of business owners to buy new systems — or refurbish their existing models. They would get a new motherboard, solid state drive (SSD), and Windows 7. That’s technically not a new computer, but it’s a sale!
