Research showing that PC shipments in Western Europe grew 19.6% year-on-year in 2Q10 does not accurately represent the state of the market, according to the analyst that led the study.
Gartner research director Ranjit Atwal says a better comparison for 2Q figures is the same period in 2008, because figures for 2009 were skewed by a slowdown in sales caused by the global recession.
The contrast with 2008 shows sales grew just 6% to 15.6 million in 2Q10, however Atwal said the growth is enough to prove the market has recovered, and is at its most competitive in years.
Gartner placed Acer ahead of HP in the sales charts for the first time. The Chinese vendor grew shipments 30% to 3.6 million during the quarter, with HP close behind on shipments of 3.3 million.
Third-placed Dell was closely flanked by ASUS, with shipments of 1.5 million and 1.3 million units respectively, and Toshiba rounded out the top five with 917,000 units shipped.
Several vendors outside the top five - including Apple, Sony, Samsung and Lenovo – grew shipments 30% during the quarter.
Most of the growth was driven by consumer demand for notebooks and desktop PCs, however demand for mini-notebooks slowed.