Trends
So,to deal first with the aberration in this popularity list that is mentioned above - how well are the Amazon Kindle Fires really selling? In the outside world - according to the recent IDC report -  the Amazon Kindle Fires are actually in fourth place selling a creditable 1.8 million in the first quartet of 2013. That report also puts the iPads as the most popular models overall, holding around 40% of the market followed by Samsung on 18% and then Asus. From a buyer 's point of view, the fairly equal shares of the market held by the Apple's iOS and Android platforms are probably quite healthy, as it encourages competition between them.
The same cannot really be said of the next most popular platform, according to IDC, which is Microsoft's Windows 8, with only 900,000 sales shared been the two flavours of ots Surface tablet - RT using ARM chips and their standard offering using the more power-hungry Intel chips.
Of course, Microsoft have many other profitable businesses, a massive pile of cash, and a very positive reputation in the equities market, so they can fight an expensive battle against Apple and Google for a long time - but not for ever.
The iPad 4 has been available in the UK for a while now. Some people are clearly buying it from Apple direct and selling their used iPad 2 from last year via Amazon or EBay. iPad 2s and 3s are still strong machines but the Kindles have driven down the average selling price here to around £165.
The big sellers from Samsung are also performing strongly with the Tab2s holding their positions in the top ten while the Galaxy Note 10, aimed rather more at the "pro-sumer" and those wanting to generate some of their own content is not that far behind. With a replacement for the Note 2 phablet expected soon, its sales have started to tail off recently.
The many budget sellers - often retailing devices bought wholesale from China - are currently led by LelikTec, Ployer, NATPC and Moonar. While the offerings from these budget suppliers have improved enormously in technical terms over the last year or so, some of the bigger brands like Acer and Asus are now producing tablets at much more competitive prices.
With a history of being very much wedded to the Windows platform, the big American manufacturers, HP and Dell have really struggled to get a foothold in the market.
And talking of the Windows platform, it's not been excluded from thesw lists, it's just that the Windows tablets, like the Surface from Microsoft themselves or the HP Envy X2 just haven't been attracting enough buyers. These machines struggle to shake off their image of being expensive and slow or short on battery life.
Microsoft are now acknowledging that the Windows 8 platform is due fur a bit of a rethink so unless a user is clear that they cannot avoid buying a Windows tablet, it's probably best to buy one of the alternatives now and look again in a couple of years' time to see if Microsoft have pulled off a rather unlikely miracle with their new Windows Blue. |
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