Laptop, notbook, tech news

.Hurt by enterprises putting off PC purchases, Intel Corp. last week presented research purporting to show that large companies that buy new PCs equipped with its vPro security and management technology can recoup their investment in less than a year.

A company with 30,000 PCs that upgrades to new Core 2 Duo or Quad computers would make its money back in 17 months — and in just 10 months if those PCs are also equipped with vPro-enabled motherboards, according to Intel.

One analyst, however, said such ROI figures apply only to a limited set of firms and do not encompass other costs of PC upgrades, such as buying or upgrading new software licenses, something many companies have also been delaying.

“This might make sense for IT outsourcing firms or very large companies,” said Jim McGregor, an analyst with In-Stat. “But for many of us, this is the worst economic downturn of our lives. Unless it fits in your company budget, it doesn’t make sense.”

According to an Intel-commissioned survey by Wipro Consulting of 106 North American and European companies, only 32% have slowed their PC refresh rates in the last six months. The majority, 60%, of the companies haven’t changed their PC upgrade policy, while 8% have actually accelerated them. The companies that were surveyed had a minimum of 5,000 PCs if they were based in North America, 2,500 if they’re located in Europe.

“Corporate IT is overdue for an update from Windows XP,” said Rob Crook, general manager and vice-president for Intel’s business client group. “Yes, it’s tough economic times, but those who can, are [upgrading].”

Though still profitable, Intel blamed delayed PC upgrades on down revenues in recent months.

Slower PC upgrades mean that many enterprises haven’t tried out vPro, which Intel launched in April 2006. The first desktop PCs featuring the technology began shipping about several months later.

vPro enables a number of services such as Active Management Technology (AMT) that allow IT managers to remotely configure and set policies for PCs, and Intel Trusted Execution Technology (TXT) to enforce security policies.

According to independent analyst, Jack Gold, only 10% to 15% of enterprise PCs deployed today have vPro today. Gold released research last week showing that upgrading laptops makes financial sense, primarily due to the cost of maintaining breakage-prone, out-of-warranty hardware.

Desktop PCs don’t have that problem, Gold said. Upgrading to new vPro-enabled PCs on the desktop side can still be financially smart, though he said the payback is less straightforward than Intel may make it sound.

TXT is supposed to be more secure because it is in the hardware, not software, layer. That didn’t stop security experts from breaking TXT earlier this year, and explaining how it was done.

McGregor still praises vPro’s features. But he says vPro technology needs to be paired with strong back-end management tools and run in large environments for it to translate into increased security and lower costs.

An Apple official may have trashed netbooks for cramped keyboards and “junky” hardware, but shipments for the inexpensive laptops are showing no signs of slowing down.

IDC last week said worldwide netbook shipments went up sevenfold to roughly 4.5 million during the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same quarter last year. Netbooks comprised approximately 8 percent of all PC shipments during the first quarter.

Despite an early backlash due to uncertainty surrounding the device, netbooks have been grabbing more attention since early 2008, said Jay Chou, research analyst at IDC. Netbooks are attractive as secondary devices because of their low prices and small sizes, he said. Low prices helped fuel netbook sales, although people in general have reduced spending during the recession.

“People in different areas have different expectations of what [netbooks] are supposed to do. Some of our surveys show students using it as a note-taking device. They don’t want to take a 6-pound [laptop] to campus,” Chou said.

Netbooks also meet the needs of many people for Web surfing and word processing.

“Vendors are waking up to the fact that people respond to so-called ‘good-enough’ computing. They don’t really need all the power of a Core 2 Duo CPU most of the time. Most of the time CPU usage is about 5 percent,” Chou said.

Netbook shipments for the year should double to 22 million in 2009 compared to last year, taking a larger share of PC shipments as the year goes on. Shipments should pick up during the back-to-school season in the third quarter, and possibly jump in the fourth-quarter holiday season.

However, shipments may record slower incremental growth starting in 2010 as netbooks become a mainstay of the PC market, Chou said.

Chou couldn’t provide exact market-share numbers for each vendor for the first quarter of 2009, but he didn’t expect a change in rankings from the fourth quarter. Acer was the top netbook vendor during the fourth quarter with a 32 percent market share, followed by Asustek, with a 26 percent market share. Following Asustek were Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo and Samsung.

Acer President and CEO Gianfranco Lanci recently said the company expects to ship between 10 million and 12 million netbooks during 2009. It shipped just over 5 million netbooks in 2008.

Due to seasonal reasons, shipments fell sequentially from the 6.2 million netbooks shipped in the fourth quarter of 2008. Buying activity is higher in the fourth quarter because of the holiday season. Purchases slowed down after the holiday season ended, affecting netbook shipments during the first quarter of 2009.

Netbook shipments saw sharp growth in Europe and Japan during the first quarter, Chou said. Japan is usually a market where people crave small things, and netbooks fit into that category, Chou said.

Samsung was a relative latecomer to the netbook space but saw plenty of buyers for its NC10 laptop in Western Europe, Chou said. Samsung offered users a better overall netbook experience with a larger screen and a decent-sized keyboard.

Telecommunication companies are playing a big part in Europe and Japan to drive the netbook phenomenon by bundling it with telecom services. The trend is also reaching the U.S., with AT&T offering a US$99 Acer netbook with a two-year mobile broadband contract.

Netbook adoption will also continue to grow as PC makers add more and more features like bigger screen sizes and better graphics, Chou said. Asus, for example, added a DVD drive to one of its models. Early netbooks have been panned for poor graphics capabilities, but Nvidia has come out with a chip platform that will make it possible to watch full high-definition video on netbooks.

There is also a growing interest in netbooks with screen sizes between 9 and 12 inches, Chou said. Early last year, laptops with a 7-inch screen size dominated shipments, but interest waned as laptops with larger screen sizes shipped, Chou said.

IDC defines netbooks — which it calls mini-notebooks — as laptops with screen sizes between 7 and 12 inches with low-power processors like Intel’s Atom processors.