Is IT following a consumer trend of letting the laptop age?

Monday, January 14th, 2013 Karen Ambrose Hickey, Editor

Windows 8 fails to reignite PC market: Gartner, continues the discussion of the PC quickly being replaced by the tablet.

Holiday shoppers stayed away from Windows 8 and tablet systems seemed to be taking off during Q4. According to Gartner, this PC slip indicates that the sector was suffering from a shift in consumer habits as much as a weak global economy. “Tablets have dramatically changed the device landscape for PCs, not so much by ‘cannibalizing’ PC sales, but by causing PC users to shift consumption to tablets rather than replacing older PCs,” said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner.

Some analysts are saying that battery life and lack of needing to re-boot is mentioned as a reason to carry a tablet, in Report from the street: Tablets are kicking laptops to the curb

Is IT following this trend of slowing their replacement of laptops, but quickening the acquisition of tablets?
IT can look at device usage and not replace laptops as quickly for groups not needing creative or processing power. There’s a shift in modernizing the computing fleet.

Even the article The iPad Will Not Replace the Laptop in 2013 says that we aren’t looking at direct replacement. It’s “more than just accessing data on a tablet. Some enterprise software can be occasionally accessed over the iPad’s mobile Safari browser, but the tablet isn’t good for regular use and deep dives.” The PC is still needed.

Whether it’s delays in PC replacements, economy or laptop replacement for some job functions, PC sales are slipping. And as we’ve seen in the consumer world, users are more comfortable using a different device depending on the function. As tablets continue to evolve (and many are still waiting to see what happens with Microsoft tablets) with users and IT waiting for the developments, tablets could continue to eat into the PC share of office.

Tags: tablet