Gartner predicts Apple growth, but spurns iPad

Gartner has added its take on Apple's Q4 earnings to a growing list of other predictions.

Gartner predicts that Mac sales grew by nearly 24 percent, helping Apple to take a 9.7 percent share in Q4. However, it claims that any reason for a lagging growth for PC makers was simply to be blamed on the iPad, which it did not count as part of PC sales and lumped it in among "media tablets."

"Overall, holiday PC sales were weak in many key regions due to the intensifying competition in consumer spending. Media tablets, such as the iPad, as well as other consumer electronic (CE) devices, such as game consoles, all competed against PCs," said Mikako Kitagawa, a principal analyst at Gartner.

Gartner did include netbooks in PC sales for other companies. It did not explain why they excluded the iPad from PC sales, but did count netbooks. Doing so would significantly boost Apple's revenue for Q4. But, Gartner did say that Apple and Toshiba were the only top-5 vendors to increase shipments, with Apple's 23.7 percent being far higher than Toshiba's 14.4 percent growth.

Apple most likely will announce its Q4 earnings next week.

[via AppleInsider]