According to a recent report from Gartner, sales of personal computers declined by 0.1% compared to last year’s.  The decline in sales is said to be influenced by a PC saturated market as well as consumers are more interested in purchasing other technologies such as smartphones and tablets.  Though there was high hopes for Ultrabooks or thin and light netbooks, the demand for those was also minimal.

“Uncertainties in the economy in various regions, as well as consumer’s low interest in PC purchases, were some of the key influencers of slow PC shipment growth. Despite the high expectations for the thin and light notebook segment, Ultrabooks, shipment volume was small and little impact on overall shipment growth,”  said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner.

IDC also reported the same decline as Gartner, stating that a slowing economy in China also hurt PC sales.  The reports also stated that the decline in PC demand was more pronounced in developed countries since their markets are notebook saturated – more people are interested in buying portable devices such as netbooks/Ultrabooks rather than buying bulky, space-consuming devices.  But the IDC has an interesting thought – Windows 8 could possibly revive the PC market.

“The announcement of a Windows 8 launch date, as well as broader communication of new features in the OS, are key steps that would help to address uncertainty about new product availability and help consumers and channels plan their purchases,”  IDC analyst Jay Chou said.

Windows 8 to revive PCs?

Microsoft announced that their newest operating system would be available by October together with the Surface – their very own tablet running on Windows 8.  So how would an operating system drive PC sales?

Windows 8 can be used in PCs and compatible tablets but prides itself with a new user interface called Metro.  This UI is best experienced when using a touch-based device like a tablet or a PC with a monitor that has a touch feature.  So if you just buy the OS and use it on your old computer, Windows 8 won’t be optimized to its full ability.  In order to fully experience Windows 8, you either buy a Windows 8 tablet, buy a touchscreen computer monitor or buy a whole new computer like the all-in-one computers  with touchscreens from Dell.

But even if Windows 8 revives PC sales, the effect won’t be noticed until the fourth quarter or the first quarter of 2013 since we’d have to wait until November or December to see PCs with Windows 8 in the market.

No full retail version

While we wait until it’s officially released, let’s look at some of the recent news regarding the OS.  First, existing Windows or Windows 8 Release Preview users would only have to pay less than $40 to have their OS upgraded to Windows 8 as there will be no full retail version available.  That’s great news for people who are in a tight budget.  But for those who aren’t Windows users, they can avail the System Builder version which is actually the version meant to be used by OEMs.  Though it will be priced higher than the upgrade, it will still be cheaper than the full retail version.