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Writing about the Tuesday introduction of new iPods by Apple, American Technology Research's Shaw Wu observed that the product debut came smack in the midst of a lousy economic cycle where "macro headwinds are becoming more apparent."

That qualifies as more than mild understatement.

The economy's wheezing, big banks are collapsing and oil prices remain sky high. So then why is PC demand expected to be strong through the end of 2008--and beyond?

That's the gist of a new report out of IDC. No matter that Lehman's on the ropes or that Uncle Sam … Read more

The New York Times has a cool visualization chart on its site Wednesday showing how the world population spends its discretionary income.

It highlights per capita spending on clothing and footwear, electronics, alcohol and tobacco, household goods, and recreation. At Crave, we obviously zeroed in on electronics spending, and the results seemed predictable at first: the U.S. spends an ungodly amount of money on electronics: $162 billion a year. "Electronics, " by the way, are defined here as PCs, TVs, stereos, and camera equipment. Cell phones, notably, are not included.

The U.K., France, Germany, and Russia also … Read more

Turns out, the sky isn't falling on the PC industry.

That's according to an update from IDC, an analyst firm that tracks the global PC market. Despite economic sluggishness in the U.S., PC shipments have actually increased worldwide more than expected.

Worldwide PC shipments are expected to grow by 15.7 percent this year to reach 311 million units, according to a report released Wednesday by IDC. Growth will slow slightly, but remain above 9 percent through 2012. IDC says that amounts to annual PC shipments reaching more than 482 million in 2012.

This growth is to … Read more

This post was updated at 12:30 p.m. PT to reflect Dell's announcement of partnering with Vodafone.

A year after the Asus Eee PC began aggressively marking territory in the low-cost notebook business, the second-biggest PC maker in the world is finally ready with an answer.

The Dell Inspiron Mini 9 will be formally announced Thursday, as CNET News reported Tuesday. It's Dell's first foray into the Netbook category--undersize notebooks powered by Intel's Atom processor.

Hewlett-Packard, Acer, and seemingly hundreds of lower-tier players jumped in months ago to what has been certainly the most interesting development in the PC business in some time. But is it too late for Dell to make a meaningful impact in the category? Furthermore, is it even necessary for Dell to participate?

Whether this category has much potential for significant growth depends on who you ask. Gartner is predicting 5.2 million Netbooks will sell this year, but reach 50 million in 2012. Rival firm IDC has a vastly different view: 3.5 million this year, 5 million next year, and 9.2 million by 2012.

The category can be confusing for the average PC user. A Netbook is essentially a notebook form factor shrunk down, but these devices don't act as the average PC user would expect. It has a smaller screen, smaller keyboard, lower storage capacity, among other things.

That's why Dell is taking pains to reframe consumers' expectations of this type of device, and is throwing in a few different options.

"We didn't build a small PC, we built an ultramobile device," said John Thode, vice president of small-screen consumer devices for Dell. "It does a lot of PC functions, but its intent was not to emulate a PC in every aspect."

Managing the expectations consumers have of a device in this category is a good idea, but it doesn't change the fact that it falls into the category of a Netbook. (CNET Reviews like what the Mini 9 offers as a Netbook, and for a full rundown of the specs, plus a hands-on review, see here.)

Price is the other reason for the reframing.… Read more

I don't know. Something about framing the purchase and playing of video games in the same light as the practice of religion, defending one's property, and attaining redress from one's government strikes me as a tad overly dramatic.

On the other hand, I get it: gaming is serious business. Like, to the tune of almost $10 billion a year, according to the Entertainment Software Association.

And like any industry, consumers have come to expect a certain level of service. That's why two game developers compiled a list of 10 "rights" PC gamers have. The … Read more

This post was updated at 3:50 p.m. PDT with comments from Michael Dell and analysts.

Dell on Thursday reported its second-quarter results, and the company admitted it had more work to do to improve its performance.

Its second quarter profits were down 17 percent to $616 million, from $746 million a year ago. Dell reported earnings of 31 cents per share, missing analysts' expected 36 cents per share.

Revenue was $16.43 billion for the quarter, an 11-percent increase from a year ago. That was helped by a big boost in shipments of the company's hardware--up 19 … Read more

Should a computer ever be described as "cute?" The Space Cube shows that's surely open to debate.

After drooling over the tiny available-only-in-Japan Space Cube, PC Pro finally got one, and has done a rather lengthy review of the adorably twee computer. The Space Cube measures 2 square inches on each side of the cube, and is made by the Shimafuji Corporation. The price? Reportedly 1,500 pounds, or $2,750. (Editor's note: Wow.)

The guys over there are clearly smitten. Since the Space Cube has arrived, it's been "inspiring awe and provoking disbelieving … Read more

MetroPCS is the first stop for Samsung's answer to the LG Rumor. The Samsung Messenger, also called the SCH-R450, offers a candy bar design with a 262,000-color display and a slide out keyboard to warm your text-loving heart. Though the phone's overall styling is rather bland, the feature set is respectable. Inside you'll find a 1.3-megapixel camera, an MP3 player, e-mail and instant messaging, stereo Bluetooth, USB mass storage, organizer features, a speakerphone, voice recognition, 20MB of internal storage, and an microSD card slot.

The Messenger costs $199, which may seem a tad expensive, but … Read more

Intel talked up its supercharged processor at the Montevina unveiling last month, but now the first notebooks with it are making their way to the public.

Some people have wondered if four processing cores inside a laptop is overkill, but Lenovo clearly doesn't think so.

Lenovo's ThinkPad W700 is the first to market with the Core 2 Extreme Quad Core processor. As you might imagine, this isn't one of those thin-and-light notebooks the industry is so high on. Nope, the W700 is a mobile workstation, but "mobile" isn't really the emphasis here.

"This … Read more