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PC sales to bottom out, says analyst

The downturn in PC sales could slow this quarter, forecasts Gartner analyst Tracy Tsai.

Lance Whitney Contributing Writer
Lance Whitney is a freelance technology writer and trainer and a former IT professional. He's written for Time, CNET, PCMag, and several other publications. He's the author of two tech books--one on Windows and another on LinkedIn.
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The worst may be over for the PC market, at least according to a Gartner analyst.

Chatting with the Wall Street Journal, Gartner analyst Tracy Tsai said she believes the freefall in PC sales will slow this quarter, resulting in a 3 percent drop over last year's fourth quarter. This year's third-quarter PC sales showed an 8.6 percent decline from the same period in 2012.

The analyst expects PC shipments in 2014 to be about flat compared with this year's results.

Heavy competition from smartphones and tablets have hurt PC sales. The demand for tablets and tablet-like devices may factor into the PC sales forecast.

"The decline is at a much slower rate. The global economy is stabilizing," Tsai told the Journal. "Also, there will be more lower-cost, aggressively priced two-in-one (tablet with a keyboard) devices that are being launched in the second half of this year, which should help demand."