Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[greg s]

I would, if you don't mind, prefer to use numbers and verbiage from IDC as reported in June of this year (so you don't misinterpret). This and even more detail has been available, but I don't have time to do a voluminous search:

Upgrade cycle

The corporate growth comes from the long-awaited PC upgrade cycle that corporations have been putting off amid budget concerns. In the 1990s, conventional wisdom held that corporations upgraded their PC infrastructure every three years, as processor and component technology improvements increased productivity. However, the last major PC upgrade cycle came during the preparation for the Y2K bug, and many businesses have been making do with PCs purchased in 1999 or 2000.

"There's a small number of good reasons not to upgrade: It costs money, and the PCs you've got now work pretty well," Kay said. But concerns such as increasing worker productivity and rising maintenance costs are mounting as companies realize they can't make their older PCs last forever, he said.

Worldwide, unit shipments are expected to regain the losses suffered since the economic downturn began in 2000. In 2000, 140.1 million units were shipped, according to IDC, falling to a low of 134.6 million in 2001.

http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/main_news.cfm?NewsID=6429