Two research firms on Wednesday said growth in computer shipments worldwide will be more robust than they had previously forecast for the year, driven by continuing strength in sales of portable computers.

IDC now expects shipments to rise 15.2 percent by last year, compared with a 2008 forecast of 12.8 percent growth that the Framingham, Mass.-based firm made in March.

Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner, which uses different methods than IDC to track shipments, now forecasts a 12.5 percent increase from the 264 million units it counted last year, up from its 10.9 percent projection three months ago.

IDC’s new forecast predicts global PC shipments will reach 310 million units that year, up from 269 million last year, when the growth rate was about 14 percent compared with 2006.

Portable computers have posted stronger growth rates than desktop models in recent years, and IDC projects a 35 percent growth rate for portable models that year. Those gains have recently offset slow growth in U.S. demand for PCs amid an economic

Factors driving recent portable PC growth include the replacement of desktop models with notebook computers and the emergence of extremely low-cost portables popular in developing nations.

“Despite recent economic pressure, the consistent gains fueled by portable adoption, falling prices, and new users — particularly in emerging regions — will continue to drive growth during the forecast,” said Loren Loverde, director of IDC’s worldwide quarterly PC tracker.

Low-cost portables such as those built off Intel Corp.’s Classmate PC platform and the “XO” from the One Laptop Per Child initiative had previously been excluded from IDC’s statistical tracking considering of their nontraditional designs and features such as relatively low processing potential and storage capacity. But IDC said that it has now begun counting such models considering “the latest versions of these systems are now more robust, meeting IDC’s criteria to…

Original post by Chase Higgins

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