Stan Beer
Sunday, 14 December 2008 14:21
Opinion and Analysis
Page 1 of 2
For a brief moment in time, between October 2007 and April 2008, thanks to the Asus Eee PC it really did seem as if desktop Linux was finally going to have its moment in the sun. Unfortunately for the Linux crowd, however, Asus, Acer and other hardware makers realised they could sell many more netbooks if they did deals with those nasty folks in Redmond.
According to
recent estimates, we can expect one of
various distributions of Linux to be the operating system on about 30%
of netbooks by the end of 2008 (Windows XP on the other 70%). While
that news may cause the hearts of Linux lovers to flutter with
excitement, on close examination this is really nothing for them to
crow about.
While the Windows XP Eee PC 701 was offically released in January 2008,
most of the world didn't get to see a Windows version of the now iconic
netbook until around April. Until then, Linux netbooks had a full six
months head start on Windows, with 1 million Linux netbooks sold in
2007 and say another 1.5 million sold in the first quarter of 2008 (a
guesstimate on my part). That's 2.5 million Linux netbooks moved before
Asus brought out the first Windows XP model.
Since then, the netbook market has literally exploded. In Q3, more than
5.6 million netbooks were shipped worlwide and a total about 14 million
are expected to be sold in 2008.
So if we take the total number of netbooks sold into the market so far
as 15 million, of which 30% (4.5 million) are Linux machines and 70%
(10.5 million) are Windows, what conclusions can we draw?
Since April this year when Windows netbooks first appeared,
conservatively about 81% of all netbooks sold have been supplied
pre-loaded with Windows XP. This appears to indicate that a more
realistic assessment of the Linux netbook market share is something
less than 20% and dwindling as the market gets swamped by Windows
netbooks
There are also
reports stating that return rates of Linux netbooks are
quite high
- four times that of Windows netbooks - although Asus denies this is
the case with the Eee PC range.
CONTINUED Page 2
