By Neil Hughes

Published: 04:55 PM EST (01:55 PM PST)

Quarterly PC shipment estimates were released Wednesday, and Apple's share of the U.S. PC market grew 34 percent year over year to capture 8 percent of the total domestic market.

Gartner

According to research firm Gartner, Apple was the fifth-largest PC vendor in the U.S. for the three-month quarter to start 2010. With an estimated 1.398 million Macs shipped stateside, Apple was behind only HP, Dell, Acer and Toshiba.

Gartner said the hype around Apple's recently released iPad likely helped Mac sales for the quarter, which grew 34 percent from the same period in 2009. A year ago, Macs accounted for 7.2 percent of the U.S. market.

Total estimated PC shipments in the U.S. were 17.4 million for the first quarter of 2010, representing a 20.2 percent increase from the same frame in 2009. That amounts to two consecutive quarters of double-digit shipment growth for the U.S market.

"Although the first quarter is not typically a strong quarter for the consumer market, growth in the consumer segment was strong," said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst with Gartner. "We are expecting about 30 percent growth in the U.S. consumer PC market in the first quarter of 2010. The positive economic outlook and affordable system prices drove U.S. consumers to buy more PCs. These purchases either replaced aging PCs or became additions to buyers' households."



Staying atop the domestic market was HP, but it and second-place manufacturer Dell saw year-over-year growth that came in below the industry average, at 7.1 percent and 7.2 percent, respectively. HP still managed to take 25 percent of the U.S. market, followed closely by Dell with 23.4 percent.

In third was Acer, which skyrocketed 50.9 percent from 2009 shipments, followed by Toshiba which grew an even 50 percent. Acer took 15.6 percent of estimated U.S. shipments, totaling 2.7 million. Toshiba accounted for 1.5 million and 8.6 percent of the market.

Worldwide, HP was also on top, with a total of 15.3 million shipments estimated for the first quarter, good for an 18.2 percent market share. In second was Acer, taking 12 million and 14.2 percent, followed by Dell (10.2 million, 12.1 percent), Lenovo (7 million, 8.3 percent), Asus (4.6 million, 5.5 percent) and Toshiba (4.6 million, 5.5 percent). Apple did not make Gartner's list of the top worldwide PC vendors.

IDC

Also released Wednesday were figures from IDC, which tracked estimated domestic Apple shipments at 1.13 million, good for a 6.4 percent market share. IDC, too, found Apple to be the fifth-largest U.S. vendor, behind HP, Dell, Acer and Toshiba.

Differing from Gartner, IDC found that Apple's year-over-year growth was just 8.3 percent, and total market share was down from 7 percent in the first quarter of 2009.

In all, the U.S. PC market grew an estimated 16.9 percent to 17.5 million units in the first quarter of 2010, according to IDC. HP captured 25.4 percent of the market, selling 4.5 million PCs, edging out Dell's 4.2 million and 24.1 percent share.

"As expected, the U.S. market was not able to maintain the spike of growth (more than 24%) seen in 4Q09, but momentum from the holiday season continued, resulting in stronger than expected sales across both form factors," IDC wrote. "Steadily improved business spending, as well as growing interest in niche desktop segments, yielded a strong desktop quarter."



Worldwide sales increased 24.2 percent, with total shipments in the first quarter estimated at 79 million. HP was the top company, shipping 15.6 percent in the first quarter, good for a 19.7 percent market share.

IDC found that Acer was the No. 2 overall worldwide PC manufacturer, with 10.8 million PCs shipped and a 13.6 percent market share. Dell took third, with 10.5 million shipments and 13.3 percent of the market. Lenovo (7 million, 8.8 percent) and Toshiba (4.6 million, 5.8 percent) rounded out the top five.