PC Sales May Be Going Down, but SSD Shipments are only Going Up

[DocSwag]

Source: http://www.anandtech.com/show/10348/q1-2016-market-trends-ssds

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Shipments of SSDs in the first quarter of 2016 were up 32.7% compared to the same period a year ago, according to findings of TrendFocus*, a storage market tracking company. Sales of all types of SSDs, including those for client and server systems, were up sequentially and year-over-year, which indicates that NAND-based storage devices are taking share away from traditional hard drives.

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The industry sold a total of 30.777 million SSDs in Q1 2016, up 32% from 23.190 million in the same period of 2015, according to data by TrendFocus. By contrast, shipments of PCs dropped to 60.6-64.8 million units (according to Gartner and IDC), or by around 10% year-over-year (YoY); whereas shipments of HDDs collapsed by 20% YoY, based on data from hard drive manufacturers. The growth of SSDs has been consistent despite slowing sales of PCs and HDDs for several quarters now, therefore, a minor sequential increase (~4%) of their shipments in Q1 2016 was not surprising.

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Samsung is the world’s largest maker of NAND flash and is also the largest manufacturer of SSDs. The company has been controlling over 40% of the market for a while now and its unit shipments increased from 9.42 million in Q1 2015 to 12.93 million in Q1 2016. Samsung supplies SSDs to such large PC makers as Apple, HP and Lenovo, therefore, its success is well expected.

The second largest supplier of SSDs in Q1 2016 was SanDisk, which shipped 3.94 million drives and controlled 12.8% of the market. It is noteworthy that while SanDisk and Toshiba operate the world’s largest NAND flash manufacturing complex, the latter is not a major maker of SSDs. In Q1 the company only sold 1.2 million of SSDs, whereas its market share was 3.9%.

The world’s third largest supplier of SSDs in the first quarter of 2016 was Lite-On, which sells drives under Plextor and Lite-On brands. The company not only increased shipments of its SSDs from 1.39 million units in Q1 2015 to 3.51 million units in Q1 2016, or by 152% year-over-year, but also gained a significant amount of market share. In the first quarter Lite-On controlled 11.4% of the global SSD shipments.

Kingston, which is the world’s No. 1 independent supplier of DRAM modules, is also a significant maker of SSDs. The last 12 months were not exactly good for Kingston in comparison to others. Unit sales of Kingston’s SSDs only increased by around 14% year over year, but its market share dropped from 10.8% in Q1 2015 to 9.3% in Q1 2016.

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If sales of PCs drop in Q2 2016, shipments of SSDs and HDDs will decline as well. Earlier this year Western Digital already predicted a slight decrease of the HDD TAM (total available market) in the second quarter, which is a bad news for storage market in general. On the other hand, shipments of PCs usually increase in the second half of the year, which means that not only HDDs 'should' rebound, but SSDs will have good chances to set a new record in terms of unit shipments (we say should, as various reports have mixed predictions).

Even though PC sales as well as HDD sales are declining, SSD sales are going up by over 30% every year. SSDs seem to only be growing with popularity, for good reason. New TLC SSDs have been driving prices down making them an actual good deal. I personally find this to be just as I expected. SSDs will probably only get increasingly popular until HDDs get phased out completely. As well, Samsung seems to be the most popular SSD maker by a long shot. This isn't surprising, especially because of their V-Nand, which really helps performance and has made TLC producing flash much cheaper.

[Fetzie]

I'm guessing that a lot of people have realised that they can make their pc faster by simply buying an SSD instead of an entire computer.

[CTR640]

Who the hell buys pre-build POS PC's?? When will those stupid assholes of the makes realises people

mostly builds their own PC and don't buy those shit pre-builds PC's?!

The fuck is wrong with them saying PC sales going down??

[2FA]

4 minutes ago, Fetzie said:

I'm guessing that a lot of people have realised that they can make their pc faster by simply buying an SSD instead of an entire computer.

No, just more and more laptops are including small SSDs.

[minibois]

Hmm, unsurprising to be honest. People can easily upgrade their PC with an SSD and shipments are going up... I still remember when SSD's were quite new so it's still developing technology (and its price is getting lower)

[KuJoe]

2 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

Who the hell buys pre-build POS PC's?? When will those stupid assholes of the makes realises people

mostly builds their own PC and don't buy those shit pre-builds PC's?!

The fuck is wrong with them saying PC sales going down??

A lot of people do, why spend a ton of money when you don't have to? Open your mind to all of the possibilities. Also, don't get so angry so quickly at something you don't understand, you'll live longer.

[CTR640]

1 minute ago, KuJoe said:

A lot of people do, why spend a ton of money when you don't have to? Open your mind to all of the possibilities. Also, don't get so angry so quickly at something you don't understand, you'll live longer.

All of the possibilities? Lol

 

Building a gaming PC is cheaper than "gaming" OEM PC.

[KuJoe]

Also SSD sales numbers would increase if places like Newegg and Amazon wouldn't limit orders to 3 SSDs at a time. Seriously, who orders only 3 SSDs at a time? Are that many people really running RAID5 with SSDs (in before write amplification statement).

[KuJoe]

1 minute ago, CTR640 said:

All of the possibilities? Lol

 

Building a gaming PC is cheaper than "gaming" OEM PC.

And thus why I said you should open your mind, not everybody is buying gaming PCs so why spend more money when you don't have to?  

[CTR640]

1 minute ago, KuJoe said:

And thus why I said you should open your mind, not everybody is buying gaming PCs so why spend more money when you don't have to?  

Buying a laptop is better than buying an OEM PC

[minibois]

6 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

All of the possibilities? Lol

 

Building a gaming PC is cheaper than "gaming" OEM PC.

But getting a pre built is faster than doing the research on what parts to get, research on how to build a PC, etc.

Also if something is wrong with your PC, you can just take it to the store and they will fix it. You wont have to troubleshoot, RMA something just to find out that was not the problem, etc.

Some people just don't have the time for all that shit.

 

It's not all about the price.

[CTR640]

Then PC Gaming is kind of a niche market

[KuJoe]

2 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

Buying a laptop is better than buying an OEM PC

There we go, now you're using that noggin!  I'm sure laptop sales were included in the report since they don't specify desktop and just say the generic term "PC".

[CyanideInsanity]

8 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

All of the possibilities? Lol

 

Building a gaming PC is cheaper than "gaming" OEM PC.

Not when you know nothing about computers and know nobody who does. See, everyone "needs" a computer, but not everyone "needs" a powerful money saving price/performance machine.

[CTR640]

1 minute ago, KuJoe said:

There we go, now you're using that noggin!  I'm sure laptop sales were included in the report since they don't specify desktop and just say the generic term "PC".

Well, I would do that if I ever going to buy an OEM: a laptop.

[CTR640]

1 minute ago, CyanideInsanity said:

Not when you know nothing about computers and know nobody who does. See, everyone "needs" a computer, but not everyone "needs" a powerful money saving price/performance machine.

I had that and there are forums like LTT and Hardware.info to ask for help and there you go

That's what I did in the first place.

[Fetzie]

12 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

Who the hell buys pre-build POS PC's?? When will those stupid assholes of the makes realises people

mostly builds their own PC and don't buy those shit pre-builds PC's?!

The fuck is wrong with them saying PC sales going down??

Businesses buy PCs in bulk from Dell, HP, Acer etc. If you need to equip an office with computers you don't build them yourself.

 

People (private customers) buy them for the convenience of it. If it goes wrong, you call the manufacturer and they have to fix it. You don't need to think about components, only about the price, and that is something that is very attractive to somebody who just wants a computer.

[Fetzie]

12 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

Who the hell buys pre-build POS PC's?? When will those stupid assholes of the makes realises people

mostly builds their own PC and don't buy those shit pre-builds PC's?!

The fuck is wrong with them saying PC sales going down??

Businesses buy PCs in bulk from Dell, HP, Acer etc. If you need to equip an office with computers you don't build them yourself.

 

People (private customers) buy them for the convenience of it. If it goes wrong, you call the manufacturer and they have to fix it. You don't need to think about components, only about the price, and that is something that is very attractive to somebody who just wants a computer.

[spartaman64]

48 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

All of the possibilities? Lol

 

Building a gaming PC is cheaper than "gaming" OEM PC.

most people dont buy computers for gaming

[spartaman64]

41 minutes ago, CTR640 said:

I had that and there are forums like LTT and Hardware.info to ask for help and there you go

That's what I did in the first place.

then why do you hire people to fix your roof, do your plumbing, install electrical wiring when you can do it yourself 

[GeekJump]

*puts on old man glasses and lights pipe*

 

I remember when I had to travel to the other side of town and pay an arm and a leg for a 16 *mb* FLASH DRIVE! You kids got it easy with your amazons and ebays >_> *dry cough*

---

But seriously SSD's have literally drop to half the price of their similar versions last year. My 120 gb cost me $80 last Jan, now I can get a 250 for that price

[Sakkura]

Kinda strange how Lite-On/Plextor is growing so fast all of a sudden. I felt like they were dropping off the map a little in terms of interesting products.

 

1 hour ago, CTR640 said:

Buying a laptop is better than buying an OEM PC

 

A laptop is an OEM PC.

[Centurius]

2 hours ago, CTR640 said:

Who the hell buys pre-build POS PC's?? When will those stupid assholes of the makes realises people

mostly builds their own PC and don't buy those shit pre-builds PC's?!

The fuck is wrong with them saying PC sales going down??

That's because most people buy pre-built.  

[RagnarokDel]

There hasnt been a reason to upgrade in 5 years until now...

[Clyne]

Well if you just buy a 300-400 dollar laptop and upgrade it to a SSD, it'll feel really fast..

A SSD can make your computer feel faster.