By now, it is a well known fact that netbooks grew in popularity by a very great deal during 2009 and have already become the main focus of hardware makers, even despite some surveys that imply that notebooks may still outrank netbooks in the preference lists of end-users. Now, as it is always the case in the closing periods of the year, market analysts publish their findings. This year, however, it seems that netbooks have scored quite a high popularity surge indeed and the total amounts of shipments are definitely mirroring this fact.

According to market research and consulting firm DisplaySearch, the total amount of netbook PC sales surpassed 33.3 million units, as opposed to 2008, when the total number of shipments was slightly over 16.4 million. This means that the netbook sales grew by 103% year-on-year, while the portable PC market grew by 11.7%, compared with 2008.

"Mini-notes continue to be a significant piece of the notebook PC pie, in terms of both units and revenue. However, our long-term outlook is that the mini-note share of the notebook PC market has stabilized, and will remain at approximately 20% through 2011 before starting to erode," John F. Jacobs, director of Notebook Market Research, said. "While mini-notes offer lower ASPs and are thinner and lighter than notebook PCs, the performance of larger notebook PCs continues to improve while prices continue to steadily decline, increasing the performance gap while narrowing the price gap."

On the other hand, revenues for every class of notebook PCs, besides netbooks, decreased year-on-year and ASP sales are predicted to see a 15% Y/Y decrease not just in 2009, but also next year. Nevertheless, DisplaySearch believes that the market for notebooks will grow to 16% in 2010. Of course, mini-notes and ultra-portable personal computers are expected to perform the best out of all types of products in the portable-computer market segment.