• MSNBC/AP, Thursday, April 19, 2007 10:45 AM

No. 1-ranked Hewlett-Packard beat No. 2-ranked Dell by about 4% percentage points in the hotly contested worldwide personal-computer market during the first quarter. HP, which supplanted Dell as the leader in PC shipments in the third quarter of 2006, gained momentum in the retail and consumer segments.

IDC and Gartner announced slightly different results on vendor rankings yesterday, but both showed that industry shipments continued to grow in the first quarter, and that HP beat Dell. Under IDC's measure, China's Lenovo Group tied Taiwan-based Acer for third place in worldwide shipments, each achieving a 6.7% slice of the market. Gartner's found Acer with a slight lead over Lenovo for the first time, garnering a 6.8% share, compared to Lenovo's 6.3%. Japan-based Toshiba rounded out the top five with a 4% share, according to both firms.

After three quarters of single-digit growth, global PC shipments grew by 10.9% in the first quarter, according to IDC, which expects double-digit growth to continue for the next two years.

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