Jon Peddie Research (JPR) released GPU shipment statistics for the third quarter of 2012, and while the numbers were all over the map, it was mostly good news for Nvidia (more on that in a moment). Discrete GPU shipments held steady at 34.3 million units, up 4.5 percent sequentially but down 5.2 percent compared to the same quarter one year ago. There was also a 4.5 percent dip in overall graphics shipments in Q3 compared to last year, JPR says.
"The news was terrific for Nvidia and disappointing for the other major players," JPR said. "From Q2 to Q3 Intel slipped in both desktop (7 percent) and notebook (8.6 percent). AMD dropped (2 percent) in the desktop, and (17 percent) in notebooks. Nvidia gained 28.3 percent in desktop from quarter to quarter and jumped almost 12 percent in the notebook segment."
Nvidia did very well for itself in what was otherwise "not a very good quarter." GPU shipments overall declined 1.45 percent sequentially and 10.8 year-over-year. It is interesting to note, however, that GPUs shipped more than PCs. The reason is because of "double attach," meaning some PCs shipped with both discrete and integrated graphics solutions.
"The turmoil in the PC market has caused us to modify our forecast since the last report; it is less aggressive on both desktops and notebooks," JPR said. "The popularity of tablets and the persistent recession are the contributing factors that have altered the nature of the PC market. Nonetheless, the CAGR for PC graphics from 2011 to 2016 is 3.6 percent, and we expect the total shipments of graphics chips in 2016 to be 608 million units."
Though Nvidia was the biggest winner in Q3, it's 18.5 percent share of the GPU market still trails both Intel (59.8 percent) and AMD (21.2 percent).
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