Only about half of those machines come equipped with Intel chips, according to Dataquest, a consultancy.
Neither side's arguments are without self-interest, observes David Fraley of Gartner Dataquest, a market-research firm.
According to Gartner Dataquest, Nokia increased its market share from 30.6% in 2000 to 35% last year.
Dataquest had forecast that 20 million copies of Windows 95 would be sold by the end of 1995.
Analyst Martin Reynolds, a vice president and research fellow at Dataquest in San Jose, California, echoed that sentiment.
"This is the first true Internet appliance that will come into the consumer space, " said Dataquest analyst Van Baker.
And in other European countries, including the U.K., Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland, Net penetration is nearing that level, Dataquest said.
Vaio computer sales more than doubled last year in Japan and grew 42% in the U.S. to a total 2.8 million units worldwide, according to DataQuest.
Gartner Dataquest, a market-research company, reckons one in four employees in America worked from home for at least one day a week last year.
Niall O'Reilly of Dataquest in Hong Kong says just under 20% of all PCs sold in Asia this year were multimedia units for the home.
Dataquest is expected to provide further details on the report's findings at the company's annual European conference, Predicts 99, to be held in Paris this week.
Gartner Dataquest analyst Todd Hanson says Bluetooth may have limited applications for businesses, and that it isn't likely to replace Wi-Fi for use in local area networks.
Worldwide, sales of mobile phones have fallen to just below 400m in 2001, representing the first-ever decline in the industry, according to Gartner Dataquest, a research group.
This is a strategy typified by Gateway's Yourware service, said Dataquest's Smulders, and it's one that every PC maker will be compelled to consider in the months ahead.
Dataquest's Martin criticized both the PalmPilot and Windows CE devices.
Dataquest, a San Jose research firm, also predicts big things the operating system, saying Linux will account for almost a quarter of worldwide server appliance revenue by the year 2003.
In countries such as France and Italy, which have traditionally been slow to accept the Web, as well as Central and Eastern Europe, Net growth is now fast-paced, Dataquest said.
Market Research Firm Gartner Dataquest estimates that while there were 130 million PCs sold last year, consumers bought slightly more than 8 million Zip drives, 3 million fewer than in 1999.
"Cisco wants people in the entertainment and computing industry to understand that they are the way to get something from point A to point B over the Internet, " said Dataquest's Van Baker.
"What Intel hopes it will do is attract consumers and commercial buyers back to a more expensive PC, so they can sell their higher-end processors, " says industry analyst Van Baker of Dataquest.
"Growth in the global PC market will be more than 20% next year for the third year in a row, " says Philippe de Marcillac, vice-president and chief analyst for PC markets at Dataquest in California.
"Microsoft and the hardware vendors seem to have had a hard time positioning these kinds of devices and articulating their value, " says Michael McGuire, principal analyst for mobile computing at Dataquest, a San Jose market research firm.
Other products to watch for at the show include high-definition television sets from Mitsubishi, Samsung, Panasonic and others, although pricing and technical issues mean that the market will take a year or more to advance, Dataquest's Baker said.
Despite its beautiful machines, its smart and entertaining advertising, its retail stores and its compelling argument that its platform is simply better than Windows, Apple's share of the computing world continues to slide, and now stands at less than 3% globally, according to Gartner Dataquest estimates.
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