Desktop sales expected to resume growth in 3Q17

PC sales have been pretty weak in the first half of 2017, but is expected to start growing in the third quarter driven by new products from AMD and Intel for the gaming and high-end desktop markets.

AMD's new top-end 16-core Ryzen Threadripper 1950X and 12-core 1920X will become available in the retail channel on August 10, while its 8-core 1900X is scheduled to be released at the end of August, reports digitimes:

Several vendors have already begun accepting pre-orders for desktop models using AMD's latest top-end CPU processors since the end of July including the Alienware Area-51 Threadripper from Dell.

AMD also recently announced its new Vega-based GPUs including the Radeon RX Vega 64, using either liquid or air cooling modules, and Radeon RX Vega's prices start from US$399. AMD also offers free games and discounts on hardware including Samsung's CF791 monitor as well as price-cuts on CPU/motherboard bundles to help consumers save up to US$300.

Intel has also prepared to release its next-generation 14nm Coffee Lake processors in the near future and will initially launch products such as the Core i7 8700K.

AMD and Intel are also seeing growing sales in the server ssegment. AMD's EPYC 7000 series processors were unveiled at the end of June. Although the processor series currently only accounts for less than 1% of the server market, orders for related server makers have been picking up recently and are expected to stay strong in the second half of 2017 with players including Microsoft, Baidu, Dell, Hewlett-Packard (HP), Supermicro, Inventec, Wistron, Asustek Computer, Gigabyte Technology and Tyan eagerly promoting their systems.

Intel debuted its Purley server platform in July and is currently seeing strong orders from enterprises looking to replace their existing server systems. Some market watchers believe the replacement trend will last for a whole year and shore up Intel's profitability and revenues.