ITscope Market barometer Q1/2024

For gra­phic cards an intri­guing trend is emer­ging: while the click num­bers on the top 100 gra­phics cards remain sta­ble on ITscope, pri­ces are expe­ri­en­cing a signi­fi­cant increase. This trend can part­ly be attri­bu­ted to Nvidia’s stra­te­gic focus on the lucra­ti­ve mar­ket for AI chips, indi­rect­ly lea­ding to a shorta­ge in gra­phics card pro­duc­tion. The empha­sis on AI tech­no­lo­gies, cou­pled with the ste­ady demand for high-performance gra­phics cards, is dri­ving pri­ces up. Oliver Gorges suc­cinct­ly sum­ma­ri­zes the situa­ti­on: “The rapid advance­ments in AI tech­no­lo­gy are fue­ling a gro­wing demand, ine­vi­ta­b­ly resul­ting in pri­ce hikes, with Nvidia rea­ping the bene­fits of this trend.”

With the return-to-office trend and the con­tin­ued inte­rest in AI appli­ca­ti­ons, PC sys­tems are once again taking cen­ter stage. “The return to office and the launch of Windows 11 are two incen­ti­ves for com­pa­nies to refo­cus on cost-effective and upgrada­ble com­ple­te sys­tems,” explains Benjamin Mund, CEO of ITscope. Notebooks are also shi­ning bright­ly in the ITscope ana­ly­sis this spring. Lenovo leads the pack, with HP and Dell also remai­ning rele­vant play­ers in the market.

With the intro­duc­tion of WiFi 7, Access Points are set­ting new stan­dards in wire­less com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on tech­no­lo­gy: the high data trans­fer rates enable speeds that can even sur­pass wired con­nec­tions. The Ubiquiti UniFi U7 Pro is among the first pro­ducts on the mar­ket to sup­port this new stan­dard and has gar­ne­red num­e­rous clicks from ITscope users. “This deve­lo­p­ment not only show­ca­ses the cur­rent sta­te of tech­no­lo­gy but also indi­ca­tes the direc­tion in which the IT world is hea­ding,” notes sales expert Gorges. “Everything is beco­ming smar­ter and more inter­con­nec­ted, with tech­no­lo­gi­cal inno­va­tions play­ing a key role in this transformation.”

Highflyer: Groundbreaking tech­no­lo­gy inno­va­tions 
Graphics cards: AI boom keeps Nvidia cas­hing in
PC sys­tems: The return of the office com­pu­ter?
Notebooks: Rising clicks and strong momen­tum
Access points: New stan­dards rai­se the bar
Mobiltelefone: Samsung setzt mit KI-Funktionen zum Sprung an
Tablets: Everyone is wai­ting for Apple’s new iPads
Drucker: Stagnation im Schatten der Digitalisierung

The ITscope Highflyers pre­sent the most striking new pro­ducts in the first quar­ter of 2024. This sel­ec­tion pro­vi­des an insight into which inno­va­tions and tech­no­lo­gi­cal deve­lo­p­ments are curr­ent­ly gene­ra­ting the most inte­rest. Based on the num­ber of clicks within the ITscope plat­form, we draw a pic­tu­re of which pro­ducts that have been lis­ted on ITscope within the last six months stand out in their respec­ti­ve cate­go­ries. From the most recent­ly lis­ted items, we sel­ect tho­se with the most clicks per cate­go­ry and rank them from 1 to 15. This metho­do­lo­gy pro­vi­des a clear view of cur­rent demand and reflects mar­ket pre­fe­ren­ces wit­hout resort­ing to super­la­ti­ves. It is a direct insight into the dyna­mics of the IT mar­ket, taking into account both the front­run­ners and the full ran­ge of innovations.

Third place goes to the UbiQuiti U7 Pro access point, the first device from the manu­fac­tu­rer UbiQuiti with WiFi 7 tech­no­lo­gy, which can achie­ve an impres­si­ve speed of up to 5 Gbit/s. The 1,646 clicks show the gro­wing importance of fas­ter and more effi­ci­ent net­work con­nec­tions in modern IT envi­ron­ments – a reason for us to dedi­ca­te a sepa­ra­te cate­go­ry to access points in this mar­ket barometer.

The high-flyer in the tablet cate­go­ry is the Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+ SM-X210NZAAEUB, a device prai­sed by Chip​.de as an “afforda­ble ever­y­day tablet” with a MSRP of €185.82. The Samsung Galaxy S24 deser­ves a spe­cial men­ti­on as it shows remar­kab­le per­for­mance despi­te ear­lier skep­ti­cism regar­ding the per­for­mance of the Exynos chips. According to a test by Chip​.de, the Exynos 2400 chip instal­led in the Galaxy S24 is slight­ly behind the Ultra model in terms of per­for­mance, but cle­ar­ly out­per­forms the pre­vious year’s models. Despite initi­al dis­ap­point­ments in the per­for­mance of the Exynos chip line, which fell short of expec­ta­ti­ons and could not hold its own in direct com­pa­ri­son with com­pe­ti­tors such as Apple and Qualcomm, Samsung demons­tra­tes a signi­fi­cant impro­ve­ment with the S24.

Even if Gamestar descri­bes the new “Super” GPUs from Nvidia as bor­ing, this does not detract from their popu­la­ri­ty: The MSI GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER 16G VENTUS, which comes with a push-pull air­flow design and an alu­mi­num housing and has a MSRP of €948.94, is ahead in Q1/2024.

In the pro­ces­sor seg­ment, the AMD Ryzen 7 5700X3D pro­ves that even late­co­mers with an AM4 plat­form can offer impres­si­ve gam­ing per­for­mance at an attrac­ti­ve pri­ce. The CPU is an excel­lent opti­on, espe­ci­al­ly for upgrades. Golem high­lights the excel­lent price-performance ratio, alt­hough PC Games Hardware tends to advi­se users to opt for the more powerful Ryzen 7 5800X3D.

The Be Quiet! Dark Rock PRO 5 lives up to its repu­ta­ti­on as the “king of air coo­ling” and offers out­stan­ding coo­ling per­for­mance for deman­ding PC sys­tems. According to PC Games Hardware, it impres­ses with its per­for­mance and low noi­se level – it is the most popu­lar new release in the coo­ling cate­go­ry at ITscope.

For mid-range sto­rage solu­ti­ons, the Synology Plus Series HAT3310-12T hard dri­ve, spe­ci­fi­cal­ly desi­gned for Synology sys­tems, offers a relia­ble opti­on for home users and small offices.

The mar­ket for gra­phics cards is show­ing lively acti­vi­ties this spring. Prices for gra­phics cards have risen dra­ma­ti­cal­ly over the past year, which is not only due to the AI boom and a gene­ral­ly high demand for high-performance hard­ware, but also to stra­te­gic decis­i­ons made by Nvidia, the lar­gest play­er on the market.

While the avera­ge Wholesale sel­ling pri­ce (WSP) for the top 100 most-clicked GPUs on ITscope was still €811.50 in the first quar­ter of 2023, this value more than dou­bled to a remar­kab­le €1,912.95 by the first quar­ter of 2024. This pri­ce increase reflects less a direct increase in demand for gra­phics cards in the AI seg­ment, but rather the result of tigh­ter quo­tes and hig­her pri­ces due to Nvidia’s focus on the pro­fi­ta­ble mar­ket for AI chips.

Nvidia plays a key role in this, as the com­pa­ny is on the ups­wing thanks to its supre­ma­cy in AI chips and gra­phics cards. This is under­pin­ned not only by the posi­ti­ve per­for­mance of Nvidia shares, but also by reports of anti­trust alle­ga­ti­ons and limi­t­ed pro­duc­tion capa­ci­ties, which are dri­ving pri­ces even hig­her. Nvidia’s domi­nan­ce is also evi­dent on ITscope: around 90% of the top 100 gra­phics cards come from the GPU giant, while AMD is well behind with a share of around 10%. In terms of AI tech­no­lo­gy, Nvidia gra­phics chips have a clear advan­ta­ge, as their CUDA cores can also be used fle­xi­bly. Unlike their com­pe­ti­tors from AMD and Intel, they are also easier to use for tasks other than gra­phics display.

Market rese­ar­chers from IDC and Canalys have regis­tered increased sales figu­res for PC sys­tems world­wi­de in the first quar­ter of 2024. We also obser­ved incre­asing inte­rest in PC sys­tems on ITscope, which is repre­sen­ta­ti­ve of the German B2B mar­ket. This trend may have been dri­ven by the incre­asing num­ber of employees retur­ning to the office (“back to office”), but the AI boom and the gro­wing importance of Windows 11 are also play­ing a role, as PCs are easier to upgrade with more CPU and GPU power.

Notebooks are also enjoy­ing a resur­gence in popu­la­ri­ty at the start of the year, which is reflec­ted in the num­ber of clicks on ITscope. At the fore­front of this move­ment is the HP ProBook 450 G10, which takes the lead with an impres­si­ve 7,911 clicks and an avera­ge WSP of €840.73. According to Notebookcheck, this model impres­ses with its com­bi­na­ti­on of office sui­ta­bi­li­ty and GeForce RTX power.

Lenovo is also making a strong state­ment in the note­book seg­ment with the ThinkBook 16p G4 ran­king 2^nd and the ThinkPad E16 Gen taking 3^rd place. The most expen­si­ve lap­top in the top 15, the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2, saw a signi­fi­cant decrease in its MSRP from €2,300 to around €2,000 by the end of February. Equipped with a Core i7, 1,000 GB sto­rage, 32 GB RAM, and a 16″ dis­play, it stands out as a top-tier model for dis­cer­ning users.

Good news for Microsoft: The Surface Laptop 5 for Business clim­bs from 17^th to 4^th place. Here, too, the­re are strong fluc­tua­tions in stock and the avera­ge WSP – the note­book with Intel Core i7 is curr­ent­ly only in stock at a few retail­ers. The situa­ti­on is simi­lar for the Lenovo ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen 4 (10^th place): Demand is hig­her than sup­p­ly, which is why the WSP is curr­ent­ly rising.

The Apple MacBook Pro, MRX33D/A, remains a remar­kab­ly powerful choice with its unu­su­al 18GB of RAM and M3 chip, making it 7^th in the ITscope cate­go­ry with 1887 clicks. However, the top per­for­mer from the fourth quar­ter of 2023, the 2020 Apple MacBook Air with M1 pro­ces­sor, has lost inte­rest and slip­ped to 11^th place.

The intro­duc­tion of WiFi 7 marks a signi­fi­cant advan­ce in wire­less com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons, with data rates that theo­re­ti­cal­ly exceed tho­se of wired net­works. Theoretically, in that the end devices must also be compatible.

Access points con­nect wired and wire­less net­works to ensu­re a sta­ble Internet con­nec­tion throug­hout the enter­pri­se. In addi­ti­on to the WiFi stan­dard, important sel­ec­tion cri­te­ria include sup­port­ed fre­quen­cy bands, data rates, MIMO tech­no­lo­gy for effi­ci­ent com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on and WPA3 for maxi­mum security.

Topping the list with 2,997 clicks is the Ubiquiti UniFi U6-PRO, a WiFi 6 access point that boasts sup­port for the 6 GHz fre­quen­cy band – a signi­fi­cant advan­ta­ge as this band is less con­ge­sted and allows for hig­her data rates.

Places 5 through 7 go to the HPE Aruba pro­ducts, which are desi­gned spe­ci­fi­cal­ly for enter­pri­se use and offer high com­pa­ti­bi­li­ty and per­for­mance at a reasonable pri­ce. Of par­ti­cu­lar note is the HPE Aruba AP-515 (RW), which offers impres­si­ve data rates and Bluetooth con­nec­ti­vi­ty. The WSP here is €445.18.

Interest in mobi­le pho­nes on ITscope remains strong in the spring of 2024. The new Apple models in par­ti­cu­lar are attrac­ting clicks. The iPhone 15 Pro Max once again takes the top spot with a record num­ber of 4,555 clicks, fol­lo­wed by other Apple models such as the iPhone 14 and iPhone 13. Despite reports of waning inte­rest in the iPhone 15 in other mar­kets, this trend is not con­firm­ed on ITscope for the German-speaking B2B regi­on, which streng­thens Apple’s posi­ti­on in this seg­ment. The smart­phones of the major Apple com­pe­ti­tor Huawei hard­ly arou­se any inte­rest on ITscope.

Among other things, Apple pro­ducts are known for their pri­ce sta­bi­li­ty. This makes it all the more sur­pri­sing that the fifth-placed iPhone SE (3^rd gene­ra­ti­on) drop­ped signi­fi­cant­ly in WSP for a few days in March.

Samsung’s Galaxy series, espe­ci­al­ly the Galaxy A54 5G, is in high demand, which is reflec­ted in a jump from 25^th to 8^th place. The Enterprise Edition fea­tures a busi­ness pro­gram that pro­vi­des addi­tio­nal secu­ri­ty fea­tures and manage­ment tools for enter­pri­ses. The intro­duc­tion of the new A35 and A55 models could fur­ther streng­then Samsung’s position.

The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra with built-in AI capa­bi­li­ties, now ran­ked 15^th on ITscope, is show­ing remar­kab­le upward move­ment in the mar­ket, reflec­ting the gro­wing inte­rest in advan­ced AI tech­no­lo­gy. With the One UI 6.1 update in March, other devices also recei­ved the new fea­tures, but accor­ding to GameStar Tech, this led to mas­si­ve pro­blems for some users, such as unu­sual­ly fast bat­tery con­sump­ti­on and overheating.

Despite the ongo­ing popu­la­ri­ty of Apple tablets, the­re has been a noti­ceable pri­ce drop for the 10.9‑inch Generation 10 iPads and their Cellular ver­si­ons for the first time. This trend could be lin­ked to Apple’s delay­ed releases of new iPads. It appears that fans of the brand may need to exer­cise a bit more pati­ence befo­re get­ting their hands on the latest innovations.

The top 9 spots in the ITscope cate­go­ry are domi­na­ted by models from 2020 to 2022, high­light­ing the lon­ge­vi­ty and con­tin­ued rele­van­ce of pro­ven models. In the manu­fac­tu­rer com­pe­ti­ti­on, the land­scape remains con­sis­tent: Apple leads the mid-price seg­ment, while Microsoft secu­res the niche in the high-price seg­ment with its Surface tablets. On the other hand, Samsung excels in the more afforda­ble models.

A nota­ble addi­ti­on to the tablet mar­ket is the Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE, known as the “Fan Edition,” descri­bed by Chip​.de as a “high-quality yet afforda­ble all-around tablet.” While rela­tively new to the mar­ket, it may not stand out com­pared to its com­pe­ti­tors. Another stand­out in the tablet seg­ment this quar­ter is the Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+, posi­tio­ned as an attrac­ti­ve choice for budget-conscious buy­ers with a WSP of €185.82.

In the cate­go­ry of prin­ters and mul­ti­func­tion devices, inno­va­tions are rare to come by, with fami­li­ar models like the HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M283fdw con­ti­nuing to domi­na­te this quar­ter. The waning inte­rest in the­se devices may stem from the lack of new fea­tures, but more likely, it is a result of the ongo­ing, cross-industry digi­ta­liza­ti­on. The year 2023 pro­ved to be chal­len­ging for prin­ters: sin­ce January, the­re has been a noti­ceable decli­ne in inte­rest on ITscope com­pared to the pre­vious year, and this trend per­sis­ted with a fur­ther drop in the fourth quar­ter. It’s no sur­pri­se: According to Bitkom, 82% of com­pa­nies print less than they did five years ago.