PC Gaming Daunted but Unbowed by Recession, According to Jon Peddie Research

TIBURON, Calif.--(Business Wire)--
According to recent market reports, consumer spending has slowed in all markets,
but less so in the gaming industry, and in particular less in the PC gaming
segment.

Jon Peddie Research (JPR), the industry's research and consulting firm for
graphics and multimedia, today announced the market forecast for PC gaming
hardware and the results are encouraging overall, even with the modest drop due
to economic conditions.

The total PC Gaming Hardware market is forecasted to drop $1.4 billion (-7%) in
2009 versus 2008 (from $20.07 to $18.65 billion.). The decline is due to reduced
sales because of the recession, and lower prices on PCs and components (also due
to the recession and competitive pressures.) But, in such an environment, PC
gaming systems seem to have suffered the least discounting which illustrates the
value consumers place on such systems.

Furthermore, in 2009 the PC Gaming Hardware Market, approaching $19 billion, is
forecasted to eclipse the hardware market for all gaming consoles combined by
almost $2 billion. (Console costs include the console, a certain amount of
accessories, and a factor for the cost of an HDTV to display the games on.)

PC Gaming Hardware Market 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Total* $20,076 $18,658 $23,937 $28,907 $30,672

(*PC gaming hardware includes the PC, a percentage for the monitor (because some
people will already have one), a percentage of accessories like driving wheels
and special mice/joysticks, as well as aftermarket and DIY parts and systems.)

The JPR PC Gaming System Hardware Market report is a unique analysis that does a
bottom-up forecast of systems based on GPU and PC shipments, and a
macro-economic top-down forecast based on the eco-demographics which covers 36
countries.

United States Spain Greece
South Korea India Turkey
Japan Netherlands Argentina
China Brazil Indonesia
Germany Mexico Czech Republic
United Kingdom Hong Kong Thailand
France Poland Algeria
Italy Belgium Malaysia
Canada South Africa Romania
Australia Austria Hungary
Switzerland Sweden Chile
Russia Denmark Portugal
Colombia

JPR updates the data in the PC Gaming Report every quarter to compensate for
changing economic conditions, GPU and PC shipments, and the information in this
release reflects our latest results.

The report shows the expected shipments in three classes: Enthusiast,
Performance, and Mainstream for both desktop and the newly emerging notebook
category. It shows the distribution of branded sales (HP, Alienware, etc), non
branded ("White box"), aftermarket component sales and DIY sales, as well as
peripheral sales of gaming components.

This is the most comprehensive report on the PC gaming hardware market ever
produced and took almost five years to bring it to life. Individual segments can
be purchased separately for $5,000 and the whole set is available for $12,000
which includes a bonus total market summary report.

So why in a recession?

The PC Gaming market is dropping a little in 2009 just like all other industries
are forecasting, and yet less so - why? The conclusion the researcher at JPR
have come to is that people are staying home more, less movies, less dinners
out, postponed vacations, and turning to other forms of entertainment. PC Gaming
is a very economical form of entertainment, a $50 game can provide hundreds of
hours of play, and it's not uncommon for players to replay a game. Also,
purchases of a PC for gaming can be shared since the machine can be used for
watching (and creating) videos, as well as office work and web browsing,
something consoles can't offer.

About Jon Peddie Research

Dr. Jon Peddie has been active in the graphics and multimedia fields for more
than 30 years. Jon Peddie Research is a technically oriented multimedia and
graphics research and consulting firm. Based in Tiburon, California, JPR
provides consulting, research, and other specialized services to technology
companies in a variety of fields including graphics development, multimedia for
professional applications and consumer electronics, high-end computing, and
Internet-access product development. Jon Peddie's Market Watch is a quarterly
report focused on the market activity of PC graphics controllers for notebook
and desktop computing.

View all JPR press releases http://www.jonpeddie.com/about/press/index.shtml

Jon Peddie Research
Jon Peddie, 415-435-9368
jon@jonpeddie.com
Robert Dow, 415-435-9368
robert@jonpeddie.com
or
Pat Meier Associates
Pat Meier-Johnson, 415-389-1700
patmeier@patmeier.com
Follow us: http://twitter.com/howtweetitis

Copyright Business Wire 2009