Stories about: NPD Group

Stephen Elop, the new head of Microsoft's business division, may be a mystery man to those outside of Silicon Valley. But those who have worked for him say Elop, 44, is a no-nonsense, hardworking sales executive who helped take Flash maker Macromedia to new heights during the dot-com boom and, as short-term CEO during the subsequent downturn, helped the company survive by engineering its acquisition by rival Adobe Systems.

The elegant minimalism of Google Inc.'s search engine is a huge reason for its unparalleled popularity.

Apple's late-October launch of Leopard generated the best first-month results for an operating system upgrade in the company's history, a market research firm said Monday.

One of the potentially hottest items in the software aisle of US electronics retailers this Christmas season is, if you ask Santa's load-bearing reindeer, just an empty box.

Well, it's the moment of truth for this year's holiday shopping season: iPhone, yes or no? Tracy Mayor put the Question of the Year to Computerworld Editor in Chief Scot Finnie, PC World Editor in Chief Harry McCracken, Computerworld Online News Editor Ken Mingis and NPD Group analyst Ross Rubin. The panel was tied -- two said yes, and two said no, so Tracy turned to me to break the tie.

As commercial sales of One Laptop Per Child's XO laptop close on Monday, a user tracking the nonprofit effort said continued commercial availability of the laptop could benefit OLPC's nonprofit effort, the XO manufacturer and children using it as a learning tool.

Mere days after a group of Blu-ray-supporting studios orchestrated an event to show off the Blu-ray Disc format in Los Angeles, the HD DVD format achieved a dramatic resurgence with Toshiba's move to a $100 player. Never let it be said that consumers don't love a bargain--but will price alone decide this format war?

While Apple is tight-lipped about the introduction of new Mac systems with Intel's latest Penryn processors, analysts said the company's Unix-based Xserve servers could be the first to include the power-efficient Penryn chips.

Futurists and industry analysts have long predicted the ascent of the mobile Web, in which people can traverse the Web using smart phones as easily and fruitfully as they can at their desktops. But almost three years after 3G networks became widely available, few are using it to access the Web with their phones.

Apple said it has shipped more than 2 million copies of Leopard, the Mac OS X upgrade it released globally last Friday.

If you're running Vista and you need a multifunction printer, Brother's MFC-5860CN might seem like a great choice. After all, it's proudly sold as "Certified for Windows Vista."