Apple sold 2.5 million Macintosh computers during the quarter, representing 9% unit growth over the year-ago quarter. This bucks the industry trend. According to IDC, the overall market for personal computers shrunk in the December quarter. During their Q1 2009 quarterly earnings call, Apple indicated that they felt customer response to their MacBook announcement in October was very strong. Portables accounted for 71% of all Macs sold in the quarter. Apple believes that customer excitement over the announcement led to the strong Macintosh performance this quarter and also shows an industry trend towards portable computers. In addition, almost half of all Mac sales through retail Apple Stores were to customers that had never had a Mac before.

 The iPod division booked a record 22.7 million iPods during the quarter, representing 3% unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple’s US  market share for portable music players is over 70% according to the NPD group. And the iPod continues to gain market share world-wide. The iTunes Store also had its best quarter ever along with its biggest sales ever during the week of Christmas and on Christmas day.

Quarterly iPhone units sold were 4.4 million, representing 88% unit growth over the year-ago quarter. This great quarter for the iPhone means that Apple totaled 13.7 million sales for 2008 – ahead of the 10 million unit goal set by Steve Jobs when the iPhone was first announced. A side note that Apple announced prior to this earnings report is that the iTunes Store has over 15,000 application available and customers have downloaded these over half a billion times since early July of 2008.

Apple will continue to invest in the Apple TV because they see a profitable future for them in that space. Apple representatives stated that movie rentals through the iTunes Store  have resulted in improved sales of the Apple TV.