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Smart connected device (desktop and portable PCs, tablets and smartphones) shipments total 367.7 million units in Q4 2012 with 28.3% Y-o-Y growth IDC reports-- with smartphones and tablets driving growth as PCs decline.

Overall 2012 shipments total 1.2 billion units.

According to the analyst PC shipments are down (desktops by -4.1% Y-o-Y, portables -3.4%), tablets show record 78.4% Y-o-Y growth and smartphones grow by 46.1% while accounting for 60.1% of all 2012 smart connected device shipments.

Sony globally launches the tablet addition to the Xperia mobile family, the Xperia Tablet Z, at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2013-- a 10.1-inch number the company claims is the thinnest and lightest yet.

The successor to the now retired Xperia Tablet S, The Tablet Z carries a 1920 x 1200 touchscreen, a 1.5GHz Snapdragon S4 pro quad-core CPU, 2GB RAM and either 32 or 64GB of internal storage inside a shell weighing 465g and 6.9mm thick.

The Android variant of choice is 4.1.2 Jelly Bean, while further features include 8MP rear- and 2MP-front facing cameras, NFC connectivity, microSD card slot, x4 speakers and a "Battery STAMINA" mode promising to "significantly" improve standby time.

Just like its Xperia Z smartphone sibling, the Tablet Z is water and dust resistant and has IP55 and IP57 certification to prove it.

The Tablet Z will be available in 60 markets through 140 sales channels from Q2 2013.

Go Sony Announces Global Availability of Xperia Tablet Z

The Chromebook Pixel has a number of firsts for Google-- it is the first to carry Google branding, together with premium industrial design and a high resolution touchscreen.

Borrowing (the unkind might say "imitating") design cues from Apple's MacBooks, the Pixel features aluminium construction, black inset squared keys and a 13-inch 239 DPI touchscreen with 2560 x 1700 resolution and an unusual 3:2 display ratio Google claims is more web browsing-friendly.

A  1.8 GHz Intel Core i5 CPU powers the device, together with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage (boosted by 3 years' worth of up to 1TB free Google Drive storage). Connectivity options include x2 USB ports, mini Display Port, dual-band wifi, Bluetooth 3.0 and a built-in SD/MMC card reader.

Being a premium laptop, Google asks for premium pricing ($1300 for the wifi-only version), even if one has to keep in mind it still makes use of Google's cloud-powered ChromeOS. It will be available from the online Google Play store and select Best Buy stores from April 2013.

Go Google Chromebook Pixel

Sony fires the starting pistol for the next generation games console race as it unveils the (un)imaginatively named Playstation 4 at the Hammerstein Ballroom, New York.

As a successor to the 7-year old Playstation 3, the console tries hard to impress both consumers and developers-- Sony drops the esoteric "Cell" architecture in favour of a PC-style 8-core x86 processor, an enhanced GPU and 8GB of GDDR5 RAM, a combination producing up to 1.84 Teraflops of processing power.

Interestingly the PS4 will ship with a redesigned version of the Kinect-style Eye camera peripheral. It carries dual camera lenses and x4 microphones, which Sony says will handle log in procedures via face recognition.

The familiar Dual Shock controller also gets a slight redesign through the addition of a touchpad, stereo cameras (to work in tandem with the Eye), headphone jack and a "share" button allowing users to instantly record and share game footage.