Although worldwide desktop shipments are expected to drop up to 15% on year in 2015, the volume in 2016 is only expected to decline less than 7% in 2016 thanks to increasing demand for high-end gaming, professional workstation and embedded-related products, while mini PCs are also expected to see stable demand, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.

Despite the releases of Intel's Skylake processors and Microsoft's Windows 10 in the second half of 2015, the weak global economy and weaker-than-expected demand from emerging markets such as China continue to impact the worldwide PC market especially the desktop segment.

Worldwide mini PC shipments will surpass six million units in 2015 and are expected to be over eight million units in 2016. Worldwide all-in-one PC shipments are also expected to rise as demand from China's Internet cafes gradually recovers.

Intel will continue its cooperation with upstream supply partners and will provide more reference design to help reduce partners' costs. Although Intel is seeing its desktop CPU shipments dropping from a year ago, most of the shipment drops are from entry-level product lines, while its mainstream Core processor shipments had flat performance from a year ago. Intel's high-end and top-end K-series shipments will grow 15% on year.

With vendors such as Lenovo, Dell and Hewlett-Packard (HP) turning their focuses to niche product lines, the sources expect the vendors to see lower declines in 2016, while Gigabyte Technology and Asustek Computer, which have already been operating in these segments for a while, will maintain stable performances.