Sales of motherboards down; CNBC reporter draws very wrong conclusion

CNBC reporter draws incredibly stupid conclusion on a report that motherboard sales are down 10%.  Erin Burnett holds up a smartphone and declares on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" that every computer has a motherboard, therefore this means sales of all computer devices are going down.

INCREDIBLE!  The report was obviously about motherboards as a commodity used to build PCs.  Motherboards for PCs, made by companies lie ASUS, are the kind of commodity whose sales can be tracked. 


I'm not sure how the term "motherboard" applies to a device like an iPhone or an iPad -- the devices pack their smarts in amazingly tight spaces and may not have a "motherboard" at all.  In any event those are proprietary packages of electronics, not commodities whose sales are known.

The correct conclusion to draw is there may be a drop in PC sales -- and that the drop is likely because of the sustained popularity of smartphones and the amazing rate of sales of the iPad.  Even Mac sales are down due to the explosive demand for iPads.

Really dumb conclusion. Erin is really pretty, though.