There’s something new coming in the PC market: Growth. Sales volumes have hit bottom and will start to pick up from next year, say analysts at Gartner.

Growth won’t be fast — just 0.4 percent next year, and perhaps 3 percent the year after — but it will mark a change from the 8 percent drop in unit sales Gartner is forecasting for this year.

Sales of basic laptops and desktops will continue to shrink, from 216 million this year to 199 million in 2018, said Gartner research director Ranjit Atwal: The growth — from 49 million this year to 75 million in 2018 — will all be in the expensive premium ultramobiles category. That’s good news for vendors’ bottom lines, if not for IT budgets.

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