As if Apple wasn't successful enough analyst firm Canalys has now revealed the firm has overtaken HP to become the world's number one PC vendor, although only if you class an iPad as a PC.

The figures show that Apple shifted five million Macs and 15 million iPad devices; and this inclusion of tablet sales skews the figures hugely in favour of Apple

Nevertheless, Canalys noted that Macs and iPads represented 17 per cent of the total 120 million PCs shipped globally in fourth quarter 2011.

Overall, the PC market, including desktops, netbooks, notebooks and tablets grew 16 per cent year-on-year but if tablet are excluded from calculations, PC sales actually fell 0.4 per cent during the last quarter.

This tough market for PC vendors was shown by the fact only Lenovo managed to increase its performance, with the Chinese firm increasing its market share by two per cent, making ground on HP.

"The vendor's decision to use Android for enterprise and consumer pads gives it a better opportunity than HP to continue gaining market share," Canalys noted.

No other Apple competitor had any success, though, with Acer, Dell and HP all losing market share.

Still, the chaps at Cupertino could have some proper challenges in 2012 as Canalys also predicted that ultrabooks will see moderate adoption during the first half of the year.

"Ultrabooks will finally gain momentum later in the year as price points decline and Intel launches a new line of processors and embarks on an aggressive marketing campaign," said Michael Kauh, a research analyst at Canalys.

However, with the iPad 3 around the corner, this won't save all vendors.

"In the short term though, vendors will experience more pressure in the netbook and notebook segments, especially with Apple's annual iPad refresh approaching," he added.

For Tim Cook and co, already sitting on a cash pile of $100bn, it's just another reason to smile.

It seems the Big Apple will be the choice venue for the next big news from Apple.

AllThingsD reports that the company is planning to hold an unveiling in New York some time around the end of January.

Those of you holding out hope for the unveiling of the next iPad model might be disappointed by the news, however. Early reports suggest that the main focus of the event will be digital publishing.

Among the items rumoured to be on the agenda will be an effort to improve the availability of digitised textbooks. Apple is said to be working on a platform which would allow students to purchase their textbooks for use on an iPad.

Such a campaign could help to remedy one of the biggest complaints amongst university students. Extravagently-priced textbooks can cost students hundreds of dollars apiece and publishers frequently release new editions of books to stymie the trade in used copies.

If any company can break up the textbook rackett, however, it's Apple. The company has long been a mainstay in the education market and the appeal of the iPod and iPhone brands amongst young people could mean that Apple already has a critical mass in place to make a textbook service work.

Google has posted an update for the iPad version of its Search App.

The free App has been updated to include a number of additional features from the Google Search platform as well as a few unique features for the iPad.

Among the features offered by the update is Google Instant. The search tool allows users to see possible results as they type, the time-saving feature has proven popular since it was first introduced for Google online search in September of last year.

Additionally, the update will bring a new iPad navigation system which will sport result preview panels and allow users to view images on a carousel presentation screen which can be navigated through tap gestures.

Google has posted a video demonstration of the new App along with more information on its Mobile blog.

While iPad-optimised applications have existed since Apple first introduced the tablet, the practice seems to be picking up steam as both developers and iOS grow even more sophisticated and familiar with the iPad. We're anxious to see what features can to the iPad version of recently-ported applications such as Minecraft. 

A 16-year-old boy and 21-year-old man are being held by police in connection with a raid on Apple's flagship London store in Covent Garden during the early hours of Monday morning.

It is believed that 14 people arrived at the store on mopeds and motorbikes at around 1am, before breaking into the shop and leaving with a number of iPads and other kit worth potentially thousands of pounds.

Members of the group are said to have worn crash helmets as they fled the scene.

The two were arrested at an address in Clerkenwell where one of the suspected mopeds was found, according to Crimestoppers.

"Although two men are in custody on suspicion of burglary, the inquiry continues and other persons are sought," said DS Nathan Tozer of Westminster CID said.

"It is essential that anyone who saw the smash-and-grab, or the suspects making off, contact us as soon as possible."

It is not known what other pieces of kit were stolen, although Apple stores worldwide will be preparing for the much-hyped launch of the iPhone 4S.

There have been accusations for decades that Microsoft rips off Apple's ideas in its products. The latest reports out of Redmond may not kick off any lawsuits, but they do indicate that the rest of the market continues to follow Apple's lead.

Windows boss Steven Sinofsky announced via a blog posting yesterday that Metro, the version of Windows 8 designed for tablets, will not support plug-ins. The post hardly mentions any specific plug-ins, but it's pretty obvious that Adobe Flash played a large part in Microsoft's decision.

Perhaps Apple did as well. Early on, when the iPad maker vowed not to support Flash in iOS, Apple took all sorts of heat and many predicted that sales would suffer as a result.

As it turns out, people don't use Flash as much as they thought they would. Sites that rely on the technology are usually able to develop a workaround by creating special mobile and iPad versions of their sites with HTML5. Apple also avoids the security risks and performance worries that have dogged Flash in recent years.

Now that Microsoft has announced it will drop Flash support for its tablet OS, the reaction is very different. The move has drummed up some attention in the press, but it most certainly was not the firestorm the Apple's announcement caused, and there is little to no speculation that the move will have any substantial negative consequences for Microsoft.

Adobe, meanwhile, may need to pick up the pace on its corporate makeover. It looks like the market for Flash may be drying up faster than it thought.

There's an old saying that, if a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Particularly when it's being offered out of the boot of a car by a man with a gold tooth.

A 22 year-old woman from South Carolina learned this lesson the hard way this week when she was duped into paying $180 for a fake iPad, and a remarkably bad fake at that.

It seems that the woman was coming out of a McDonald's restaurant in Spartansburg, South Carolina when she passed two enterprising gentlemen who were selling what they claimed were brand new iPads out of the back of a white Chevy Impala. Their story was that the iPads had been acquired in bulk, and they were selling them in order to turn a quick profit.

The men were asking $300 apiece for the tablets but, ever the expert negotiator, the woman was able to haggle them down to just $180 for an iPad sealed inside a FedEx shipping box. No doubt feeling like a savvy shopper, she went home to unbox her shiny new ... iPlank.

Yes, to almost nobody's surprise, the supposed iPad was in fact a fake. The men had simply painted a plank of wood black, and glued an Apple logo and a few pictures on either side.

Remarkably oblivious to the way the world works, the woman then went public, telling police that her grey-market electronics source was not behaving in an ethical manner. Presumably the police will look into the matter once they stop laughing and shaking their heads.

Two important lessons to take away from this story:

1. A plank of wood with an Apple logo stuck to the back still sells for nearly twice as much as a brand new HP TouchPad.

2. When you're buying hardware from a reseller (especially one operating out of the boot of a car) make sure you check the merchandise before you pay.

Apple's iCloud has been eagerly anticipated since it was unveiled in June at WWDC alongside iOS 5 and Mac OS X Lion.

Pitched as a key addition to the Mac OS and iOS platforms, iCloud offers a way to backup, synchronise and manage Apple devices on the web. 

Despite the hype, Apple has avoided setting a hard release date for the service, but if recent developments are to be believed an iCloud launch could come sooner rather than later.

A quick visit to iCloud.com shows that Apple has moved the project into the beta phase. While it may currently be limited to developers, the move indicates that in all likelihood we are just weeks away from a public launch.

When it does arrive, iCloud could bridge an important gap in Apple's lineup. The company has established itself in the mobile and desktop spaces, but the only thing connecting the iOS and OS X brands thus far has been a small white USB cable.

The success of iCloud could bring Apple that much closer to having a single platform to connect and manage all its future devices.

Apple's chief patent lawyer, Richard 'Chip' Lutton Jr, has decided to quit after 10 years with the firm.

Reports suggest that Lutton wants to try something new and that he could even make the jump to the Federal circuit to hear patent appeals.

However, the timing of his departure will raise eyebrows as Apple's litigation team is involved in numerous high-profile patent infringement disputes with firms such as HTC and Samsung, as well as a bitter trademark battle with Amazon for rights to the term 'app store'.

It's fair to say that Apple's disputes with Samsung and Amazon aren't going to plan, and its bid to get a preliminary injunction against the latter to stop using the term 'app store' was rejected.

Apple also lost a patent infringement case with Nokia, which is unlikely to have have gone down well and could be the reason that Lutton is leaving.

Losing the case means that Apple will have to pay out around €420m to Nokia, along with quarterly licensing payments of around €95m.

B J Watrous, formerly a deputy general counsel at HP, is the brave man who has taken over as Apple's chief intellectual property lawyer.

Apple is set to have showdowns with Samsung and Amazon in court later this year, and it's fair to say that Watrous is going to be one of the busiest men in tech. We doubt that Steve Jobs tolerates failure. A baptism of fire indeed.