Macbook Air is cannibalising tablet -

Apple's tablet really was a fad which could be easily countered with conventional technology and it seems that the release of the 11.6-inch MacBook air has resulted in a slump in sales of the iPad.

Ashok Kumar, an analyst at Rodman & Renshaw has warned that there is anecdotal evidence that the MacBook Air is cannibalising the iPad.

It seems that a fully functional notebook, or in the case of the Air a very expensive netbook, is much more useful to punters than a content consumption only device.

When punters think they have a choice they are opting for a Macbook rather than what is being peddled as a game changing tablet.

If this is true then it means that the tablets were only an Apple fanboy fad and will go the same way as the hula-hoop or Tony Blair's credibility.

After all, who would want a keyboardless netbook when you can buy one with a keyboard and actually do more with it?

It will also mean that all those Android tablets will die a death long before any of the good cheap ones hits the shops.

Nvidia thinks that the next-generation Android tablets will kill off traditional laptops, as tablets become more adept at multitasking and begin to approach the processing power of low-end laptops.

It will not be the middle of next year until we know. But the smart money is on tablets being a transition technology. They might still hang around, if they are cheap enough, but the gadget market is going to want a little more power and less cloud-based controls. Perhaps there will be more of a hybrid market of laptops that can function as a tablet too.