WASHINGTON, March 20: Global sales of personal computers are expected to increase 10.5 per cent in 2007, getting little help from the new Windows Vista operating system, a market research firm said on Tuesday.

Gartner Inc. predicted worldwide PC shipments rising to 255.7 million units in 2007. But because prices are falling, this will mean only a 4.6 per cent rise in revenues to $213.7 billion, the survey found.

"We expect the market environment to be much the same over the near term as it has been recently," said George Shiffler, research director for Gartner's Dataquest service.

"Emerging markets and mobile PCs will continue to afford PC vendors their best opportunities for growth," he said.—AFP