First came the PC, then the notebook and netbook. Now we fast forward to the smartphone and the tablet. These new devices are taking the technology world by storm. Apple (AAPL) could sell 30 to 65 million iPad 2s this year.

As a result, The PC industry is bleeding badly. Look at these numbers:

• February revenue from PC makers in Taiwan is down 20%. The number is significant because Taiwan manufacturers 90% of all PCs.
• Hon Hai (HNHAF), which makes Apple products and PCs for Dell (DELL), saw shipments down 18% in February, as reported in Financial Times.
• Gartner, a research consultancy, lowered PC shipments by 5% to 387.8 million units this month.

The market tried to hit a new two-plus-year high again today. Anything cautious for the markets is being discounted and valuation concerns are out the door. It seems the bulls are in charge -- regardless of what comes down the pipe in the Middle East, Japan, the PIIGS and elsewhere. Even a goal of only aiming to cut foreign energy dependence by one-third did not rattle markets. The TARP even made money. Maybe we can just convince Bernanke to go ahead and raise rates to get the pain over with, once and for all.

Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow Jones: 12,350.61 +71.60 (0.58%)

S&P500: 1,328.26 +8.82 (0.67%)

Nasdaq: 2,776,78 +19.90 (0.72%)

Top Analyst Calls

Analyst Upgrades

• Philip Morris (PM) to conviction buy from buy at Goldman.
• Peet's Coffee (PEET) to neutral from sell at Janney Capital.
• Cephalon (CEPH) to equal weight from underweight at Morgan Stanley.
• StoneMor Partners (STON) to outperform from neutral at RW Baird.
• Tibco (TIBX) to buy from underperform at BofA/Merrill.
• Apollo Group (APOL) to outperform from market perform at BMO Capital.

A few weeks back, we noted that while Apple's (AAPL) products continue to see huge demand, a key concern for the company is management of supply-related constraints. The recent Japanese earthquake has now added to these concerns. According to market research firm iSuppli, the earthquake may cause logistical disruptions and supply shortages for the newly launched iPad 2. Although Apple remains king of the tablet market, it is expected to face a growing set of challengers in 2011 from Research In Motion (RIMM), Motorola Mobility (MMI), Dell (DELL), Samsung and LG.

We maintain a $420 price estimate for Apple stock, roughly 25% above market price.

IBM (IBM) sells middleware software and technology services such as outsourcing and integration to large and medium sized businesses worldwide, and competes with firms like Oracle (ORCL) and Red Hat (RHT). IBM is also among the global leaders in business systems and competes with hardware vendors like Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) and Dell (DELL) in the server market as well as firms like EMC (EMC) and NetApp (NTAP) in the storage market.

In a recent development, IBM announced the launch of a new software and consulting service targeted at helping companies swiftly adapt to rising customer demands in today's digitally transformed marketplace. The firm chooses to call this new emerging category "Smarter Commerce," keeping in line with its Smarter Planet initiative. We have earlier discussed IBM's focus on its Smarter Planet initiative and how the firm stands to benefit from it. (See IBM's Smarter Planet Initiatives Lay Groundwork for Growth.)

Analyst Upgrades

• Cree (CREE) and Rubicon Technology (RBCN) to buy from neutral at Merriman.
• Children's Place (PLCE) to outperform from market perform at BMO Capital.
• Lockheed Martin (LMT) to neutral from underperform at BofA/Merrill.
• Copano Energy (CPNO) to outperform from market perform at Morgan Keegan.
• Motorola Mobility (MMI) to neutral from reduce at Nomura.
• Parker-Hannifin (PH) to buy from hold at KeyBanc.
• Akamai (AKAM), ShoreTel (SHOR), AMB Property (AMB) and ProLogis (PLD) to buy from hold at Stifel Nicolaus.

Dell (DELL) competes with personal computer manufacturers like HP (HPQ), Apple (AAPL), Acer (ACEIF) and Toshiba (TOSBF), and increasingly against IBM (IBM) and others for IT services. We have a $22.39 Trefis price estimate for Dell's stock, and we estimate that Dell's hardware business which includes notebooks & netbooks, tablets, desktops, printers and displays makes up nearly 33% of Dell's stock. Our price estimate is around 40% ahead of the current market price.

Below we discuss four key trends for Dell's hardware business and their potential impact on Dell's stock price.

Intel (INTC) competes with Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and Nvidia (NVDA) in the PC microprocessor and graphics businesses. We estimate that notebook microprocessors are the most important product segment for Intel, generating roughly 39% of its equity value.

Over the past couple years, the storage market has been the target of big acquisitions from companies like HP (HPQ) and Dell (DELL). With cloud computing -- as well as the emergence of data-hungry applications -- the growth in the market has been strong.

To capitalize on this, some of the top companies are looking at IPOs. For example, Fusion-io made its filing this week. The lead underwriters include Goldman Sachs (GS) and Morgan Stanley (MS).

IBM (IBM) sells middleware software and technology services such as outsourcing and integration to large and medium-sized businesses worldwide, and competes with firms like Oracle (ORCL) and Red Hat (RHT). IBM is also among the global leaders in business systems and competes with hardware vendors like HP (HPQ) and Dell (DELL) in the server market, as well as storage firms like EMC (EMC) and NetApp (NTAP) in the storage market.

When it comes to picking trends, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) has nailed the latest market to experience explosive growth. It is the fast-growing tablet market, as reported in Reuters.

Morgan's analyst, Mark Moskowitz, has upped his forecasts for tablet sales in 2011 and 2012. For 2011 he raised his numbers from $24.9 to $26.1 billion. For 2012 his numbers are increased from $34.1 billion to $35.2 billion. Unit sales were upped by over 1 million to 48.1 in 2011 and 79.6 in 2012.

Dell (DELL) experienced a good reaction to its latest earnings report on Tuesday, but I don't find myself interested in the stock. The company just doesn't call out to me as a solid buy. Back in September of last year, I noted that there were probably better investment options out there. I tend to feel the same way today.

The 52-week low for the shares is $11.34, while the 52-week high is $17.52. At the time of this writing, the stock was up over 5% to $14.64 during the post-bell period following the release of Dell's Q4 data.