Apple's iPad has provided much of the leg for the global tablet market to march through incredible growth in the June 2012 quarter, gaining 77 per cent from the overall shipments of the gadget over the past 12 months.

According to market research firm ABI Research, tablet computer manufacturers pushed out close to 25 million units from their depot from April to June in the current year and 69 per cent of which were printed with the Apple logo at the back.

For the Cupertino, California-based tech giant, the actual number of iPads that hit worldwide store shelves in the period was around 17 million units, which ABI Research said "nearly matched 2010 total worldwide shipments of 17.3 million for all vendors," in the same period of 2011.

There was no denying that Apple has maintained its lead over its rivals in the lopsided tablet war, which by the end of the first half this year saw the company gobbling up nearly 70 per cent of what global consumers have been ogling at store windows.

The company's chief nemesis, Samsung, failed to extend its rule on the smartphone arena as the South Korean tech giant only managed to eat up 8.1 per cent of the Q2 2012 tablet shipments, ABI Research said.

But the market watcher noted too that Samsung, along with Asus, saw their market pies expanding a bit, a development that is most notable on the part of Samsung since a number of its Galaxy tablet models have pushed out from the market on the strength of legal challenges being pursued by Apple against the company.

The new report also affirmed an earlier survey that showed tablets with cellular connectivity were not catching up that fast on consumers as only about 27 per cent of the devices shipped in the period were 3G or LTE enabled.

Most consumers bought the Wi-Fi version of tablet computers "to keep personal expenses down," the ABI Research study said, adding that existing stiff competition environment in the market was a big factor too in the stunted growth of tablets with more mobile connectivity options.

Nonetheless, ABI Research is upbeat that up to 110 million tablets will hit global stores by the end of the year, the shipments to accelerate in the holiday during the fourth quarter as consumers welcome the arrival of new slate editions that vendors were set to unleash in the dying months of 2012.

Apple has been largely rumoured to issue a shrunk version of its iPad, which speculators said will be called the iPad Mini, between the month of September and October.

Analysts are convinced that Apple has another killer tablet in the offing, which should again fuel further growth for what is already the most valuable company in the planet.

Not a single product in the pipeline is seen to measure up with the two iPad versions, experts said, not even the Surface tablet that Microsoft is set to roll out October this year, which is a launch in line with the software giant's Windows 8 debut.

PC Magazine has reported this week that Microsoft will produce at least three million units of Surface, which will be offered in two versions - one to be powered by Intel processing chip and the other by ARM.

However, PC Magazine analyst John Dvorak is highly doubtful if the Surface would slice a sizeable cut on the 110 million tablets that ABI Research said will likely shipped by manufacturers for the whole of 2012.

Citing the unproven credentials of Microsoft's new offering, Mr Dvorak is pessimistic of the likelihood that it would clear its 3-million Surface inventory by June 2013 unless the company opts to slap heavy discounting on the product.