Personal computers will inevitably be relegated behind the pacesetting smartphones and tablet computers, research firm Gartner said in a new report made public on Wednesday, adding that mobile phones are likely to emerge as the preferred computing tool by 2013.

As of the current year, Windows environment remains the dominant platform in general consumer and enterprise settings with around 1.5 billion devices set operate on the Microsoft platform by the end of the year, Gartner said.

On the other hand, Google's Android is expected to power some 608 million computing gadgets at around the same time, placing the open and free mobile OS in a strong second spot after Windows, which this week will be bumped up to the freshly engineered Windows 8 that will run on traditional PCs, tablets and smartphones.

However, Android's activation pace will be so rapid that the entry of Windows 8 into the fray will not prevent its ascent to the top, Gartner said, and by 2016 2.3 billion computing tools would be attuned to the Google ecosystem.

Machines, PCs and mobile devices on the Microsoft universe will not be too far behind though, the new Gartner data showed, with about 2.28 billion units humming exclusively for Windows in 2016.

The new report strongly suggested too that over the next four years, Windows will be toppled from the top after decades of occupying that position and will end up as simply one of the key IT environments that the world knows.

We have embraced the age of mobile devices, according to Gartner vice president David Cearley, and "by 2013 mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide and that by 2015 over 80 per cent of the handsets sold in mature markets will be smartphones."

"By 2015, media tablet shipments will also reach around 50 per cent of laptop shipments," Mr Cearley was reported by TG Daily as saying.

Gartner's report, according to ZDNet, painted a new setting in which "smartphones will be indistinguishable from tablets and tablets will be commonplace, while a PC is a relic of the early-21st century."

It also pointed to the steady decline of global PC shipment that in the September quarter this year saw its deepest retreat since 2011, at around eight per cent, according to Reuters.

Windows' difficulty of putting up a viable challenge against current mobile computing leaders, Apple and Google, was also highlighted in the new Gartner report and its efforts so far has been widely viewed as dismal failure.

Ahead of Microsoft's Windows 8 debut on Friday, the previous version of the platform was languishing at the cellar of wireless competition, with its smartphone penetration pegged only at three per cent, Reuters said.