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Redmond,Wash.–Dollar sales of Microsoft's Surface tablets more than doubled on a sequential basis during the company's fiscal 2014 second quarter to hit$893 million,up from the previous quarter's$400 million,the company announced.
Unit sales also more than doubled.
The company attributed Surface gains to improved Surface RT sales and to the introduction of the Surface 2 and Surface 2 Pro.
Surface sales combined with Xbox sales drove up sales in the devices and consume hardware segment by 68.4 percent to$4.7 billion compared to the year-ago period and by 219 percent on a sequential basis from the first quarter's$1.49 billion,the company said.The company sold 7.4 million Xbox console units into the retail channel during the quarter ending Dec.31,including 3.9 million Xbox One consoles and 3.5 million Xbox 360 consoles.
First-half revenues in the segment rose 60 percent to$6.2 billion compared to the year-ago half.
The segment's gross margin fell in the quarter and half because of the Xbox One launch,the company said.Second-quarter gross margin fell 85 percent to$411 million from the year-ago$762 million but was nonetheless up from the first quarter's$210 million and compared favorably to the fourth quarter's gross margin loss of$650 million.First-half gross margin fell 96 percent to$617 million from the year-ago$1.21 billion.
