Gottheil attributed the surge in laptop sales to the systems, and the higher average sale price of Apple's notebook line to buyers opting for the more expensive 13-in. models rather than the entry-level $999 11.6-in. MacBook Air.

Desktop Mac sales, however, were down 1% year-over-year, to 1.2, a slight decline from the third quarter, as well as off from the same quarter in 2009.

Gottheil said he found even that small slip surprising, since both comparisons were to quarters when Apple revamped its iMac systems. "Desktop sales a year ago were very strong, and leapt to record numbers," he said, impressed that Apple was still able to nearly match those numbers.

Although Jobs wasn't available, Cook stepped in to bash Android, as Jobs did during the last earnings call when he vowed over smartphones running 's mobile operating system.