For all the strength of Mac sales, however, Apple's computers accounted for a smaller slice of the company's total revenues than either the quarter before or the same quarter the year prior. Last quarter, Mac sales contributed just 34.9% of all Apple revenues, down from 36.9% in the same period in 2007 and off even more from the 45.8% in the quarter that ended in September 2008.

"The Mac piece of the pie is getting smaller and the overall iPod market is saturated," said Gottheil. "That's why the iPhone is the big propeller behind the overall growth of the company."

Apple sold 4.3 million iPhones in the last three months of 2008, down substantially from the 6.9 million it sold the quarter before. But that still represented an increase of 88% year-to-year over the 2.3 million sold in late 2007.

Gottheil was bullish on the iPhone, in particular the amount of money each one sold brings to Apple's bottom line. "They were even more transparent than they have been in the past," he said, referring to Apple's new habit of noting what revenues the iPhone would have contributed if the company didn't spread out the money over a 24-month span.

Each iPhone, said Gottheil, is a "$600 cash infusion" -- the amount it makes from the retail sales and mobile carriers' subsidies -- to Apple.