Just last month, Gartner noted that HP was holding strong even as it faced new challenges in its consumer PC business.

The trouble, as it has been for months now, is that the burgeoning tablet market has hammered the PC market, especially in the U.S.

A recent Gartner report noted that sales in the worldwide PC market have been slowing. For instance, global PC shipments were up only 2.3% in the second quarter of this year. Gartner had earlier expected them to be up by 6.7% during that period.

"There are other areas where HP can invest its time and money to get a better return and higher growth rate," said Olds. "So it makes sense to get out of the business if that's their rationale. Spinning it off rather than selling it is due to the fact that there aren't a lot of buyers who have the desire and the money to take it off HP's hands."

He also noted that this isn't all that different from what IBM did with its PC division, when Lenovo took its own PC manufacturing business off IBM's hands.