Both faced questions on Thursday about the strength of the recovery in spending on technology, after Cisco Systems Inc CEO John Chambers' warned last week about "unusual uncertainty" in the global economy.

 

Analysts said fears persisted about the strength of any recovery in consumer spending, as growth moderates in Europe and China as well as in the United States.

 

But executives from the two largest U.S. personal computer makers waved off such fears, even as shares of Dell fell 3 percent after it posted slightly weaker-than-expected growth margins and HP fell about 1 percent.

 

"We saw better-than-normal quarterly seasonality, as well as good balanced performance across all of our three regions," said Cathie Lesjak, HP's interim chief executive, on a conference call with the media.

 

Lesjak also fielded queries on a successor for former CEO Mark Hurd -- who stunned Wall Street by resigning two weeks ago over expense account inaccuracies linked to a female marketing contractor.