A new survey conducted by ChangeWave and RBC Capital Markets found that five percent of 2,600 respondents had either already preordered or were “very likely” to buy the Fire, exceeding the four percent who said in 2010 that they were very likely to buy the iPad. Another 12 percent said they were “somewhat likely” to purchase the Fire, again surpassing the nine percent who said the same thing of the original iPad prior to its launch.

And of the five percent of “very likely” buyers, 26 percent said they would delay their iPad purchase to buy the Fire.

If those metrics are surprising, they really shouldn’t be. The Fire’s low price, relative to the iPad, is obviously a major attraction — $199 to the iPad’s $499. And — thanks to the iPad — consumers are now familiar enough with the tablet category to be comfortable dropping $199 on the Fire.

That said, the pent-up Kindle Fire demand on display in this survey suggests that Apple may finally have a true tablet rival with which to battle, as RBC analyst Mike Abramsky observes:

“Tablet contenders (Xoom, Galaxy Tab, PlayBook, etc.) have failed to gain appreciable traction against iPad’s estimated 67 percent share, and iPad 2 should be a popular holiday purchase,” he writes. “However, strong early Fire uptake seems likely, raising speculation Apple now faces a real tablet contender.”

Of the 2,800 respondents ChangeWave surveyed, 32 percent used the iPad as their e-reader and 47 percent the Kindle. That’s far less of a disparity between the two than we saw in the research outfit’s August survey, which found 62 percent of respondents using a Kindle and just 16 percent using an iPad. In other words, by this measure, between August and November, the iPad’s share of the U.S. e-reader market rose 16 percentage points and the Kindle’s fell 15 points. And that trend seems likely to continue in the months ahead. Of those respondents planning on buying an e-reader in the next 90 days, 42 percent said they’d like an iPad while only 33 percent said they’d opt for a Kindle.

Said ChangeWave’s director of research, Paul Carton, “The Amazon Kindle is hanging on to a rapidly diminishing lead over the Apple iPad among current e-reader owners….The iPad is likely to be the biggest beneficiary of the expanding e-reader market this holiday season.”

If that’s the case, Credit Suisse analyst Spencer Wang’s prediction in February that Amazon might see its e-book market share slip from 90 percent to 72 percent this year and to 35 percent by 2015 might not be so far off.

New data from ChangeWave shows a promising trend in PlayBook purchasing intentions. The research house surveyed 3,108 consumers with an eye toward determining tablet and netbook demand and found the PlayBook to be the second most popular choice among respondents planning to buy a tablet. Eight percent of respondents expressed interest in it. That’s significantly less than the 80 percent who professed interest in the iPad, which, predictably, claims a daunting lead, but it’s significantly greater then the three percent who claimed interest in Samsung’s Galaxy tablet and the two percent who said they’d like Hewlett-Packard’s forthcoming Slate.

Which, as RBC analyst Mike Abramsky notes, is promising. Extrapolating from that eight percent figure, he estimates that RIM may sell as many as six million PlayBooks in 2011 (calendar) to claim 13 percent of the market.

For RIM’s (RIMM) sake, let’s hope so, because the company’s current OS certainly isn’t doing that now. According to a new survey by ChangeWave Research, consumer interest in the BlackBerry is declining at a time when demand for smartphones is on the rise. Just six percent of survey respondents planning to purchase a smartphone in the next 90 days intend to buy a BlackBerry. That’s fewer than half the number that were planning to do so during ChangeWave’s last survey, taken in March. And it is dwarfed by the 52 percent of respondents planning to buy an iPhone (up from 31 percent) and the 19 percent planning to buy an HTC handset (up from 12 percent).

Grim news, and it only gets worse. Customer satisfaction with the BlackBerry is on the decline as well. Just 30 percent of respondents who own the device say they’re satisfied with it. That’s a record low for RIM after a seventh consecutive quarter of decline, and something of an embarrassment when 73 percent of iPhone owners rate themselves very satisfied.

Clearly, RIM has fallen. The question now is, can it get back up?

“In recent quarters RIM models appear to have lost their ‘cool factor,’ and the onus is now squarely on RIM to regain consumers’ confidence in their products,” ChangeWave says. “To do so they need new, highly compelling offerings that can compete on an equal footing with the best that Apple and Android have to offer. Otherwise, RIM’s future growth may increasingly be limited to the success or failure of its lower cost models on the international market.”

Still, RBC/ChangeWave found that 13 percent of the 3,200 respondents who participated in its iPad survey were either somewhat or very likely to purchase the device, compared with the nine percent who gave the same reply for the original iPhone in a similar survey conducted prior to its launch (see chart below; click on charts to enlarge). Said RBC analyst Mike Abramsky: “While we do not expect feverish initial launch lines like iPhone, the data portends well for healthy initial iPad uptake.”

The reason? The iPad’s unexpectedly low price point. Starting at $499, it is significantly below the $999 price expected. “Only 8 percent (of respondents) appear unwilling to pay Apple’s indicated iPad prices,” Abramsky notes. “That’s below the 28 percent who balked at initial iPhone pricing. Interest appears strongest with both Entry-Level and Tech-Savvy Buyers; 19 percent of declared iPad buyers indicated interest in the $499 16GB WiFi-only iPad, and 19 percent in the $829 64GB 3G iPad.”

Top planned uses for the device among both groups of buyers: Surfing the Internet (68 percent), checking e-mail (44 percent), and reading e-books (37 percent).

Evidently, Apple (AAPL) has managed to hit the pricing sweet spot at both the high and low ends of the market, which, as Abramsky observes, bodes well for its chances for success. “This data, while preliminary, suggests iPad may have greater potential than expected, to expand Apple’s addressable PC, iPod markets and to capture a segment of the home PC market (est. 35M+ units/yr),” he writes.

Abramsky’s estimate for iPad sales in CY 2010: Five million units, for revenue of $2.4 billion and earnings per share of 33 cents.

“A significant number of buyers–21 percent (3,100 respondents)–would be interested in purchasing a Mac tablet priced at $500-700,” RBC analyst Mike Abramsky wrote in a message to clients this morning. He noted as well that this is far above the nine percent who professed to be interested in the original iPhone in an April 2007 survey. The promising early interest illustrates the market opportunity for a Mac-based tablet, Abramsky said.

Assuming, of course, Apple (AAPL) plans to bring one to market.

“We expect Apple to add new iPhone carriers in the U.S. within the next year (likely with a new product launch next summer), Munster writes. “By way of example, for various reasons the company moved from an exclusive relationship with French wireless carrier Orange to a multi-carrier model. In France, the company now enjoys dramatically higher market share (in the 40% range vs. about 15% in ROW) than in countries with exclusive carrier agreements (such as AT&T in the U.S. where the iPhone has market share in the mid-teens). We believe Apple is seeing the increased unit sell-through more than offset the slightly (~10%) deteriorated economics per unit involved in non-exclusive agreements.”

If Munster’s prediction proves true, it will undoubtedly be welcomed by iPhone owners–nearly a third of whom listed AT&T as the feature they dislike most in the iPhone in a recent ChangeWave survey. But it will be ugly news for AT&T (T), which could suffer some serious subscriber defections if the company loses its iPhone-exclusivity deal–particularly if Apple signs on Verizon (VZ) as a second carrier. As Pali Research recently noted:

“As the iPhone exclusivity period rolls off between AT&T Wireless and Apple, a material number of AT&T customers will flock to Verizon’s superior network. We estimate that nearly a third of AT&T’s post-paid customers are being retained by AT&T primarily because of the iPhone exclusivity.”

“We expect Apple to add new iPhone carriers in the U.S. within the next year (likely with a new product launch next summer), Munster writes. “By way of example, for various reasons the company moved from an exclusive relationship with French wireless carrier Orange to a multi-carrier model. In France, the company now enjoys dramatically higher market share (in the 40% range vs. about 15% in ROW) than in countries with exclusive carrier agreements (such as AT&T in the U.S. where the iPhone has market share in the mid-teens). We believe Apple is seeing the increased unit sell-through more than offset the slightly (~10%) deteriorated economics per unit involved in non-exclusive agreements.”

If Munster’s prediction proves true, it will undoubtedly be welcomed by iPhone owners–nearly a third of whom listed AT&T as the feature they dislike most in the iPhone in a recent ChangeWave survey. But it will be ugly news for AT&T (T), which could suffer some serious subscriber defections if the company loses its iPhone-exclusivity deal–particularly if Apple signs on Verizon (VZ) as a second carrier. As Pali Research recently noted:

“As the iPhone exclusivity period rolls off between AT&T Wireless and Apple, a material number of AT&T customers will flock to Verizon’s superior network. We estimate that nearly a third of AT&T’s post-paid customers are being retained by AT&T primarily because of the iPhone exclusivity.”

Nearly a third, 32 percent, said AT&T.

And another 23 percent said the quality, coverage and speed of AT&T’s network. (Click image below to enlarge.)

Now, that isn’t all that surprising given the swell of bad press that occurred when AT&T admitted at Macworld 2009 that unlike dozens of other carriers that it wasn’t ready to support iPhone tethering or MMS support. But it’s interesting that AT&T (T) is responsible for two of the top three complaints about an Apple (AAPL) product. I can’t imagine that’s going over too well in Cupertino.

Says ChangeWave: “There are no indications that Apple’s AT&T problem is going away. On the contrary, the better customers feel about their iPhones the worse they feel about AT&T–with nearly one-in-two 3GS owners citing AT&T-related issues as their biggest dislike. These survey results suggest Apple will be forced to deal with the issue sooner than many analysts expect.”

“There will be a day when we are not exclusive with the iPhone,” AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said recently. And apparently, iPhone users are hoping that day comes sooner rather than later.

Nearly a third, 32 percent, said AT&T.

And another 23 percent said the quality, coverage and speed of AT&T’s network. (Click image below to enlarge.)

Now, that isn’t all that surprising given the swell of bad press that occurred when AT&T admitted at Macworld 2009 that unlike dozens of other carriers that it wasn’t ready to support iPhone tethering or MMS support. But it’s interesting that AT&T (T) is responsible for two of the top three complaints about an Apple (AAPL) product. I can’t imagine that’s going over too well in Cupertino.

Says ChangeWave: “There are no indications that Apple’s AT&T problem is going away. On the contrary, the better customers feel about their iPhones the worse they feel about AT&T–with nearly one-in-two 3GS owners citing AT&T-related issues as their biggest dislike. These survey results suggest Apple will be forced to deal with the issue sooner than many analysts expect.”

“There will be a day when we are not exclusive with the iPhone,” AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said recently. And apparently, iPhone users are hoping that day comes sooner rather than later.