San Jose, Calif. ? Apple Computer Inc.’s first-quarter earnings more than quadrupled, dramatically exceeding Wall Street expectations, based on strong holiday sales of laptop computers and its wildly popular iPod music players.

For the three months ended Dec. 25, Apple said it earned $295 million, or 70 cents per share. In the same period a year earlier, the company earned $63 million, or 17 cents per share.

Apple Computers Inc. customer Jake Olsan, 11, listens to an Apple iPod Mini at an Apple Store in Palo Alto, Calif. Apple earnings have surged in large part because of the popularity of the iconic iPod. Apple had sold more than 10 million iPods since 2001 and holds 65 percent of the hard drive-based portable music player market.

Revenue for the quarter was $3.49 billion, up nearly 75 percent from $2 billion in the year-ago quarter.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call had projected earnings of 49 cents a share on revenue of $3.18 billion.

“We came in quite a bit stronger than we guided, and I’d attribute that to the fantastic results of iPod,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s chief financial officer.

Apple announced Wednesday that it shipped a record 337,000 iBook laptops in the last quarter. It shipped 4.58 million iPods, a 525 percent boost from the holiday quarter of 2003.

Before the earnings report, Apple shares climbed 90 cents, or 1.4 percent, to $65.46 in Wednesday afternoon trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market. In after-hours trading, the shares jumped 11 percent to $72.60.

IPods have made Apple a Wall Street darling since their debut in 2001.

In the past year, Apple stock has tripled on strong sales of the iPod, which is emerging as one of the 21st century’s first cultural icons.