Apple released record Q4 results as profits climbed to $1.58 billion. CEO Steve Jobs said he was “thrilled” to report that the fourth quarter was the company’s “best quarter ever,” with the highest revenue and earnings in Apple’s history.

Profits for the quarter were $1.76 per share, up by more than 50% from the same quarter last year. The company posted revenue of $9.6 billion, with sales outside the United States accounting for 45%.

Sales of Macintosh computers were up 44% from the last quarter of 2006, and Apple reported an increase of 17% on iPod sales. The company also reported sales of 2.32 million iPhones during the quarter. Jobs said that the company has sold more than 4 million iPhones since the device’s launch.

But the company predicted less than dazzling Q1 results, which led to a drop of as much as 10% for the company’s stock. Apple’s CFO Peter Oppenheimer announced conservative expectations for Q1, saying the company anticipates per-share earnings of 94 cents on revenues of $6.8 billion in the first three months of 2008.

Though these conservative estimates do not spell impending doom for the hip tech company, Carl Gressum, senior analyst at Ovum, warns, “A recession could also spell problems…So even though Apple is doing very well, it has been riding the wave of economic boom.  If this comes to a halt, so could Apple.”