Author Topic: The new Valve system survey has started.  (Read 2690 times)

Offline Pugnate

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The new Valve system survey has started.
« on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 11:28:25 AM »
Last year when I took the same survey, I found the results to be very different to what they are today, and in a good way. It seems to me that interest in having a good PC has increased significantly. As you may note, this new survey only started 3 weeks ago, so things could look very different in a few months when more have taken it. Also for those who aren't aware, the survey is for people who have STEAM installed.

You can have a look at the standings here: http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html

System RAM

A year ago, most gamers had 512MB RAM. Today the biggest percentage has at least 2.0 GB RAM, which is heartening.

Processor Vendor


Last year it was AMD with 53% of the market, while Intel had 47%. Sadly so far AMD is at 43% while Intel is flying at 57%. It is obvious that the Core2Duo chip has a lot to do with this.

Physical CPUs


Or does it? Looks like most people still own single core processors, so that's weird actually. While dual core owners are up from last year to 35%, it is still not a huge rise.


edit:Having thought about it, it does make sense. Last year Intel users were at 47%, with the vast majority using P4s or whatever. This year, Intel users have gone up by 14%, while dual core processor owners have gone up by a slightly larger percentage... so it makes sense.


CPU Speeds

I think you are better off ignoring these particular stats, because CPU speeds mean jack all these days.

Video Card Driver Name

Same as what I remember last year. More people own Nvidia cards.

Video Card Description

Now this is what is absolutely brilliant. Last year, with the 8800GTX not out for more than a few months, it was the least popular video cards among the Valve customers. In fact even though there were powerhouses like the 7950GX2 and the 7950GTs around, the most owned video card was Nvidia's 6600, alongside ATI's X800.

Not a year later, and the biggest percentage goes to the 8800 series! This obviously includes the 8800GTX, the 8800GTS and of course the 8800GT, all sharing the first position. I have a feeling that the $220 priced 8800GTs and the $280 priced 8800GTSs have something to do with this.

It certainly explains how Crysis has been selling so well, with more and more gamers able to play the game at decent settings. It also shows that people are willing to pay money for quality video cards.

Unfortunately the list also shows how good marketing can sell a bad product. The 8600 cards, which are crap, are very high on the list at number 4. Last year's champ, the 6600 is down to no3, but still kicking. I have a feeling the owners of these cards have finally started to move on, with the release of the 8800GT. At no2 is the 7600, the budget card of the 7 series.

The video card list doesn't have any good news for ATi. Most of their older cards are still being used, though at a lower percentage. Unfortunately their newer cards are very low on the list, making one feel sympathy for ATi. At the same time, you can't help but think that it is partially their doing. What progress ATi was making with the 2900XT, was brought to a standstill when they were bought by AMD.

The fact is that on this list of 40 or so video cards, the 8800 series is on top at number 1, while their direct ATi competitors are near the bottom, only one place above the horrible Nvidia FX 5600. While the 8800s have had a lot more time on the market, the numbers for the 2900 series are disappointing.


Monitors:


76% of the gamers still use standard aspect monitors. Of those, 52% use 16-17'' displays, while 20 percent use 19'' displays.

The other 24% use widescreen monitors, and amazingly the biggest percentage of these (19%) use monitors that are over 24''. That's pretty significant. Gamers that have 22'' monitors come in at 14%, while those with 19'' widescreen monitors come in at 15%. So it seems that most gamers who go for widescreen monitors, end up going for the big ones.

I have no idea how the monitor stats compare to last year (as I wasn't paying attention to it then), but I still find it very interesting.

Bus Types

I remember last year, that the gap between AGP and PCIe users was surprisingly narrow. This year, it has widened with 63% of gamers using PCIe, while AGP gamers are down to 30%

VRAM

Not surprisingly, most gamers have 256MB of Video RAM. 27% of gamers have less than 256MB RAM.

Desktop Bit Depth / Primary Display Resolution


Not surprising that 97% of those surveyed use 32 bit colors on their desktop.

In terms of resolution, 32% of gamers are still using a 1024x768 desktop resolution. Gamers to use 1280 x 960 or more come in at 63%.

Audio Devices

Most gamers seem to be using on board audio these days. The new Creative X-Fi cards have caught on, but not enough to make a significant blip.

Total Hard Drive Space

With hard drives getting bigger, and so many users having more than one, this particular list needs to be more detailed. Needless to say, most people have at least 250GB hard drives.



« Last Edit: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 02:09:39 PM by Pugnate »

Offline scottws

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #1 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 12:32:57 PM »
Most gamers seem to be using on board audio these days. The new Creative X-Fi cards have caught on, but not enough to make a significant blip.
I read something about this on a techie website.  I think I was searching for information on future, more Vista-compatible soundcards and found it.  Basically it said that less and less people are springing for a separate sound card these days and finding modern onboard sound "good enough."

That's where I personally sit.  I didn't notice a difference on my old PC when I bought an Audigy.  I didn't bother on my new system... I didn't want Creative's crap cluttering up my system anyway.

Offline Pugnate

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #2 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 12:39:59 PM »
Yea I actually removed my Creative card a few months ago. The onboard 7.1 was a bit of a bitch to configure with XP and needed some driver updates.

It was seamless with Vista, and works better with it too. But you are right. It has been a trend for the past couple of years from what I read. I am sure Creative need to diversify into other products to survive.

Offline Cobra951

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #3 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 01:43:46 PM »
Creative succumbing to onboard sound?  I love it.  Whether they go away completely, or end up getting scared into providing decent support, it's all good.

That survey is depressing.  I'm so far below the sweet spot now, although I guess I can still run some of last year's games that I missed.  That's quite a leap in stats in just one year.

Offline scottws

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #4 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 01:54:17 PM »
They've been succumbing for awhile.  They are doing virtually nothing about it.  You think they'd really try to clean up their act, but they haven't so much as lifted a finger.

Offline Pugnate

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #5 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 02:14:18 PM »
Yup. It is a pity that one of the most important companies in the history of PC gaming has come to this. It isn't just the drivers is it? They have a bad reputation with their value products, that are often cheap repackaged versions of products of a previous generation.

For example the Soundblaster live value wasn't actually a Sounblaster live series card, and there was a huge controversy. In the end they even apologized and offered owners of the product some sort of compensation.

But unfortunately it seems they didn't learn. The X-Fi cards are superb, and quite powerful.

Creative released some X-Fi budget version that gamers flocked to because of the lower price. Turned out it was just a repackaged Soundblaster Live card, so that just went to show how much Creative learned.

I guess all companies do it, but that doesn't make it right.

Offline MysterD

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #6 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 02:37:14 PM »
Yeah, my current PC has on-board sound.

W/ my onboard sound, I have never have had any sound card issues, had to reinstall soundcard drivers b/c the sound drivers went "poof" getting corrupted for some reason, etc etc. I can't say the same for Creative -- w/ their Live card, I've had to reinstall soundcard drivers a handful of times, at least.

Y'know when I started to notice the rise of on-board sound??? After Doom 3. After Creative slapped Id Software w/ that lawsuit for the "reverse engineering" or whatever and Carmack actually agreed to support Creative in return (to settle the lawsuit), I began to notice over time a slowly but surely trend of "Fuck Creative Labs" coming from gamers...Looks like that dictated the market...

Offline Cobra951

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #7 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 02:57:28 PM »
What?  Reverse engineering is legal.  I've heard nothing of this.

If there's bait and switch happening with Creative again, then they can go to hell.  I don't even want them to clean up anything.  Just go away.  Audio is a solved problem, and onboard solutions work fine with current tech.

Edit: Is this the deal between Creative and Id?  I can't find much else on it.  I did find that Apple had to pay Creative $100 million to make lawsuits over iPods go away.  The contention was that the user-interface software in iPods violated Creative patents.  That right there is enough for me to hate Creative, even though I waste no love on Apple.  No wonder they're still in business.  They have a sweet extortion mechanism going for them.

Offline MysterD

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #8 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 03:21:17 PM »
What?  Reverse engineering is legal.  I've heard nothing of this.
Carmack was working on it w/ the Doom 3 Engine -- but, Creative heard that he was and they actually already had "patented" this, long time ago....Here's a link.

So, this is when the shit hit the fan -- Creative decided they would either sue Id OR Id would actually have to officially support their audio-card. Then, this news came out, eventually...

Quote
Edit: Is this the deal between Creative and Id?  I can't find much else on it.  I did find that Apple had to pay Creative $100 million to make lawsuits over iPods go away.  The contention was that the user-interface software in iPods violated Creative patents.  That right there is enough for me to hate Creative, even though I waste no love on Apple.  No wonder they're still in business.  They have a sweet extortion mechanism going for them.
Yup.

Offline idolminds

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #9 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 07:03:59 PM »
Its was software patent bullshit. It wasnt reverse engineered, they just call the technique "Carmacks Reverse".

Read

Carmack and Creative discovered this particular way of rendering "shadows"...Creative used it for sound manipulation and Carmack used it for visuals. He apparently had no prior knowledge of the technique and discovered it independently. However, Creative got a patent on it and strong-armed id to include EAX support in Doom 3 (id had built its own sound renderer).

Offline Quemaqua

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #10 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 07:09:48 PM »
*sigh*

天才的な閃きと平均以下のテクニックやな。 課長有野

Offline scottws

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Re: The new Valve system survey has started.
« Reply #11 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 07:36:07 PM »
Its was software patent bullshit. It wasnt reverse engineered, they just call the technique "Carmacks Reverse".

Read

Carmack and Creative discovered this particular way of rendering "shadows"...Creative used it for sound manipulation and Carmack used it for visuals. He apparently had no prior knowledge of the technique and discovered it independently. However, Creative got a patent on it and strong-armed id to include EAX support in Doom 3 (id had built its own sound renderer).
One of the other articles posted earlier tells a more sinister tale.  It says that some guy that works for nVidia created the technique and discussed it at some Creative summit (ha!).  John Carmack later was able to explain why it worked better than some other technique (the original creator knew it was better but not why).

About a year later Creative patented the technique.  Supposedly it's possible Carmack and this other guy could have won a prior art case, but I guess they determined it wasn't worth it.