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Steam Update Shows FPS Gamer Stats

Posted by simoniker on from the watch-the-battle-develop dept.

majestik writes "Valve Software today sent out a Half-Life 2 hardware survey via their Steam content delivery app to over 270,000 gamers (and counting!), collecting various hardware and software information about their PC systems to see how they'll measure up to the forthcoming FPS. Lotsa interesting data to check out, if you ever wanted to know what kind of systems today's FPS gamers use. And yes, if you're wondering, right now Intel takes 50.02% of the CPU market, leaving AMD with 49.98%." The stats are updated in real-time, and it seems this update has again stressed the Steam servers, with a message noting "the Steam network has been overloaded, causing many Steam users to be unable to login", though the effect is reportedly diminishing.

9 of 101 comments (clear)

  1. AMD vs Intel by Ethon · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Wow...I didnt figure that the margin between Intel/AMD was so close...I always have just assumed that as far as gaming went, AMD had a significant lead. Learn something new every day I suppose :)

  2. Re:AMD the winner by MerlynEmrys67 · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Not sure how to read this - how was this data gathered ? 41% of people have HT technologies (is HT even available on AMD) and only about 25% of people had a processor fast enough to have HT enabled.

    Is this a user feedback form - or does it gather the data directly from the system ?

    --
    I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them
  3. And the other winner: Nvidia by Vaevictis666 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    47.34% total for NVidia cards,
    41.17% Unknown,
    10.30% total Radeons,
    1.18% Intel.

    It's possible (though unlikely) that all the unknowns were ATI cards, but I think this is a clear win for NVidia.

    OTOH, the most popular card is a GF4MX, which is actually a less capable card than my poor dead GF2TI, which didn't even make it on the list :P

    1. Re:And the other winner: Nvidia by BW_Nuprin · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Looking at the driver names, it looks at least 20-some percent of the users are using ATI cards. Perhaps pre-Radeon?

  4. Re:Heh, interesting by imr · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I used to play counter and action quake2 that way on a p200mmx. I had a better framerate and no dark places.

  5. Steam Stress by Dark+Paladin · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I've been thinking this is the real reason why Half-Life 2 has been delayed. Don't get me wrong - I'm in no big rush, and since I don't anticipate an "OS X" client in, well, never, it will have to wait until I finally bother to upgrade my home PC.

    But from what I've been seeing about Steam, I have the feeling that most of the delays have been figuring out how to make that system work right the first time so they don't have a "first day Ultima Online/Everquest/any other massive online game issue" out there.

    A good thing, and it's interesting to watch the baby steps they take to break it (like with this survey) then probably analyze what worked and what didn't.

    --
    52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
  6. Opt-out or opt-in? by xTown · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Is participation in this survey voluntary? I'm sure it's not; part of the Steam license probably says "we're going to gather data on you and you can't say boo about it." But I'd like to know for sure; I stopped playing HL when Steam came out.

  7. Re:Er... by OppressiveGiant · · Score: 2, Interesting

    over 40% had hyperthreading... and fewer than 3% actually had processors that support hyperthreading(>3ghz). Something is up with those "other settings"

    --
    i could not think of anything clever.
  8. Win 95 by rvw14 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Anyone find it interesting that 212 users are using windows 95?