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Valve hardware survey shows gamers yet to embrace Vista

arstechnica.com — The latest results for Valve's Steam hardware survey are in, and they provide a valuable look at the types of systems most gamers are using. They also show a much lower uptake of Windows Vista than Microsoft will likely be happy with.

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  • schestowitz, on 10/11/2007, -33/+17Shrap contrast to what they said a few months ago?

    Valve questions Microsoft's commitment to PC gaming

    ,----[ Quote ]
    | Half-Life 2 developer Valve thinks that Microsoft's current
    | "Games for Windows" marketing push is a cynical ploy to sell
    | more copies of Windows Vista, rather than a genuine effort to
    | invigorate the PC gaming market.
    `----

    http://tomshardware.co.uk/2007/03/12/valve_questions_microsofts_commitment/
    • jimbojim, on 10/11/2007, -26/+11I think we need to take the numbers with a grain of salt. I know Counterstrike source didn't even work on Vista when it came out... they might have patched it by now, though.
    • GawtMilk, on 10/11/2007, -3/+426% is higher than I thought. NVidia drivers are currently awful for Vista, and around 60% of Steam users are NVidia users, according to the statistics.
    • puto, on 10/11/2007, -4/+10I have the new 8800GTS and I will not install vista (Har!) until TF2 comes out supporting DX10.

    • Detritus, on 10/11/2007, -11/+28Hmm I didn't read the blogspam, so forgive me if this is mentioned there... but I thought this was interesting at the source: http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html

      Windows Vista 19,707 5.36 %
      but the people with Vista that can actually use DX10 is only:
      DirectX10 Systems (Vista with DirectX10 GPU) - 1.24% of users

      I'm sitting on a 8800 in XP because the performance is so much better in XP, when Vista and the Drivers get their ***** together (by SP1) I'll consider the switch. I don't care about Crysis or Shadowrun. ET: Quake Wars and TF2 both support DX9.
    • Sanchez, on 10/11/2007, -11/+9I'm running Vista with 2GB of RAM and I get solid performance, I don't really have an XP system to compare it with (i moved my other computer and my sister's laptop to vista as well) but all 3 of them get decent framerates. I really don't think they're much slower than on XP, it isn't noticible at least. 7900GTX with latest beta drivers. Early on there were glitches and such, but the newer drivers have really helped.
    • brufleth, on 10/11/2007, -5/+42I like Windows XP on my home machine. I just don't have a desire to install Vista. What's the big advantage? The slick UI doesn't matter when I'm just booting up a game anyway.

      Most of that 5.36% is probably people who have bought newer computers that came with Vista.

      I could maybe see the reason to upgrade if you use the OS UI extensively (I wouldn't mind it at work) but on a machine primarily for gaming it only make sense to upgrade when it is required or offers significant in game enhancements which don't exists yet.
    • kelbear, on 10/11/2007, -11/+13The keyword is "yet".
    • betterth, on 10/11/2007, -12/+10I've used the 8800GTS with Vista since Beta2. It was rough back then, but by RC2 I've really not had many if any issues at all. I've played all of Half-Life 2 and Episode One on Vista with these drivers, pushing mind-splittingly high FPS. I play DoD:S and CS:S with Vista and 8800GTS. I also play Command and Conquer 3, Lord of the Rings Online, STALKER, FEAR, Warcraft 3, Need for Speed Carbon and the Sims2, just to name a couple of games that run flawlessly.

      I've honestly never had any major issue with Vista. I've had small issues, but then again, some issues that have always been horrific on XP have been delightfully simple on Vista. Sound card drivers, especially for RealTek, are autoinstalled and work instantly on Vista. As do my network drivers, which on an XP reformat were always annoying.

      Hate Vista all you want, but the _ONLY_ valid claim is 4-5FPS lower than XP at high fps. (1-2 if the fps is lower than 40, from what I've personally seen with FRAPS)

      Edit: I actually used a ATI 9800XT with Beta2, and didn't upgrade my computer until RC2 was around. That's when I started using the 8800 with Vista. The drivers were rough until I believe the end of last year or the beginning of this, but right now it's totally fine in all my games, and has been for months and months.
    • InetRoadkill, on 10/11/2007, -26/+22DX10 is overrated and so is Vista.
    • dn11, on 10/11/2007, -10/+17"Hmm I didn't read the blogspam"
      WTF? any article submitted to digg now = blogspam? why do you even come to digg, it is all blogspam!
    • emorgoch, on 10/11/2007, -3/+11@betterth

      I have an Athlon X2 4200+, 2GB of OCZ Platinum RAM, and a nV 7800GTX in my system. Playing CS 1.6 on XP, I get 60 fps no questions asked, but playing it on Vista, I will drop to 20 fps when there's more than 2 players on the screen.

      I'm not saying Vista is bad. I thoroughly enjoy it as a productivity OS, and am using it as my primary. However, there are still a lot of application compatibility problems that exist with it, and there is a performance hit with games, which is why I also keep my XP install around for a dual-boot.
    • BlackKnight6, on 10/11/2007, -9/+6One thing the article doesn't take into account is people that are dual booting or just not upgrading to Vista yet due to driver issues (Don't get confused about game peformance on Vista, its not Vista, its not MS that needs to fix it, its Nvidia and Ati and Creative that need to get their drivers up and going, lots of people just assume Vista uses more resources...it does a better job actually). The odds of gamers running their games with current drivers from Nvidia and ATi are very slim. I have 2 HDs, one is Vista, one is XP. When Steam took my specs I was on my XP install and it tallied my user name as XP, even though I am basically a Vista user. The reason I haven't moved over is actually nothing to do with video. It is how the HAL directsound is now removed meaning almost all of my games (those using directsound) dont support 5.1, hardware accelerated sound (more CPU usage then) and no EAX. Creative has dropped the ball is and is taking FOREVER to get it working again with the use of their program alchemy which they plan to CHARGE Audigy series owners to have so all their games work.

      I love Vista, so far my only problem is the sound thing, I want all of my games to work with the sound it had in XP. And when a DX10 game comes out I will sell my video card for the 8800GTX. Just because Valve has a server that shows a low adoption rate for gamers doesn't mean much. Wait until a DX10 game is out and more driver support (not MS fault, all on the card makers at this point). Hell, Valve's survey also shows all the people with ***** as comps, alot of people are just running CS 1.6 or playing CSS at around 1024x768 with everything off like HDR. I wouldn't call the Valve gamers hardcore setups, much more varied.

      A survey after there are some good DX10 games out would give a MUCH better idea of gamer interest in Vista and DX10.
    • ayeroxor, on 10/11/2007, -3/+13dn11: "Blogspam" is used for any linked-to page that references an article but is usually mostly comprised of some *****'s unwanted opinion about the article, and does not actually contain the majority of the article. The reader then has to click on another link to get the entire article.

      Welcome to teh internets.
    • radu79, on 10/11/2007, -3/+9We have a small online game, and only about 3% of the visitors on our website use Vista. About 10% use Linux, 2% use Win 2K, 1.5% use OSX, and the rest use XP.
      When we had a poll on our forums about the OSes people use, the results were quite different, about 30% using a non MS OS (mostly Linux and some OSX and *BSD).
    • nicko68, on 10/11/2007, -4/+5""Blogspam" is used for any linked-to page that references an article but is usually mostly comprised of some *****'s unwanted opinion about the article, and does not actually contain the majority of the article. The reader then has to click on another link to get the entire article."

      Ah Web 2.0... where everyone thinks everyone else wants to know what they think, what they're doing, etc. :)
    • dn11, on 10/11/2007, -7/+5yeah i know what is meant by "blogspam". but sorry, i don't consider arstechnica referencing a fairly obscure hardware survey that I wouldn't have known about to be blogspam. maybe you collect all of your news first hand from the source every time - i don't have time for that myself
    • bemenaker, on 10/11/2007, -5/+16@Blacknkight,

      "Just because Valve has a server that shows a low adoption rate for gamers doesn't mean much. "

      Uhm, WHAT?! A sampling of 300,000 users is a pretty damn large sample size, and is extremely telling of the market as a whole. That sample size is 100x's what common public opinion surveys use.

      Vista adoption is slow because of a few things:
      1) MS has a reputation of releasing a buggy OS's, and if you're smart you wait til first service pack, (actually, what OS doesn't fit this)
      2) What compelling features are there too warrant it when it cost so freakin much, and XP works just fine, is stable, has drivers
      3) Driver support is still shaky as hell in Vista
      4) There is no HAVE TO HAVE program that is Vista only, be it games or apps or super duper ultra realistic 3-d pr0n
    • StephenCIreland, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2my 20" dual headed iMac featured in that survey, :)
    • haggie, on 10/11/2007, -7/+2Survey shows moronic newbies embracing Vista!

    • BlackKnight6, on 10/11/2007, -3/+2@bemenaker

      I didn't say the sample size was small, I said small adoption rate. It is funny you even quote the sentence you can't read. Try to hold back your uncontrolled bias against something which causes you to be unable to comprehend a sentence.

      You are arguing my point, though with some invalid points. Most gamers aren't going to move over until some DX10 games come out (If you actually read my comment, you would have gotten that). Another point you AGAIN argued for me was the fact that the sample size is so big and Valve's games grab specs from all ranges of people that this can't be considered a survey of hardcore or even high-end gamers or enthusiasts, not even "gamer rigs", lots of these are kids or teens playing on their parents or family comp. It grabs people with crap CPUs, crap amounts of RAM, crap video cards, etc.

      For me, I would consider myself a gaming enthusiast. I love my games, so I have both XP and Vista for my games. I still have everything I had before with XP and I am prepared (almost, still need to grab a DX10 card) for future DX10 compatible games with Vista (Crysis, Alan Wake, UT3, etc). My Vista install has been PERFECTLY stable, not one freeze, BSOD, nothing. It boots alot quicker then my 2 month old install of XP, starts programs WAY faster, has cool and interesting features and new apps, most of my games run just as fast as XP, well Deus Ex runs 2x as fast and ***** up the time scale but whatever. For games I have issues with, mainly the damn sound, I use XP.

      Anyhow, there ARE reasons to move to Vista, its just all these anti-MS people who feel like they need to wage some war against a company and over exaggerate bugs or even create lies about versions and "game tweaker only in Ultimate" and other FUD. Only thing, like I said before, which has been a problem for me is the sound driver issue. See, I also bought Vista Premium Retail, not upgrade, for 50 bucks through the family deal Microsoft gives for those who (My father) buy Vista Ultimate Retail (Buy Ultimate retail and you can buy 2 copies of premium for 50 bucks each.) So I got another HD and have Vista now so I get the best of both worlds.

      Now quit flaming and actually read a comment.
    • rlg420, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4"2) What compelling features are there too warrant it when it cost so freakin much"

      Okay people this statement is about as played out as it can get. It bought Vista Home Premium for $110 on newegg about a month ago. That is $20 cheaper than I paid for XP a couple years ago.
    • bemenaker, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1Actually, I wasn't the one doing the flaming. I took your comment out of context from the way you meant it. It sounded to me, like you were blowing off their poll, as being irrelevant.

      Yes, the rest of the facts we agree on, and sorry, I didn't make it clear when I added that at the end, but that part wasn't even about your post.

      Flaming? HA, I never once, attacked, you, insulted, you, or dropped into a non-sensible discussion over the issue.

      Check again who is flaming. When you take out your attacks, you make very well sounded and reasoned arguments, keep those up. :)
      ---

      There is a negative side to buying OEM versions, they have a limit on upgradeability (hardware) that the retail doesn't.
    • cawpin, on 10/11/2007, -4/+3Hmm, a HARDWARE survey and this whole article is about an OS. I think somebody needs to study basic English first.
    • Chompy, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3I only have Vista because it came with my newest box. I actually haven't run into any problems with games, although I've had to reregister the OS once already after having it for about a month. Never had that problem with XP Shady Edition.
    • chalkboy, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3@emorgoch (#7031295)
      "OCZ Platinum RAM"

      Yeah cause that makes your system faster. When will people realize that ram either works or it does not. The name brand does not matter if all the stats are the same. If you over clock the expensive stuff is usually better. But it seems to me that most people use it as a look at how much money I spent.

      Rant over
    • AICkieran, on 10/11/2007, -1/+0@chalkboy

      Decent branded RAM is generally less prone to errors than crappy unbranded stuff, hence [mostly] ruling out memory issues.
    • steven0451, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2People, the reason the numbers for Vista are so low is because the damn Valve survey program fails when it tries to scan your computer. The UAC kicks in blocking it in the background giving you no notification, therefore the survey program crashes and nothing gets sent to Valve HQ. :/
  • NeoOfTheSith, on 10/11/2007, -7/+33Stats - Blog = http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html
    • xTRUMANx, on 10/11/2007, -21/+9Stats - Blog = Data

      Stats + Blog = Information

      The blog is there for the analysis. And as arstechnia a blog anyway?
    • gcnaddict, on 10/11/2007, -5/+8"Windows Vista 20,097 5.37 %"

      That's still pretty good considering the ***** that graphics card manufacturers have been giving to Microsoft and the gamers. That's 20,000 upgraded gamers after 4 months... though most of them probably just came on board via OEMs.
    • dn11, on 10/11/2007, -6/+20arstechnica = one of the most respected tech news/analysis sources on the web that brought the data to our attention with informed commentary and a link in the first sentence

      you = lamer
    • Paktu, on 10/11/2007, -0/+14"The most popular primary display resolution was 1280 x 800 at 41.79 percent, although given the relative paucity of widescreen monitors, it seems likely that this was a typo in the results, and the real value is 1280 x 1024."

      Actually I'll bet this is not a typo. 1280x800 is a very common laptop resolution.
    • krinn, on 10/11/2007, -1/+35.37% is actually quite impressive compared to other surveys:

      4%: http://boingboing.net/stats/awstats.boingboing.net.osdetail.html
      3.74%: http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=2
      2.6%: http://w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_os.asp
      1.91%: http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php?date=2007-05-30
    • NeoOfTheSith, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1@paktu

      I honestly don't give a ***** what some news site has to say as it's all expanded stuffing that I could care less about.
  • OBKenobi, on 10/11/2007, -37/+1040 million copies sold...

    Microsoft should be held responsible for all these false claims they have made in the media. Phony Vista sales figures, the threats against Linux, misrepresenting Vista hardware requirements, and numerous other lies and exaggerations told in an effort to sabotage MS's competitors.

    Why is Microsoft given free reign to terrorize the industry? Imagine if Steve Jobs claimed there were 50 million new Macs sold in a month and that Microsoft is infringing on his patents. Wouldn't you demand that he show proof of these ridiculous claims? Microsoft must prove it too.
    • estvir, on 10/11/2007, -16/+19Phony Vista sales figures = Prove it.
      .. the threats against Linux = Reminds me of the 'Go have a cry to your mummy' line and the hypocrisy is amazing.
      .. misrepresenting Vista hardware requirements = Please tell me you aren't talking about those morons who sued because their computers couldn't run all of Vista ?
      .. numerous other lies and exaggerations told in an effort to sabotage MS's competitors. = Prove it + FSF/Apple/Others never do this, right ?

      Hah.
    • Phocion55, on 10/11/2007, -16/+10@estvir:

      "DRAM Makers Suffer Due to Lackluster Vista Adoption - Jun 4, 2007"

      Via ***** - http://tinyurl.com/392y3g
    • naio, on 10/11/2007, -12/+16Oh please OBKenobi... STFU!. You are making assertions that you can't back up. Try to be a better troll in the future.
    • Optimaximal, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2They might have sold 40 million copies, but most of those are probably OEM releases on cheap Dell laptops and crap boxes running Vista Home Basic with a fifth of the graphical capabilities to run HL2. They won't be using Steam...
  • vampireblood, on 10/11/2007, -22/+10Thats because vista is a ram hog.
  • BHull302, on 10/11/2007, -21/+19Who wants to spend $200 on the basic version and $400 on the Ultimate version (which by the way is the only version that comes with the "game tweaker") when there are no real advantages at this time to upgrade? There are no major overhauls to the GUI that I HAVE to have, no real significant performance or application advantages, and no DX10 titles out at this time.

    I am a gamer who works for a living, and can't see giving Microsoft that money for UT2007 or Crysis. I mean seriously, those are both games I really want to play, but now I am looking at spending $400 to get the DX10 eye candy support....***** ridiculous.

    And before people say the upgrade versions are cheaper - the install process is already an ass pain, and getting the upgrade versions just prolongs that pain.

    ***** Microsoft and their DX10 stranglehold, their $400 DRM bloated operating system and their CEO...yeah Steve Ballmer with your 235 patent violation *****.

    I seriously hope someone makes a DX10 port to XP so some of us who work for a living don't have to shell out hundreds of our hard earned post tax dollars so we can play the best renderings of our latest beloved games.
    • GawtMilk, on 10/11/2007, -13/+21"...don't have to shell out hundreds..."

      You don't have to shell out hundreds. It's not a stranglehold. Do you want DX10? Buy Vista. Do you care? Don't buy Vista. WOW MONOPOLY!

      And plus, what DRM is there on Vista? There's the capability to run files that won't run on other operating system. Vista never removes functionality that is available on other operating systems. Can your Linux-based PC play HD-DVDs? Thanks to the "OMG LEAKED KEY!" it can. However, this is what Vista could do out of the box. Microsoft paid licensing fees to get that capability.
    • Dalrek, on 10/11/2007, -6/+17*cough*http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116213 *cough*

      Home Basic is $160 retail, and Ultimate is $350 retail... but you can get them for $95 and $190 OEM, respectively
    • Sirocco, on 10/11/2007, -9/+12>> It's not a stranglehold. Do you want DX10? Buy Vista. Do you care? Don't buy Vista.

      If you want to play PC games in a few years, you'll need Vista.
    • puto, on 10/11/2007, -9/+1HARRRRRRRRRRR
    • selrahc, on 10/11/2007, -4/+9"If you want to play PC games in a few years, you'll need Vista."

      Yes, and you have to buy next generation consoles to play new games too. Just play your old games if you don't want to upgrade.
    • venom8599, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3"Who wants to spend $200 on the basic version and $400 on the Ultimate version (which by the way is the only version that comes with the "game tweaker") when there are no real advantages at this time to upgrade?"

      I'm running Ultimate (no key eval period, just to see what the big deal was), and there's no "game tweaker"--at least not yet anyway. In fact, for most people, I'd imagine Home Premium or Business would be enough--either Media Center/360 Connectivity/HD Movie Maker is important, or Domain connectivity/small-business tools are more important. The only reason to get Ultimate is in the rare case that you need both, or you absolutely have to have the Ultimate Extras (Which is basically DreamScene and the Hold 'Em Poker game at the moment...)
    • Sirocco, on 10/11/2007, -4/+7>> Yes, and you have to buy next generation consoles to play new games too. Just play your old games if you don't want to upgrade.

      The point was that DX10 is Vista-only, which you seem to have missed entirely. DX10 locks you into a tight development path that basically points to two targets : Windows Vista and Xbox360. As a gamer, if you are perfectly happy running XP you'll be screwed when all you favorite games start coming out using DX10, which they will.

      I'm sure creative folks (read: bored college kids) will write a wrapper to get DX10 games working under XP, but the whole point is it's just Microsoft's way of forcing players as well as developers to either adopt Vista or the 360.
    • The_Dude, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3I know what your saying about the high cost of entry to simply play a few upcoming DX10 titles with jaw-dropping settings. It's pretty high, but it just is what it is. Heck, it was pretty high a couple years ago when Doom III and all that came out. The only upside to PC FPS gaming is that it is moving so slowly now that you really don't need to build a new rig every few years.
    • init100, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1@GawtMilk

      "However, this is what Vista could do out of the box. *Microsoft* paid licensing fees to get that capability."

      You mean, *you* paid licensing fees to get that capability. Microsoft paid the license fees, but just transferred them to the purchase price.
    • bjornski, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2What's this ***** 3d video stuff? You mean I have to buy a whole new machine to play this?

      ***** that!

      How DARE they make me upgrade from my 386! I can't believe they'd FORCE me to upgrade to (run app/play game/use updated protocols).

      *****!
  • Braingoo, on 10/11/2007, -11/+9One word Drivers.
    • Braingoo, on 10/11/2007, -9/+7yeha i wont adopt till at the the three word drives come in. I have vista and went back to XP, will install vista when SP1 comes out or something.
    • wageslaven, on 10/11/2007, -8/+9"Assuming it fixes all the issues we've been bitching about since the launch..."

      And, what exactly are these 'issues"? Immature drivers? What about _Vista_ is an Issue?
    • estvir, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1I'm also curious as to these problems you all expect SP1 to fix and I'd also like to remind you that Win XP SP2 was a 'once off' thing and deviated from the normal SP.
    • init100, on 10/11/2007, -2/+2@estvir

      "I'd also like to remind you that Win XP SP2 was a 'once off' thing and deviated from the normal SP."

      Yeah, because the state of security in XP was so appalling that they had to do something radical about it.
    • TheHuntsman, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0@WageSlaven
      "And, what exactly are these 'issues"? Immature drivers? What about _Vista_ is an Issue?"

      How about problems doing basic operations like copying files?
      http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931770/en-us

      I've used Vista heavily everyday as a dev. The performance even on a good machine feels slow and the system seems buggy at times. I have hit the file copying bug (I now use Cygwin to copy files) and a bunch of other little issues.

      Here hoping it goes like Visual Studio 2005 which was a real dog until it's first service pack but pretty damn good afterwards compared to its predecessor.
  • chingy1788, on 10/11/2007, -18/+9I don't like Ubuntu, just give me troubles, setting up, doing anything
    My friend who used to love Kubuntu hates it now because it crashes every 5 seconds after an "upgrade" to the latest Kubuntu

    Vista = free for me legally, so I use that
    Similarly with XP

    I haven't really used MacOSX, but I don't like the users, they just come up to any other Windows or Linux user and sneer at them, thinking they are superior, just plain rude and annoying
    • carpespasm, on 10/11/2007, -1/+9same as doc here. I'm pretty OS ambiguous, but macs does video editing with less hassle than other systems, so i use a mac. I'm on windows right now and use ubuntu on all my older machines. i just used whatever works best for the situation.
    • Terc, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8doctorsax, thank you for handling that so maturely. I miss the days when digg saw comments like your more often.

      I have to say, I administrate Windows and Linux machines. While I have a Windows desktop at home, I prefer using my Mac Mini because at the end of the day, I just want to do basic computing tasks in relative comfort
    • sketchydave, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2@Terc
      Same here, I spend my day doing web development. I can't afford to have a preference, the stuff I build has to work on PC, Mac, Linux, and the major/current browsers. I work with them all, I need them all, and they all have their strengths and weaknesses. But my main machine is an iMac because it just gives me less headaches and I like using it.
    • bjornski, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2"...and I like using it."

      DING! DING! DING!

      WE HAVE A WINNER!

      I don't care what OS you run. If you like using it, it's the one for you.
  • jackpot, on 10/11/2007, -1/+34I feel sorry for the 12 guys who run steam on an 11" screen
    • Negyxo, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10they're probably running steam on their carputers, so don't feel too bad.
  • BrandonMills, on 10/11/2007, -5/+9Is there a 'gamer boot' mode in Vista? I know there was talk about this during developing, and it would make so much sense that I'd pick up a copy today if it exists.

    So much crap is turned on by default during a normal Windows boot. The reason consoles like the 360 can get away with running fast on slower hardware is because they don't have as much OS bloat to deal with. Even XP has a considerable amount of bloat. How about a boot option that lets me boot with only features needed for gaming?
    • wageslaven, on 10/11/2007, -8/+5There is a Tray-and-Play feature of some kind coming.

      "So much crap is turned on by default during a normal Windows boot" The "average" user is considered when the defaults are chosen. If you dont want something, turn it off. If you cant turn if off, how do you being to discuss or have an opinion on "running fast, slow hardware, bloat"?
    • darkstar949, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4@wageslaven - Tray and Play is nothing more than being able to play the game while it is still installing to the hard drive - you still have to be in Windows to use it.
  • bigfatdummy, on 10/11/2007, -13/+17The fact is that people haven't moved to Vista because things just don't work correctly yet.

    • TheG2, on 10/11/2007, -8/+11Things work perfectly fine for me. Tell me, what "things" don't work right for you?
    • catalysis, on 10/11/2007, -6/+10Sound blaster cards lose some of their functionality. My podXT live guitar processor has issues, as well as my firewire mic preamp. I have several other devices that lack full-features on vista or are totally non-functional.
    • metalstorm, on 10/11/2007, -7/+5I am going to have to agree with theq2. Besides the terrible Nvidia Vista drivers I had in the past (the current ones work fine), I have not had any major issues with Vista. Most of the people that I talk to that complain that Vista is buggy haven't even used it. It's just the popular thing to bash Vista so they jump on board.
    • bjornski, on 10/11/2007, -5/+3No. It's because the XP Media Center machine that I bought for video editing and high-end gaming works just fine for me, and I don't see any "Vista Only" reason to upgrade yet. I beta-tested RC1 and RC2, and have played with many machines that run with the released version of VIsta, and it's nice. But, I have NO NEED to upgrade my XP machine right now. Mine works. When I upgrade my machine, it WILL be to a Vista machine. No questions.

      edit: Catalysis: Those aren't Vista issues, those are issues with your podXT live processor and SoundBlaster drivers. Not with Vista.
    • catalysis, on 10/11/2007, -3/+14He didn't say vista is buggy, he said people have not moved to it because "things don't work right." The reason why I and many others uninstalled vista is because of driver and device incompatibility.

      I am an end-user. I don't care who's fault it is, it either works or it doesn't.
    • bemenaker, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2H/W vendors did complain that MS was late in giving them the specs for writing drivers for Vista, and because of that, the drivers are slow to get out.
    • init100, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2@bjornski

      "Those aren't Vista issues, those are issues with your podXT live processor and SoundBlaster drivers. Not with Vista."

      That's correct, though I sincerely hope that you also give Linux the same benefit of the doubt, i.e. not complaining about how crappy Linux is because it does not run your Windows games too well. I've just seen too many Windows fans arguing that most "Vista poroblems" aren't problems with Vista but problems with the malfunctioning third-party packages, just to turn around and blame Linux for having problems with running Windows games. Those issues are problems with the games, not problems with Linux.
    • bjornski, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I have given Linux the benefit of the doubt. I've run many flavors of it, and it doesn't do what I want.

      So I use the OS that does do what I want.

      It works for me. If you have an issue with it, don't use my machine.

  • combustion8, on 10/11/2007, -2/+2Hope all is well by the time Age of Conan is released this fall.
  • neio, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3How indicative is Valve's stats to the normal PC user?
    • TheG2, on 10/11/2007, -10/+6Ram hog? Sure it requires at least 1gb, but to be honest, if your still running less than a 1gb and trying to play todays newest games, you're don't something wrong.

      And besides, XP still runs great on anything less than 1gb (or better, you get my point), Vista is flawless on 2GB of memory.
    • bemenaker, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Normal? Not sure, gamer, very reflective.

      Gamers are supposed to be the tech adopters, we are normally the one's out on the front line of tech.
    • MrESaulved, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2It is generally accepted that the Valve Survey is an accurate snapshot of the gamer PC population, in so much that it is an opt-in process reflecting in-use and utilized PCs in both residential and corporate environments only able to report after the specific application, Steam, is installed.

      Many valid arguments for the survey misrepresenting both segment zero and segment five (the rock bottom and luxury markets) can be made for any similar population sample. The rather large population sample is helpful for discovering low probability specifics, further adding to the confidence of the sample.

      The Valve survey is best as a measurement of trends against prior Valve surveys, since the data collection mechanics and questions asked are similar. Meaningful predictions can be made from the historical data. Also, when co-related to other like surveys, such as 3DMark and Battle.Net, normalizations (calibrations) can be then made to provide a working model for more accurate analysis.

      Which would help explain such odd observations such as:

      Out of 325,341 users, only 329 are using 21" CRTs? But 9,110 are using bigger CRTs? (Perhaps they are reported as 21.1, 21.2, 21.3...)

      24.44% of respondents have 250G+ total HDD space, but 24.05% have 20G free space left. Does that mean 75% of people have too much pr0n? Or does it mean 25% do not have enough?

      Further research warranted.



    • bjornski, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1No, it is NOT "generally accepted" that the Valve survey is a accurate snapshot of the PC gamer population.

      It's an accurate snapshot of people that play Valve games.

  • oilcan, on 10/11/2007, -11/+6people like to play their games, not troubleshoot why their games aren't working properly
    • Iamnotwhoiam, on 10/11/2007, -6/+4Ain't that the truth
    • estvir, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6The truth is that ATI/Nvidia have both been dragging their feet but with Nvidia for a lot of people their drivers have been fine since the early 10x.xx range.

      Also, another truth is that they're are morons who blame Vista for slack hardware vendors.
    • naio, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4I always thought that troubleshooting the OS was a karma exclusive to Linux users... ;-)
  • troglodytejb, on 10/11/2007, -3/+6Specs for gaming on vista actually aren't that bad; the majority of the issues people have are poor vista drivers combined with legacy DX9 support. A machine running DX10 in a designed-for-dx10 game is far MORE efficient than DX9- or will be when they're available.

    As for memory, Vista idles high, at about 400-500 megs of RAM used for system idle. The rest of the memory usage is for active caching of commonly used apps- which is instantly dumped as soon as you need it.
  • f4nt0m4s, on 10/11/2007, -5/+8Counter-Strike 1.6 (aka the old CS) is built on OpenGL.

    More Steam users play CS 1.6 than CS Source.

    Vista is not OpenGL friendly.

    I know I had a few issues getting my nVidia card to run CS the right way in Vista...and simple things like smoke grenades tie down my system a bit. Not to mention the 8 year old game is running up my processors a lot more than i think it should be. Everyone is waving bye to OpenGL...except Counter-Strike. The Hardware and Direct3d Options suck ass to play CS in too.

    And ***** source, don't even mention that I should just upgrade and play that.

    • grumbel, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3These days you could most likely render CS1.6 via software rendering and it would run fine, CS isn't exactly the most hardware demanding game these days.
    • dracflamloc, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3@grumble

      Nor was it even when it came out! =)
    • bemenaker, on 10/11/2007, -3/+2My real question is, why are you still playing an 8 year old game? After Battlefield came out, I can't go back to CS. Nor do I play Quake 2 anymore, why, it's 10 years old.

      Honestly, I'm not trying to start a flame war, but I just don't understand why CS is still so popular.
    • estvir, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4> Vista is not OpenGL friendly.

      Yes, yes it is, but drivers from ATI/Nvidia originally weren't. The first bunch of drivers from Nvidia were horrible, at first I couldn't even run 1.6 than soon after I could but there would be artifacts, bizarre problems, slow performance, etc but for months now OpenGL games, like 1.6, have worked perfectly.

      I also mostly went back to XP/Ubuntu till the Nvidia drivers were sorted out for me and that was months ago, I've been playing games perfectly (From games like CS to SupCom, CoH, etc) for months now on my 7600GT.

      > Honestly, I'm not trying to start a flame war, but I just don't understand why CS is still so popular.

      In all honestly, I think BF sucks. I played 1942 at LANs, mostly just a mate and myself flying in helicopters in Desert Combat and I've tried getting into the online scene for BF2 but personally I find the game horrible.

      There hasn't really been a good FPS to displace CS, well, there have been lots of good ones (DoD:S, HL2DM, etc which I tend to play more than 1.6 these days), but none which have caught on because let's face it, they didn't manage to capture the CS gamers attention for whatever reason. It also doesn't help that Q4 sucked and aside from ET:QW there isn't much else coming out.
  • TheG2, on 10/11/2007, -5/+7As a Vista user for the last 3 months, I can say I'm a bit shocked by this, but I don't think it accurately represents the actual Market, but rather a small section of the market. For instance, I haven't started up Steam since I upgraded (waiting for episode 2).

    So what the statistics are really saying is that out of all Steam users who took the survey, a small minority uses Vista.

    And to all the whines about resource use and mainframes....your talking out your ass. Got a decent computer capable of playing todays games at above low settings and your computer will run Vista just fine.
  • pcp777, on 10/11/2007, -3/+6When I built my rig in late March I had the choice of Vista Basic or XP Home, same price of $99 at Fry's ( FYI-You get a special if you tell them its for a rig you're building)

    Went with XP as I don't want to mess with driver and software compatibility issues.

    When I decide I want to buy a DX10 game I will consider it and an 8800 series card, pretty much holding out for SP1 before I do anything...and it better be a BAD ASS game for me to shell out that kinda money.



    ABIT NF-MNS
    AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3800+, MMX, 3DNow (2 CPUs), ~2.0GHz
    1022MB RAM Corsair
    300 GB Seagate SATA
    PNY NVIDIA GeForce 7950 GT 512 MB
    SB Audigy 2 ZS Audio Gamer's Edition
    USB Saitek Eclipse
    USB Emprex
    Windows XP Home Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 2 (2600.xpsp_sp2_gdr.070227-2254)

  • skyscape, on 10/11/2007, -10/+1no one cares about this story, gamers are immature homeboys anyways
  • homerhomer, on 10/11/2007, -7/+6How about the percentage of people using Wine on Linux?
    • dn11, on 10/11/2007, -4/+8it was far below threshold
    • aAnaRchY, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1I agree with you,how about the percentage of people using Wine/Cedega on Linux? I personally use Cedega daily to play Counter Strike online. And this isn't a small percentage as the guy above me says! If you go to Cedega forums you will find hundreds of user posts only about Counter Strike let alone the other user post for the other Valve games. And if you consider that with Cedega/Wine you can play all new and old Valve games then the percentage for Linux gaming is not far below threshold! When i fill out the Valve survey it has detect my Operating System as Windows XP!
  • chris9902, on 10/11/2007, -7/+11It's still 100% more than Macs.
  • EnderMB, on 10/11/2007, -6/+4Typical article from Digg based on MS failing.

    Vista isn't all that bad. I run Vista for the same reason many others will. We've bought computers with Vista pre-installed. Once people find their computers to be out of date, they will get a Vista computer, and once most people are using it there will be Vista centric features. The Microsoft Tax still exists.

    So yeah. MS isn't going anywhere, OSX isn't going to take any market share (unless, god forbid, some of the 'mac users' here actually buy a mac), and Ubuntu is very far away from being anywhere near a Windows alternative.
    • mirunit, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I like how the MACs look - but really 500$ extra for 128mb more of GPU memory - wow. Also, vista for everything excluding games is great in my opinion. The overall OS seems better optimized for todays hardware and the eyecandy isn't too bad either.
  • CompIsMyRx, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8People using Wine default to Windows 2000 because of how WINE's system works (it officially emulates Windows 2000 by default).
  • totorototoro, on 10/11/2007, -4/+5Interesting stats. I thought gamers and power users were the early adopters in general, hence Microsoft's focus on their Vista is for Gamers campaign, etc.
    And most corporations tend to be more conservative (i.e. waiting for the first Service Pack)...makes me wonder who those 10 million Vista buyers are.
    • bemenaker, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2They are, but with horrible drivers, and no games requiring Vista, why bother now. We have been burned too many times in the past, most of us are waiting and letting things stabilize more.
  • defektiv, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5i'm a HUGE gamer and i love Vista. granted, hardware/software manufacturers are still trying to build stable drivers to work with it but that's expected with any new OS. the only way to combat this is to release Vista dev kits before releasing the software and that doesn't make much sense from a business perspective, although i think MS could make it work.

    i just don't like valve much. i've enjoyed some of their titles but i get sick of installing all sorts of front-ends and 3rd party programs just to play their stupid game. at least bf2142 doesn't MAKE you install the ea downloader, although you'll be pretty much limited if you don't install PB.

    EA and Valve seem notorious for forcing marketing packages and questionable front-ends onto the people that payed good money for their products.
  • shinelikeitdoes, on 10/11/2007, -9/+6Vista is a steaming pile of crap. I had the grievous misfortune of purchasing a new gaming laptop with Vista included. I will either be reformatting it with XP, or selling it. Other than a somewhat "cooler" looking interface (in some people's opinion anyway), it is just a clusterf**k of more crap code piled on top of the old crap code. There is absolutely no compelling reason for anyone to upgrade from XP (more secure? yeah right).

    I'm not even an anti-Microsoft person. I have had XP running perfectly stable for years no problems. Vista is a nightmare.
  • hungryduck17, on 10/11/2007, -7/+7while Microsoft keeps trying to entice us with shoddy Xbox 360 ports to PC that only run on vista to get people buy plunk down cash for the lousy new OS.......like Halo 2 PC.
    They're not foolin' anyone.
    • Sirocco, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7You can dig him down, but he's nailed it. You'll note in the "Games For Windows" specifications that Xbox360 gamepad support as well as widescreen display support are mandatory. Sound familiar? "Games For Windows" is Microsoft's way of pushing developers to Vista and 360 by forcing them to support common features. This is hardly surprising.

      http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb173456.aspx
    • Darcy, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1Microsoft can't really win here. They have one group of people complaining that there are no reasons to upgrade to Vista because it offers nothing new, and the other group complaining when something is Vista only. What do you expect them to do?
  • mattst88, on 10/11/2007, -3/+2375,120 (all) the CPUs support RDTSC, which was introduced in the i586s otherwise known as original Pentiums, but only 375,108 CPUs supported CMOV which was introduced by the Pentium Pro.

    Haha, out of 375 thousand users, only 12 are still using Pentium Pros.

    Strange thing is that only 375,097 have FCMOV (also implemented originally on Pentium Pros). This means at least 11 people have exotic processors that support CMOV but not FCMOV.
  • Travisx2, on 10/11/2007, -6/+7Plenty of gamers have Vista, they just haven't participated in the survey yet,
    Something about it blue-screening every time they try to run steam.
  • Spherion, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2If you wanted a more accurate poll regarding 'general' Vista use, I'd hit the Digg site stats and compare to at least 2 more major traffic sites, then take the average of the three per operating system and post the results.
  • pr5owner, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1think regular XP is fast? try Beast XP or Tiny XP, i guarentee no Other OS can match the performance of those 2 from Expirience.

    of course the above is ONLY for educational purposes, not intended for retail or comercial use. :D

    i support vista at work and right now it sucks ass, but the same happened when XP came out, nothing really supported it fully untill like a year or 2 later.
  • securegeek, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7"Surprisingly, the leading sound "card" in the survey was the lowly Realtek AC97 integrated audio chipset (24.21 percent), with the once-proud Sound Blaster line living on in less than ten percent of gamers' PCs"

    Funny they found this surpising.
    It's not like the early days when audio cards made a major difference in sound quality.
    The few frames per second you gain by using a Audigy sound card, is negated when you sink the $100-$150 the card would cost you on a better video card, or more memory.
  • i208khonsu, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4These are the same sort of articles we saw when XP came out. Wait for Vista to get out of beta (IMO) with SP1. Five years from now we'll all be shunning the idea of going back to XP just like none of us would ever install 98 on out boxes now.
  • ross3093, on 10/11/2007, -4/+0that survey is very dead on in comparable to my setup.
  • doubleblack, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7I've been running Steam on Vista since Thanksgiving, no issues or anything - I am pretty satisfied with Valve's Vista Support...don't be afraid! Some other providers might not support Vista as well, and Valve can still optimize a thing or two...but I'm satisfied :)
  • BoomWav, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2Just wait until a DirectX 10 game comes out and every "lucid" gamer will change anyway. I own Vista since day 2 and I just love it. I even gained a performance gain on my laptop by using ReadyBoost. Even my game PC has it and I love it. Once DirectX games are released, we'll beat consoles in graphics again.. PC is the way. Vista is the way.
  • Trixrox, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4No surprise, Vista is an expensive upgrade, and most gamers don't really need to buy a new PC to play any games Available on Steam.

    Vista works nicely for gaming though, at least if you have ATI.
  • Saint3k, on 10/11/2007, -2/+2People won't migrate to Vista until they need to, IE. They buy a new computer which has Vista preinstalled. I wouldn't count on it's market share being incredibly high in comparison to XP for at least another year and a half.
    • StephenCIreland, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5whatt decent gamer buys a stock pc ? building your own is half the adventure
  • archer75, on 10/11/2007, -4/+4How many people actually use steam? I don't.
    • bjornski, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I do. I installed it solely for X3.

      And the free Half Life stuff for ATI users is awesome.

      Thanks guys!

  • nsjoker, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5XP has another 2 good years left I think.
  • Juaquin, on 10/11/2007, -3/+4Duh. Frame rates are about 10-15% lower in Vista on my own machine, mostly due to drivers but also due to Vista not yet being fully optimized. 10-15% may not seem like much, but when playing a game like supreme commander when frame rates can drop below 20, that extra 15% is a big deal.
    • mirunit, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1http://guru3d.com/ Check for newest driver releases on the download pages and in the forums. Performance for me has been pretty much normalized, there is still a slight frame loss - but Vista seems more responsive overall.
  • Topher06, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4These days, nobody runs out and buys an OS when it comes out (except Mac users). What will hurt MS in the long run is the fact that nobody runs out and buys a new computer every 12 months either. Eventually Vista will be the standard installed base for PC's as people buy new and replace old computers, so it will happen in a couple of years, but it was the same story with XP. All this talk about people not needing XP when they had a perfectly good Windows 2000 box, now they won't get rid of XP for Vista. People have short memories these days.

    In the meantime nVidia and ATI should be working to improve driver performance under Vista so that there some compelling reason to even buy a new computer. Also, it would be nice if Valve came out with a new game more then a couple of times a decade. Nothing would drive a gamer to buy a whole new system and embrace Vista like HL3 using DX10, or even a reworked HL2 engine using DX10.
    • totorototoro, on 10/11/2007, -3/+4"These days, nobody runs out and buys an OS when it comes out (except Mac users)."

      Uh, and according to Microsoft, 40 million PC users :p.
  • drburgos, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2I use Vist Ultimate and I love it. I'm an avid gamer and what I have found with my Nvidia chip is that the recent drivers just releaed are not as good as the ones that micrsoft automatically installs. That's pretty weird but in games like CS:S I get comparable framerates to when I had XP. I just recently purchased Shadowrun for the PC and I have to admit the game looks great but is choppy due to my lowly AMD 64 3200+. I have 2 Gigs of ram and a 6600 GT so my system is far from the best but all my games run fine except for Shadowrun.
  • StephenCIreland, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2im only on steam because ATi Gave away HL2 deathmatch, but il say one thing, it worked, im considering buying css and a hl2 pack,
  • seraph82, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2This isn't news.
  • mobilehavoc, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4Yes because every single ***** Vista user logs into Steam and uploads their hardware info as part of Valve's survey!!! DUH!!
  • ortucis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I will upgrade to Vista in 2008 when there will be a horde of DX10 cards and there will be a horde of reduction in the hording prices.

    Hmm..

    Anyways, right now I am happy with my 6800GS, DX9 and XP Pro.
  • ochimaru, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Until DX10 is stable and there are more vid cards supporting DX10, it's unlikely that very many DX10 games will come out, and until the DX10 games come out to wow the gamers, there is no rush for any of us to switch to Vista. But I think a lot of hardcore gamers are preparing to switch or dual-boot. Dual booting is the way to go, if you ask me. Especially with how cheap hard drives are these days! I plan to run Kubuntu, XP and Vista on my next gaming machine.
    • an0nym0us, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1hardwares are so cheap nowadays i ran 3 desktops just to run multiple os, how nice is that? ;)
  • naonao, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2More like "Valve users yet to embrace Steam"
  • Darcy, on 10/11/2007, -1/+35.27% in 4 months doesn't seem bad to me. In fact I think it's pretty good considering the massive amount of FUD that's been spread about Vista over the last 6-12 months. When I read the title, I was expecting it to be below 1%.

  • eN1X, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1I "embraced" Vista and by "embraced" I mean "downloaded a cracked copy" and my Valve games run like ***** now. I've lost 10-15fps on my source engine games and Counter-Strike 1.6 runs very sloppily.

    Could just be ATi's drivers, but then again all my other games beautifully so I'm not sure on this one.
    • mirunit, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1With 16xCSAA 16xAF 1680x1050 + HDR I get 194 FPS on the stress test on Vista - so I would assume that you have old drivers or there is another problem.
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