Another month gone, and another Steam Hardware Survey to take a look at. This month we have an unfortunate drop in numbers.
Linux results for March 2015
Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS 64 bit 0.28%-0.02%
Ubuntu 14.10 64 bit 0.12%-0.03%
Linux Mint 17.1 Rebecca 64 bit 0.09%-0.02%
Linux 3.10 64 bit 0.08%-0.01%
Total: 0.94%-0.11%
Last Month: 1.06%
It's also interesting to note that for Linux the Intel HD Graphics 4000 chip is the most popular. Intel actually dominates the top of the GPU list it seems. My chip the powerful Nvidia 970 also looks to be quickly rising up.
My thoughts on it
It's always sad to see a decline, but we're talking about such low percentages here it's anyone's guess what happened.
It still remains to be seen how Steam Machines will be counted (if at all). On desktop operating systems you need to manually opt-in if it asks you, so will they go through that for SteamOS? I've actually shot off a message to Valve to see if they could clarify how this will be done.
Important things to remember
Be aware these results will probably not be that accurate as we don't know how they do their percentage results, they could be rounding up, rounding down or truncating the percentages. So a 0.5% could actually be nearly 0.6% as it could be 0.59% but they could do no rounding and simply truncate it.
Also remember it is a survey, so it won't ask every single one of you to do it. It would only be truly accurate if it did it behind the scenes, but that's not what a survey is for as this is just to get a general idea.
Final Note: Look at it this way, Steam has around 125 million active users, 1% of 125 million is about 1,250,000 people. What developer wouldn't want to hook into a market that's possibly that big? Of course it doesn't mean they are guaranteed that amount of sales, but it's something fun to remember.
See the Hardware Survey on Steam here. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Linux results for March 2015
Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS 64 bit 0.28%-0.02%
Ubuntu 14.10 64 bit 0.12%-0.03%
Linux Mint 17.1 Rebecca 64 bit 0.09%-0.02%
Linux 3.10 64 bit 0.08%-0.01%
Total: 0.94%-0.11%
Last Month: 1.06%
It's also interesting to note that for Linux the Intel HD Graphics 4000 chip is the most popular. Intel actually dominates the top of the GPU list it seems. My chip the powerful Nvidia 970 also looks to be quickly rising up.
My thoughts on it
It's always sad to see a decline, but we're talking about such low percentages here it's anyone's guess what happened.
It still remains to be seen how Steam Machines will be counted (if at all). On desktop operating systems you need to manually opt-in if it asks you, so will they go through that for SteamOS? I've actually shot off a message to Valve to see if they could clarify how this will be done.
Important things to remember
Be aware these results will probably not be that accurate as we don't know how they do their percentage results, they could be rounding up, rounding down or truncating the percentages. So a 0.5% could actually be nearly 0.6% as it could be 0.59% but they could do no rounding and simply truncate it.
Also remember it is a survey, so it won't ask every single one of you to do it. It would only be truly accurate if it did it behind the scenes, but that's not what a survey is for as this is just to get a general idea.
Final Note: Look at it this way, Steam has around 125 million active users, 1% of 125 million is about 1,250,000 people. What developer wouldn't want to hook into a market that's possibly that big? Of course it doesn't mean they are guaranteed that amount of sales, but it's something fun to remember.
See the Hardware Survey on Steam here. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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The comments on this article are closed.
Very new to Linux, using it for one and a half week now and I love it.
Dota 2 and Team Fortress 2 is running perfectly and it's sad so many people don't use Linux but guys in the future Linux will maybe grow and dominate :)
Dota 2 and Team Fortress 2 is running perfectly and it's sad so many people don't use Linux but guys in the future Linux will maybe grow and dominate :)
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Quoting: CybaCowboyBut those statistics are only based off those that receive the survey request and choose to complete the survey, right?
Not a very accurate way of documenting the actual hardware statistics, considering you're going to have a number of users refuse to participate and no way of ensuring a balanced collection of data... Valve Software should factor-in the number of Steam clients running on a given platform, either in the background or in-game.
There's no reason why Valve Software couldn't have such a data-collection method as an "opt-in" feature and it would surely have to be more accurate than the way they currently do things...
There is nothing to say that they don't correct for response (ie. opt-out) rates. They almost certainly do. In fact the evidence is pretty clear, users are more likely to see a survey in Windows (or Wine) than Linux native. That's down to differing response rates on those platforms. It's not that you don't get survey requests on Linux it's that the quotas required for statistically significant data is reach much earlier when response rates are higher.
The Steam client identifies by platform (obviously) and distro, so throwing up a survey request on startup to those platforms without a full quota is pretty straight-forward. Hell, even browsing to store.steampowered.com shows platform specific titles almost exclusively.
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coryrj19951 May 7, 2015
Valve is probably waiting for the steam machines to release by purposely giving windows users more surveys. Then after the release flip the surveys so Linux users get more, Linux users skyrocket and the steam machine is a "success" automatically. Aha, I figured it out! :P
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marcelomendes May 7, 2015
QuoteAlso remember it is a survey, so it won't ask every single one of you to do it. It would only be truly accurate if it did it behind the scenes, but that's not what a survey is for as this is just to get a general idea.
The weird thing is, that since I installed the Steam Linux (Beta) years ago I answered the survey only once, but I have lost the counting of how many times it pop up for me when I start Steam from PlayOnLinux. So, what kind of "randomness" is that?
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Quoting: coryrj19951Valve is probably waiting for the steam machines to release by purposely giving windows users more surveys. Then after the release flip the surveys so Linux users get more, Linux users skyrocket and the steam machine is a "success" automatically. Aha, I figured it out! :PAnd if they happened to release HL3 at the same time, as a timed linux exclusive, that makes linux look like a massive market.
CONSPIRACY!
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To sum up all of your guys comments:
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Weird. Always when I got chosen to fill out a survey Linux gets a big drop. Conspiracy :D
Something else came to my mind. On Windows Steam is usually started at boot. So there is the obvious increase in surveys they get.
Something else came to my mind. On Windows Steam is usually started at boot. So there is the obvious increase in surveys they get.
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ProfessorKaos64 May 30, 2015
If this is in-fact "random", and Windows users are way more likely to get "randomly" chosen, this makes me mad. I wish I got just one dang survey while on Linux/SteamOS.
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