Most Popular Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060, Steam Hardware Survey

[BorisDG]

Even my old 1080Ti is more powerful (raster). Weird choice.

I find it hard to believe that a third of all owners of 2-core and 4-core systems simultaneously upgraded to a 6-core processor in the month of February. Looks like a tabulation error.

Why not? Ryzen 5 (3600/5600) are most common CPUs out there. They are also affordable.

 

[P4-630]

Why not? Ryzen 5 (3600/5600) are most common CPUs out there. They are also affordable.

Or Intel i5's...Since 74,46% is intel....

 

[evernessince]

I find it hard to believe that a third of all owners of 2-core and 4-core systems simultaneously upgraded to a 6-core processor in the month of February. Looks like a tabulation error.

Edit: check the language breakdown. "Simplified Chinese" doubled from 25% of the results to 50%. So maybe this is a net cafe gone haywire and massively over-reporting its systems.

Steam survey had and still has an net cafe reporting issue. A 21% drop in english users in a single month? Doesn't make any sense. All the GPUs on top of the steam survey chart over the years have remained top GPUs in netcafes.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say the vast majority of these 3060's are mobile versions.

Doesn't make any sense that we'd see this many 3060s added in a single month during a massive market decline. It makes a lot more sense if you go with the assumption that netcafe's are upgrading in China and picked up used dirt cheap mined on 3060s, which are plentiful in china.

How do you take the steam survey? I have steam, but have never been invited or asked to take a survey.

You don't get to choose to take the survey, Valve issues a survey based on criteria they have no disclosed. I typically get asked to take a survey after I change hardware. I've taken the survey almost every upgrade (which for me is at least once a year).

Hi,
Think it's a privacy setting.

I believe that's the setting to whether they will ask you at all, whether you actually get to take the survey is based on some unknown algorithm.

 

[Gahl1k]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say the vast majority of these 3060's are mobile versions.

Steam has changed the way it collects data and now recognises and separates Laptop GPUs. The 3060 Laptop sits at 3%.

Regardless of its accuracy, it's sad seeing 6600, 6600XT, and 6700XT combined only make for 1.01%, such great value products.

 

[Frick]

Even my old 1080Ti is more powerful (raster). Weird choice.

Not really. Solid choice for laptops, and for a long time it was a solid choice for desktop.

 

[Lew Zealand]

So in a single month the number of Chinese speakers gaming doubled. So is this month's survey or last month's survey inaccurate and useless?

Answer: Both

 

[Suspecto]

"While some might argue that the Steam Survey is not exactly precise as it is apparently based on a random survey, it does give a general idea and shows the big picture."

Anyone using such an argument has then no clue about statistics. The survey being random is actually the key factor how to get an accurate result closely mirroring the reality. A unique entry is not required either.

The only way to get the precise result is to survey everyone, which is impossible.

 

[BorisDG]

Not really. Solid choice for laptops, and for a long time it was a solid choice for desktop.

There are plenty of benchmarks and reviews. 1080 Ti > 3060 (Raster)

 

[bug]

"While some might argue that the Steam Survey is not exactly precise as it is apparently based on a random survey, it does give a general idea and shows the big picture."

Anyone using such an argument has then no clue about statistics. The survey being random is actually the key factor how to get an accurate result closely mirroring the reality. A unique entry is not required either.

The only way to get the precise result is to survey everyone, which is impossible.

Most people don't. They prefer to explain things the way of conspiracies, fate or even witchcraft. Believe it or not, for the majority, that's the "reasonable" way.

 

[Melted Rabbit]

About those numbers for Simplified Chinese users, remember the whole messy break up between NetEase and Activision Blizzard? Activision Blizzard left the Chinese market which left a huge hole in the market over there.

There are numerous gamers in China looking to get their fix elsewhere and Steam is a possible replacement.

In a few months, the Steam survey numbers for Simplified Chinese will make it clear whether Chinese gamers continue actively using Steam or if the percentage of Simplified Chinese users drop off if those users become inactive and drop out from the survey.

 

[Frick]

There are plenty of benchmarks and reviews. 1080 Ti > 3060 (Raster)

Sure. But a) there are no 1080tis in laptops, and b) a few years ago when GPU's where very hard to find there were basically no 1080ti's for sale, because prices were crazy, and c) before that, when prices were saner you'd still had to find a used card as opposed to buy a new card and d) all of this depends on the prices for used cards where you happen to live, also e) if you're looking to buy a new card dredging Facebook/Ebay/Craigslist/Door to door-buying/forums for a decent card is NOT a fun experience, unless you're a nutter.

I mean honestly I don't get your point. The Titan RTX is faster than both those cards, weird how people just don't buy that instead of GTX 1660's.

 

[Lionheart]

Playing any game at max setting 1080p and even running the hardest to run PC game Last of Us (2022) at 37 FPS in 1440p. Better performance than a PS5. Of course you might get lag spikes unless you have a processor and RAM that competes with PS5 but still not bad IMO. The 3060 shaped up to be a fairly decent card despite some of the pricing hold backs and it's not even a ti card.

The only thing it had going for it was it's 12gb VRAM buffer, wasn't much faster than the standard 2060 6gb & your analysis on the Last Of Us Part 1 comparison couldn't be more wrong.

 

[evernessince]

The survey being random is actually the key factor how to get an accurate result closely mirroring the reality

Not sure steam has ever made the claim that the steam survey is random nor have they ever publicly disclosed the algorithm used to select participants.

Selecting participants in a survey is just one part of what makes a survey accurate, the how, when, and why are all equally important. Particularly when you are talking about polling virtual participants, where you can not exactly validate that each survey response is from a system that hasn't been polled before. In addition steam has a very strict data collection policy, which surely makes fingerprinting unique systems even harder.

Add to that, we know for a fact that steam has had ongoing issues and has revised multiple past surveys due to inaccuracies. At least the ones they have caught as far as they know. The steam survey is only really useful as puff pieces for tech and gaming news websites, anyone using it otherwise is doing so because they are either ignorant or it validates their pre-concieved notions.

About those numbers for Simplified Chinese users, remember the whole messy break up between NetEase and Activision Blizzard? Activision Blizzard left the Chinese market which left a huge hole in the market over there.

There are numerous gamers in China looking to get their fix elsewhere and Steam is a possible replacement.

In a few months, the Steam survey numbers for Simplified Chinese will make it clear whether Chinese gamers continue actively using Steam or if the percentage of Simplified Chinese users drop off if those users become inactive and drop out from the survey.

There are three problems with this conclusion

1) Blizzard's products were disabled in China on January 23rd. Why would we see a jump now and not in the two months in between?

2) You assume that every person switching from Activision / Blizzard's platform are being polled. If the survey is random, it would not poll all the new Chinese users at once and not within such a specific timeframe. If it is then it's not remotely random.

3) You assume that said users didn't already have a steam account. The overlap between users who have a Activision / Blizzard account who also have a steam account is likely extremely high.

 

[LabRat 891]

So, what Valve is saying is:
They haven't sold NEARLY enough Steam Decks

 

[Readlight]

I guess FX and fastest AM3 procesors were not so popular i5 looks good.

 

[mama]

This looks wrong. I am interested to know how these statistics are collected and from whom.

 

[Arkz]

Playing any game at max setting 1080p and even running the hardest to run PC game Last of Us (2022) at 37 FPS in 1440p. Better performance than a PS5. Of course you might get lag spikes unless you have a processor and RAM that competes with PS5 but still not bad IMO. The 3060 shaped up to be a fairly decent card despite some of the pricing hold backs and it's not even a ti card.

Not a good example. 37fps in 1440p? PS5 runs it 60fps locked in 1440p or 60-90fps using VRR. And 30-45fps in 2160p.

Any game max 1080p??
I doubt it runs CP2077 max settings in 1080p without it being closer to 30 than 50fps most of the time.

It's a decent 1080p card, or it would be if it wasn't still stupidly priced after all this time. 0060 cards are supposed to be the lower end price point. It's why the 1060 was so popular, but both 2060 and 3060 have been quite the rip off for the perf. Especially if you got a 3060Ti FE at MSRP up to 2 years ago..

 

[claylomax]

How do you take the steam survey? I have steam, but have never been invited or asked to take a survey.

With Steam running, press the Windows key and "R"

Then copy and enter this:

steam://takesurvey/1/

Ignore the name of the game on the first line; it doesn't matter, it works the same.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

I find it hard to believe that a third of all owners of 2-core and 4-core systems simultaneously upgraded to a 6-core processor in the month of February. Looks like a tabulation error.

Edit: check the language breakdown. "Simplified Chinese" doubled from 25% of the results to 50%. So maybe this is a net cafe gone haywire and massively over-reporting its systems.

I agree if this isn't a fine example of why something is wrong with the steam survey then I don't know what is.

 

[64K]

With Steam running, press the Windows key and "R"

Then copy and enter this:

steam://takesurvey/1/

Ignore the name of the game on the first line; it doesn't matter, it works the same.

You can do that with
steam://takesurvey/2/
steam://takesurvey/3/
steam://takesurvey/4/
also but yeah, the name of the game doesn't matter.

 

[dirtyferret]

Steam hardware survey has always been inaccurate and as a result useless, don't give it too much thought.

statistics are not inaccurate unless falsified, people can have inaccurate takes on statistics.

 

[64K]

statistics are not inaccurate unless falsified, people can have inaccurate takes on statistics.

I don't think the stats can be falsified. The survey scans your PC and collects the info automatically.

 

[dirtyferret]

I don't think the stats can be falsified. The survey scans your PC and collects the info automatically.

agreed which means the latter is happening

 

[Robin Seina]

Why is this even a newsworthy? Until Valve releases precise methodology, its "statistics" cannot be taken seriously.

What we do not know:
method of choosing sample (various leaks through years suggests that choosing process is biased)
size of the sample
mean and median
sample standard deviation
coefficient of deviation
reliability coefficient

What is a "statistics" for, if you don't have access to raw data? Only for propaganda.

"The only statistics you can trust are those you falsified yourself" - Joseph Goebbels

​

 

[dirtyferret]

"The only statistics you can trust are those you falsified yourself" - Joseph Goebbels

big fan of nazi's huh?