The statistics are in. According to the Steam Hardware Survey of April 2010 the operating system that has the biggest share of the market is 32 bit Win XP. This operating system currently has 36 percent of the market. That is probably not a surprise as consumers and businesses haven’t completely endorsed the move to Windows 7. However, over a period of one month Windows XP lost 2.6 percent of the market share. And guess to whom.
That’s right Windows 7. However, what is surprising is that the Windows 7, 64 bit platform is now second, with just over 26 percent of the market. WinXP lost market share, and by an almost identical amount, Windows 7 gained as much.
Windows - Market Share
As we progress through the rest of the operating systems, we find some surprises. Windows Vista in the 32 bit platform is third with just over 16 percent of market share; but losing just under one half a percent. Still it is a loss.
In fourth place is Windows 7, 32 bit version with around 11 percent of market share; but only gaining a third of one percent.
What is also interesting is that the other 2 Windows 64 bit operating systems, Windows Vista, and Windows XP gained share last month. Windows Server 2003 – 64 bit lost a small fraction of market share. What this means is that 64 bit CPU’s are on the rise as well.
Both Intel and AMD control the CPU share of the market. Intel with 70 percent, AMD with 30 percent. But in both cases, there is a rise in the number of CPU’s that are used by computers. Right now, the 2 core CPU computer setup takes up about 55 percent of the market. But the 4 core CPU is gaining traction and now have just under 28 percent of the market share.
Market Share: Intel and AMD
Windows 7 is probably driving this development. As companies make the migration to Windows 7, they are also upgrading their boxes. And why stop at dual core when quad core is available?
CPU Adoption Trend
Source: SteamPowered
