世論 What Japan Thinks

Much as I might have thought that there would be a sizeable geek population who would have a copy of Linux installed somewhere on one of their home machines, especially given the multiple machine ownership data, a recent article published on japan.internet.com regarding a survey conducted by goo Research on the topic of computers at home suggests otherwise.

Demographics

Between the 15th and 17th of June 2007 1,087 members of goo Research’s monitor pool successfully completed an online questionnaire. 52.6% of the sample was male, 17.4% in their teens, 19.7% in their twenties, 17.8% in their thirties, 17.3% in their forties, 17.0% in their fifties, and 10.9% aged sixty or older.

I’m Windows XP on my one home-brew, and if I were upgrading, the main factors controlling my decision would of course be price, followed by at least one gigabyte of memory and perhaps 150 gigs of hard disk. One gig of RAM – I remember when I was a kid trying to persuade my father to let my brother and I raid our savings to buy a 16K ZX81 wobbly RAM pack for a mere £100.

Research results

Q1: How many computers do you have at home? (Sample size=1,087)

One	39.4%
Two	34.0%
Three	13.7%
Four	6.8%
Five or more	5.7%
None (to end of survey)	0.4%

The 1,083 with at least one computer at home were asked the following questions.

Q2: What operating systems do you have installed on you home computers? (Sample size=1,083, multiple answer)

	Votes	Percentage
Windows XP	919	84.9%
Windows 2000	105	9.7%
Windows Vista	94	8.7%
Windows Me	84	7.8%
Windows 98	79	7.3%
Mac OS X	58	5.4%
Windows 98 SE	39	3.6%
Linux-based OS	21	1.9%
Other Mac OS	9	0.8%
Other	13	1.2%
Don’t know	7	0.6%

Q3: What makes of home computer do you own? (Sample size=1,083, multiple answer)

	Votes	Percentage
NEC	344	31.8%
Fujitsu	242	22.3%
Sony	210	19.4%
Home-built, shop brand	177	16.3%
DELL	163	15.1%
Toshiba	130	12.0%
Apple	78	7.2%
Sharp	67	6.2%
Sotec	57	5.3%
IBM	55	5.1%
Hitachi	46	4.2%
Panasonic	42	3.9%
HP/COMPAQ	33	3.0%
Gateway	22	2.0%
Mouse Computer	18	1.7%
eMachines	12	1.1%
ACER	3	0.3%
Other	48	4.4%

Q4: When buying a home computer what is the most important point? (Sample size=1,083)

	Votes	Percentage
Price	422	39.0%
CPU	193	17.8%
Maker	134	12.4%
Hard disk size	89	8.2%
Shop	64	5.9%
Design	57	5.3%
Memory size	57	5.3%
Size, weight	30	2.8%
Chipset	9	0.8%
Other	28	2.6%