Hardware-hungry techies pack more than five PCs each

Despite a PC market in freefall, it seems silicon.com readers are still packing a fair few pieces of hardware.

Asked how many PCs - including laptops, desktops and netbooks - they own, 45 per cent of silicon.com readers who responded admitted to having between three and five.

An even more hardware-heavy 32 per cent claimed to have between five and 10 computers tucked away while another six per cent 'fessed up to having more than 10 machines. And presumably very large houses and/or understanding partners.

At the low end, 11 per cent owned up to having a pair of PCs, five per cent said they own just one and a hardware-shunning one per cent said they have no PCs at all (which presumably means they responded to the poll either in the office or on a friend's hardware.)

In spite of silicon.com readers' fondness for devices, the PC market continues to struggle in the face of the recession.

According to research by analyst house Gartner, PC sales reached 68 million units in the second quarter of this year - a five per cent fall year-on-year. There remains cause for optimism however - Gartner was initially predicting a fall of more than 10 per cent.

Some regions are more hardware-hungry than others, the market watchers found: while the US and Asia Pacific showed some evidence of a buying rebound, Europe was dogged by "ongoing weakness" in PC shipments.