Early adopters and enthusiasts drive most new technology in its first few months on the market. Windows 8 is proving to be no different as the latest Steam Hardware & Software Survey shows Microsoft’s newest operating system picking up steam on the service.

Valve recently released the data it collected in January on its users’ hardware and software setups. The operating system chart is by far the most interesting because it shows that all versions of Windows except for Windows 8 is declining in usage. Granted, there are no huge declines or huge gains here, but it shows that Windows 8 use is growing among PC gamers.

Going into the numbers, both Windows 8 and Windows 8 64-bit saw a collective increase of 1.83 percent with the majority of the increase going to the 64-bit version. All in all, Windows 8 is now 8.76 percent of all Steam users’ PCs. Windows 7 is still in the the lead, however, as both 32 and 64-bit versions make up 69.73 percent of the Steam user base.

It’s important to note that Steam users don’t represent all PC users. They do, however, represent a large chunk of the active PC gamer community. The increased adoption of Windows 8 shows that PC gamers, whom were largely skeptical of the OS, are starting to switch over to it from Windows 7, Vista and XP.

Now, Microsoft definitely needs to appeal to more than just PC gamers, but this is a great start. The company can use these gamers and enthusiasts as makeshift evangelists to spread the word of Windows 8 to more casual users who may be wary of the operating system. It’s a far more effective marketing campaign than confusing piñata ads.

[h/t: The Next Web]