eMarketer tracks the behavior and demographics of consumers visiting software and hardware sites.

Visitors to PC manufacturer websites spend varying amounts of time at each site, according to Nielsen data, but it can be misleading. The hour-plus amount of time spent on the Apple site, for instance, includes visitors to iTunes, where users can sample, buy and download music, videos, podcasts or TV shows. Users hop on and off the B2B sites such as Cisco, Intel and Sun Microsystems, spending only about four to six minutes. Sites that are strictly PC-oriented, such as Dell, Gateway and Hewlett-Packard, show visitors stayed an average of between 12 minutes and 18 minutes. Visitors to these sites could configure and compare computers and peripherals, and either buy online or take their research offline to a local store.

Almost twice as many people visited software publishers' sites in January 2006 than went to hardware sites, according to Nielsen//NetRatings, most likely because a computer or peripheral is generally a one-time purchase, while software is designed for different purposes -- business, system maintenance, entertainment, et cetera -- and different age groups and users. Visitors to software sites are evenly divided between the genders, 50.25 percent male versus 49.75 percent female, though these sites drew a slightly younger demographic than hardware sites, presumably for gaming or entertainment software.

Time spent on software publishers' sites was generally less than 10 minutes, on average, where visitors could get product information and download software. Only Microsoft, the software market leader, and Danga Interactive -- the Wikipedia company -- kept visitors longer than 45 minutes.

Lisa Phillips is a senior analyst at eMarketer. eMarketer is the "first place to look" for market research information related to the internet, ebusiness, and online marketing. To email eMarketer, click here.