the latest poll on the gamedev newsletter:

Q: What shader model does your video card support?

None------------------24----|||----------------------------------2.33%
SM 1.0----------------15----||-----------------------------------1.46%
SM 2.0----------------115---|||||||||||||------------------------11.1%
SM 3.0----------------336---||||||||||||||||||||||||||||---------32.7%
SM 4.0----------------377---|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||----36.7%
I've got no idea...---160---|||||||||||||||----------------------15.5%

Total Votes: 1027

as you can see most have 3.0 or higher, and almost none have 1.0 or less, so i dont understand why people keep saying we should design games not have shaders, and not be optimised for around shader 2.0 generation or higher cards.