The Steam Machine is DOA. It’s severely underpowered even at like a USD$399 price, so when it’s > USD$1000 it’s an absolute joke.
By what metric? It was never intended to complete with consoles on price to performance.
For PCs, have you seen the price of components? 2GB of DDR5 is already around 200 USD, and a 512 GB M.2 NVME drive is around 90 USD. There is no way that, with the current market, you can buy or build a 400 USD PC that has specs anywhere close to the Steam Machine. Speculative/rumored prices are similar to what you could get for a similar spec mini PC.
I’m not sure what your point is. I’m saying that even if it was $400, like many people are/were expecting it to be, it’s still severely underpowered. At the actual realistic price point of well over $1000, it’s DOA because it’s less powerful than even a PS5, which is closer to $400 than $1000.
Speculative/rumored prices are similar to what you could get for a similar spec mini PC.
The difference being that those mini-PCs will be able to play games like GTA6, Fortnite, PUBG, COD, Apex, etc, while the Steam Machine cannot, and you can also upgrade those mini PCs, unlike the Steam Machine. The SOC in it dooms it.
$399? Are you talking about the steam deck? I think the article is talking about the steam machine.
Agreed tho, the cost of the steam machine will overpower what little value the hardware could provide. I don’t see it succeeding at this time. Especially when you can still cobble together a reasonably powered Linux machine.
Will also be interesting to see what future AAA titles do with the stagnant system hardware for the next few years.
No, talking about the steam machine. There are still people that think it’s going to release at like $400-$500 lol. It’s going to be over $1k for PS4 level power.
Ah. I’ve not been following price rumors/talks. And $399 made me think of the old steam deck pricing. Wild that someone would be that convinced a more powerful chunk of hardware would be so much less expensive than current steam deck prices.
Handhelds and consoles are different though. Consoles/PCs don’t have screens or controllers built in, or a battery. Most of the cost of handhelds is in making them handheld.
Some people may not want to spend time on cobbling together a Linux machine. There’s some research involved in figuring out which hardware works best, and maybe fiddling around with configuring a system. There is value in know that all of the hardware in your system will get priority support from the OS maintainer and game developers. Some glitchiness in a game on a steam machine will get fixed before some glitchiness on someone’s custom rig.
And many of us don’t buy a new PC every year. What benefit is it to me if a new AAA game has higher resolution options that aren’t available on my 2+ year old PC unless I spend a thousand dollars to buy video card or whatever?
No idea if this will be a success or not, but there is a lot of upside to having a standardized platform (there’s a reason consoles are so popular) and little downsides for anyone that’s not spending more money on hardware than on the actual games. Sure the PC Master Race types won’t want this, but I think that’s a very small group of people.
Sure the PC Master Race types won’t want this, but I think that’s a very small group of people.
The number of people that want a low powered, non-upgradeable, outdated by about 10 years gaming PC that will struggle to play anything other than 2D indies at 4K60, and also can’t play any of the big AAA games like GTA6, COD, Apex, Battlefield, etc at all is infinitely smaller than the PC Master Race types lol.
Fair enough. The ease of setup and use is a powerful feature. Though it’s not too hard to confugre a solid long running machine. Just upgraded my old Intel i5 4xxx 750TI machine only because Windows is a pain. Haven’t been able to play a AAA title in a minute though lol.
I’m just thinking about the people I know who purchased a PS5 Pro and I’m not sure they’re going to be the ones tinkering with proton settings on a Linux desktop.
We will surly see as time goes by. And I’m planning to get one if I can because I like tinkering and messing with things.
I’m just thinking about the people I know who purchased a PS5 Pro and I’m not sure they’re going to be the ones tinkering with proton settings on a Linux desktop.
I’d think if you get the steam machine you won’t be tinkering with the proton settings. Valve will do that and since you’re running on the same hardware they’ve tested there shouldn’t be any issues.
I did build a PC a couple of years ago, but I found myself wishing someone would just put out a decently priced PC that has hardware that’s tested with Linux. If the steam machine had have been a thing then, I would’ve gone that route. Also there’s a lot of people that aren’t happy with Windows and would like to try Linux but are worried it will be a major headache to switch (which it can be in many cases). With MS basically forcing many people to buy a new PC since Windows 11 doesn’t work on a lot of PCs currently running 10, some people might want to give the steam machine a shot… and they do have the option of paying the MS tax later and installing windows on it if they it’s not to their liking.
Hard to say how it will go, but there are reasons to get this thing. We’ll have to see how many people actually want to get it.
Hard to say how it will go
It really isn’t. This thing needed to be cheap if it was going to gain any traction. It needed to undercut everything comparable on the market, significantly. Valve needed to aggressively subsidize it since they make money hand over fist from every game that it can play. Instead it’s going to be even worse than the last time they released steam machines, only this time it will be much more damaging to them since they’re making it themselves.
I wonder if they’re going to have a sku for the Frame with drastically reduced ram that’s required to be tethered to a host PC and not run anything on its own until upgraded.
Being a standalone unit is nice, but I wasn’t planning on using it that way, and being able to save money by reducing ram would be nice
The Frame is an embedded mobile device with space constraints, it’s going to have soldered ram and storage. At least it has a Micro SD card slot so you don’t have to necessarily pay for the biggest SSD.
This would be smart. Like it would have been a bonus for me but it’s not worth the premium on ram right now.
That’s what I’ve been wanting, but I don’t think so, at least not yet. I have a pretty powerful PC, and I don’t care to use this away from it. I’m totally fine with a tethered requirement. Being standalone is cool, but it isn’t worth the additional price in my opinion.
if you reduce its ram to the point it’s no longer practical to run games on it anymore, then all the compute power it has will also be wasted. at this point might as well redesign from ground up to be a tether device…
at this point might as well redesign from ground up to be a tether device
That’s literally my point. Let me buy the non-Meta headset now, and upgrade it with more ram in 2 years when the prices aren’t as stupid
edit: My brain somehow completely glossed over Steam Frame not Steam Machine. I haven’t actually thought about VR in years. my bad.
You basically just got a bigger more expensive Steam Link at that point. Which the original one should still work?
I believe you are thinking of a Steam Machine with this response.
You’re right, kinda threw out that comment before leaving the the house.
On that note, though; I’m sure the RAM in the steam machine will likely be upgradeable, since it’s basically a small form prefab PC with Arch / SteamOS pre-loaded on it.
In fact, I hope this means we will see a desktop release of SteamOS that isn’t just turning your PC into a bulky Steam Deck.
There are advantages to soldered RAM. It can be faster without extra cost. The issue is it’s not upgradable. It depends if they’re targeting people who will upgrade their device or people who won’t on which is the smarter option.
If you want SteamOS though, there are already plenty of options. SteamOS is just another distro based on Arch. It isn’t doing anything special (except on the actual Steam Machine which will have extra hardware to, for example, turn on when you press the button on your controller). There is literally no reason you should be waiting for it, especially if you want just a desktop OS that can play games. If you want a console-like experience, where it’s harder to access the desktop and more restricted, then there still isn’t a reason but it is a thing you can do.
The nice thing about Steam OS in Desktop mode is that you can get the Arch experience without setting up Arch.
I tried Steam OS for a while, locked into desktop mode, and it was great; but I got tired of having to reinstall aur after every update. Ended up going back to an Ubuntu build and using KDE Plasma Desktop, since that was the main thing I enjoyed.
But you can get the same with Garuda, CachyOS, or other Arch based distros, without any limitations. There’s no reason for people to be waiting for SteamOS because it’s not even the best option for most users.
The Frame is a VR headset. How is that comparable to the Steam Link that is meant for display on a screen?
If all I had was a big screen beyond with a steam link strapped to it that’s still a pretty great vr headset for the price
They’re not the same. The OG Steam Link isn’t a VR headset
And I’m still waiting on my steam controller reservation 😮💨
I kind of feel like the Nvidia Spark reveal lit a bit of a fire under their ass. As well as several other announcements at Computex, such as the Intel Arc G3 stuff. I k ow the G3 is more in line with Steam Deck competition, but it shows what kind of power can be put in a small form factor. The Steam Machine is already looking like “last Gen” and it’s not even out yet. Price is really going to be what makes the SM make or break. I feel like they had a good plan, and then the RAMocolypse happened and it’s not looking so great now. I love Valve, and what they have done with Proton and for Linux Gaming is nothing short of amazing, but I’m worried about this one. The Steam Deck was amazing when it came out because of the price point. The current price is absolute insanity. Not worth it at all in my opinion, especially given it’s age.
I dunno. I really want this to work out, but it seems like every day things get more challenging.
And honestly, the Steam Machine isn’t even a thing for me. I have a great gaming PC that’s already hooked up to my TV. Don’t need it, never will. I am much more interested in the Steam Frame because it runs on ARM. I wholeheartedly believe that ARM is the way of the future, but the software side needed the pressure. Between Steam Frame, Nvidia Spark, and Apple Silicon, I feel like it’s actually finally happening.
The SM is likely for me, I planned on building a rig when my bonus came through this year but everything went mad. I was looking down the barrell of 3-5k which I am not really willing to spend and this would be the best prebuilt option, knowing it is designed to play games and being built for the living room.
That said its probably also out of reach now, value for money wise.
