Steam Machine launches today

https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/45479024/view/685257114654870245

by theschwa • 1 month ago

1922 1705 1 month ago

store.steampowered.com

https://store.steampowered.com/sale/steammachine

https://www.lttlabs.com/articles/2026/06/22/the-newell-nucle...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66QzlDewigE

seam_carver• 1 month ago

Starts at $1049

zzixp• 1 month ago

congrats to Valve on the launch!

Rooster61• 1 month ago

$1049 for the base package? Much better than I thought it was going to be. I figured minimum $1200.

itsrobreally• 1 month ago

I mean, it is $1200 if you want a controller included

littlecranky678• 1 month ago

If you want a steam controller included. You can use also PS4/PS5 or Xbox controllers easily on linux (and thus steamOS) nowadays. I use a Ps5 controller on my setup, even though I never had a ps4 or ps5.

Ekaros4• 1 month ago

Component pricing is bad. As even Valve can't get half of the hardware while other half is semi-custom...

And this likely goes on until AI really dies or stabilises...

Venn12• 1 month ago

I was expecting $1200 for the base model, so $1,049 without a controller is nice to see.

Having to enter a lottery to buy one makes it feel like Valve doesn’t have new stock in the pipeline for the foreseeable future.

red_hare• 1 month ago

Eh, it was the exact same system for the Switch 2 and no one I know waited more than a week for theirs.

Given it requires a Steam login of a certain age to register, I suspect this is just to limit the scalpers.

Venn12• 1 month ago

I hope that's the case. Seeing Steam Controller reservations pushed into 2027 tempers my optimism.

no_news_is• 1 month ago

No need to rush:

In an effort to improve the purchase experience and limit resellers, we're implementing a reservation system.
Starting right now, you can sign up for the Steam Machine model/bundle you're interested in.
If you're busy now, no problem: You can sign up anytime before Thursday June 25th at 10 a.m. Pacific.
At that time, we will close signups and do a one-time randomization to determine the reservation and waitlist order.

iLoveOncall10• 1 month ago

I know they will sell, but at this price point I don't understand who is supposed to be the target for this.

Either you want a gaming computer, and you'll get a much better one that can be upgraded in the future for the same price, or you want a console, and you'll never pay a grand for it.

4 years old hardware and poor connectivity.

jrm4• 1 month ago

I feel like there's a midrange of "not particularly techy" gamers who will strongly appreciate - "I don't care about putting anything together, I just want to place PC games like a console."

twoquestions• 1 month ago

Prebuilt machines have a terrible reputation, I could see people wanting this for a PC that you don't need hardware expertise to boot up. If you're reading this you could probably pick out your own parts and assemble them for cheaper, but for people who want a console-style plug-and-play type experience I could see the market for it.

Pricey, but so is any other sort of electronic entertainment hardware these days.

kibwen3• 1 month ago

I wanted a gaming computer (read: an airgapped system that I could install arbitrary software on without fear), and I was sick to death of Microsoft's bullshit and resolved to never buy a Windows machine again, so I've been using a docked Steam Deck as my main gaming rig. It's performed far better than I imagined on the software side (has never failed to run any game in my library, though some have required minor settings tweaks), though the hardware is a little on the lighter side, which is perfectly acceptable for a handheld, but if the Steam Machine had been available at the time I'd probably have gone for that instead.

iLoveOncall10• 1 month ago

Ok but why not buy a cheaper or more performant machine and install SteamOS on it?

calebio• 1 month ago

I think there's a middle ground of people who just are not interested in building or upgrading a gaming computer (or just don't like their typical form factor in the ready to go out of the box gaming PCs) but also don't want the completely closed off ecosystem of a console.

I think if the Xbox ended up being more like the Steam Machine (i.e. more like a PC) then this middle ground that the Steam Machine sells to would probably go away as I don't think the group of folks who care that it's Linux based is high enough to support production.

pendenthistory3• 1 month ago

I'll probably buy one. It's small so it fits under my TV, fits in with my furniture. Since it's all vertically integrated I know I can just connect it to the TV and it'll boot quickly and work well, and it has all my Steam games. I value my time and lack of frustration more than a few hundred dollars.

luqtas• 1 month ago

do you know fans or people who don't like to tinker computers?

take a sip at GamingOnLinux community... they don't seem to care about stuff running perfectly on Proton and not natively or that Gabe is buying another 600 million USD yatch. they love the Steam ecosystem more than developers crafting games and abiding to 30% of fees that are a clear sign of monopoly power

vessenes• 1 month ago

I thought about it, but don't think I'll push the button. I have a falcon nw gaming rig in my living room right now running windows / steam big picture and an NVIDIA 3060Ti -- and it's .. fine, but long in the tooth. I wouldn't mind a more console-ish hardware experience for steam gaming, and compared to a new falcon box, this thing is cheap. I experimented with just running SteamOS on the falcon hardware a few years ago, but it was a little fussy, and I wanted to also use the system for local inference, and, and, and.

All that said, I don't think this is a good value. I'm presuming if I did a little work SteamOS 3 would be workable for me, and I have significantly more RAM, and possibly a better GPU? Not exactly sure where the GPU falls out, but I definitely believe I could buy a better GPU for less than the new box.

If it gets preferred shipment for the controller, you could buy it and sell the box and keep the controller. :) I think my controller ship date is estimated in 2027 right now.

mercwear• 1 month ago

Falcon gaming computers start at $3K, I don't think Valve is after that level of consumer with this, it's more of a "Bring the console players into Steam" move imho.

sanskritical2• 1 month ago

I want a simple UNIX workstation that "just works". Apple broke this promise to me with Tahoe, where horrific design decisions compounded the bugs on essential peripherals (Tahoe began spinning up and down my external raid array to sleep constantly, for no reason, making extremely loud noises as the drives repeatedly if it's idle, forcing me to constantly touch files in a while loop over dozens of partitions -- also I have a few petabyte of storage and it now takes ages to mount every reboot, as now with Tahoe Spotlight indexing is done as part of the mounting process and I can't opt out of this behavior and I'm in a warzone where power outages necessitating shutdowns are frequent). I have since used a docked Steam Deck as my daily driver and everything I want just works! It's now my UNIX desktop OS of choice. I've been on the Mac since OS X but Tahoe was so bad that now I consider an operating system designed for wasting time gaming a more serious and less disruptive option to my daily workflow. Heck of a job you're doing, Tim Apple!

iLoveOncall10• 1 month ago

I'm sorry but a Steam Machine is a horrendous choice for a workstation, and so is SteamOS.

I really can't think of a single use-case where the Steam Machine is the right choice actually, unless your one and only wish is to make a donation to Gabe.

You can have the same performances in the same form factor with the same OS (but more upgradability) for less, or you can improve on any of those points for the same price.

jauntywundrkind• 1 month ago

I'm tempted to go order yet another BC-250, even though I haven't gotten the first one going. Sure the Machine is considerably more modern, has great new features, probably vastly better power efficiency (even though it's only 6nm vs 7nm surprisingly). But 288GB/s memory bandwidth? Versus the BC-250's 448GB/s? https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/steam-machine-gpu.c437... https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/playstation-5-gpu.c348...

Honestly tempted to buy a couple for relatives, who do some phone gaming and one who owns a 3DS they use, and see if they find anything interesting in PC gaming. Also make it a decent media center of course too.

tylerflick• 1 month ago

Are you using the stock cooler? I’m going with an AIO for the APU, but I worry that the little heatsinks I’m planning for the VRMs aren’t going to cut it.

lucius_verus• 1 month ago

I got impatient waiting for the Steam Machine to come out and grabbed a BC-250 on ebay that was already set up with a case, fan, and power supply. Works great for reasonably demanding games (CONTROL, Elden Ring, etc.).

Now that I see the final price of the Steam Machine, I'm gonna be recommending the BC-250 more strongly.

ThatPlayer4• 1 month ago

Last I checked the idle power consumption of the BC-250 was on the higher side to make me not want to use it as a media center, though that could be my PSU. No hardware decode/encode (yet) either.

And lack of DRM makes a PC in general a mediocre experience for official streaming services if you want more than 720p streaming. If you care about that.

scuff3d• 1 month ago

Oof, that price point is rough. I hope this does well for them, but I'm not sure who this is for.

drnick14• 1 month ago

Can't you build or buy an equivalent (in performance) PC for cheaper? All with upgradable standard parts? I get the appeal of a small form factor, but I am afraid it may not sell well at this price.

iLoveOncall10• 1 month ago

I think you would struggle to NOT build a more performant PC for the same price.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/brbFsK This is $50 more but it has 1TB of storage and a newer generation of both CPU and GPU and will absolutely destroy it.

I'm sure you could get actually easily cheaper and better even, I haven't followed the market a lot lately.

Prebuilt are likely to be even better deals because they will use some cheap noname parts for the RAM and the PSU, which is mostly fine.

xinayder3• 1 month ago

Even with similar specs you can still get more performance from a PC because Valve is throttling the Machine to keep thermals down.

amunozo4• 1 month ago

For me, size and aesthetics play a role. A PC like that is huge and, imo, much uglier. I know a lot of people do not care but I am sure I am also no the only one.

drnick14• 1 month ago

I would have probably picked an Intel B580 for the additional VRAM (at $250), and a case with better airflow like the Bequiet Pure Base 501, but your point stands.

amlib9• 30 days ago

It's still missing wi-fi, bluetooth, sc dongle, sd card reader, (frugal) led bar, the hdmi cec functionality and whatever you value yourself for assembly, installation, troubleshooting and tweaking time (between half an afternoon to a whole day). Dealing with pc bioses is tedious and tweaking fan behavior and thermals could take a whole other day, which you are gonna need because the cheapo case you've picked up only comes with a single loud fan and poor ventilation for pc case standards, so you either gonna have a loud motherfucker or a cooked to perfection unreliable rig.

Let alone having to put the PC on the floor because it won't fit anywhere else in the living room.

Ekaros4• 1 month ago

I think with reasonable and somewhat common sales and picking right machine probably could find even better prebuild. Size not withstanding.

vachina2• 1 month ago

You pay a premium for “it just works”.

vaylian2• 1 month ago

This. Game companies will probably test their games on a steam machine.

MBCook4• 1 month ago

Plus support and packaging. Can you make your own PC of equivalent specs in that size case? Would it have swappable face plates you’ll probably be able to buy on Amazon?

retired11• 1 month ago

If you stay in the Steam ecosystem. Similar to the Steam Controller. Works great with Steam, not so great outside the ecosystem.

inigyou24• 1 month ago

Can you still, in 2026?

tracerbulletx• 1 month ago

Only about 65 dollars cheaper for a comparable build and it wouldn't be small.

ZeroCool2u• 1 month ago

More information here: https://youtu.be/66QzlDewigE?is=WC9vt6LBtdWFPqfp

haunter4• 1 month ago

Worth watching for the Steam OS problems part

HeavyStorm• 1 month ago

who are we trying to tell you how to use your computer?

Valve is still great.

retired11• 1 month ago

Isn’t this industry standard? How many PCs have locked boot loaders?

Edit, reply to Rohansi as I am rate limited, I’m talking about gaming PCs not consoles.

Rohansi12• 1 month ago

PS5, Xbox? They're almost PCs and are in the same space as Steam Machine.

mort962• 1 month ago

This is more competing in the game console market than the PC market though.

inigyou24• 1 month ago

A lot of machines ship with secure boot locked to Microsoft's key. Usually there's a way to turn it off, otherwise you need the shim loader Microsoft signed in 2015 whose signature has just expired and who knows if Microsoft will sign it again.

koolala7• 1 month ago

I can't believe all the replies who see no problem with a company completely controlling their device like it makes no difference.

ben-schaaf• 30 days ago

Every iphone, ipad, playstation, xbox, android phone (though there are ways of unlocking), smart TV, smart Fridge. These are all devices that run a full web browser, these aren't appliances they're full personal computers. You can write and run software on them, even if arbitrarily limited in hardware access.

matheusmoreira3• 30 days ago

Yeah. Hope they never change.

GL26• 1 month ago

This seems very expensive for what a PC can do :(. A PC can be fully customizable with price ranges that are lower than the steam machine. The "hardcore console gamers" live on PS, and Xbox, and for "casual gamers", a Nintendo Switch would provide much better bang for you buck.

panikal• 1 month ago

Find me a PC in this form factor that is as well tested and supported as the steam boxes are, with the specs they are claiming to have, at this price. Its a little above the curve but a little is not a lot, and you get a fully supported Linux box at that price.

.....and if you think this is expensive just wait until the PS6 and new Xbox are released.

bigyabai12• 1 month ago

You can install a SteamOS-style console experience on any old PC, including handhelds or mini-pcs with integrated graphics. Bazzite is a great choice for that, even my RX560 handles it without issue.

a Nintendo Switch would provide much better bang for you buck.

A secondhand Steam Deck would also be better value, but this isn't a value-focused product. The Steam Machine is Valve's second stab at the premium couch-based PC gamer market, this time with Proton and a bigger focus on controller usability for ordinary PC games.

bravetraveler6• 1 month ago

Mildly disappointed to see 1GbE when spending [at least] a thousand dollars. Stupid datacenters squeezing all the chips.

littlecranky678• 1 month ago

Interested in hear the justification why you would need more than 1GbE in a machine built specificly for gaming.

Keyframe4• 1 month ago

Downloading those giant game installs and updates

corndoge• 1 month ago

It's a living room pc - using it to stream from a media NAS is one application that comes to mind

robhlt2• 1 month ago

It's a bit niche, but Steam can download games from another PC running Steam on your local network. 2.5GbE on both PCs makes that a lot faster.

neogodless6• 1 month ago

I bet at least 90% of people buying this connect it to WiFi and never think about connection speed again!

Personally... my internet is only 300 Mbps. My WiFi connection is roughly on par with 1GbE. I have a very small pool of 2.5GbE capable devices, but overall I'm just not fussed about making the switch.

bravetraveler6• 1 month ago

Probably :) However, as I mentioned elsewhere, one doesn't need fast internet to benefit. The 'Game File Transfer over Local Network' feature in Steam has been a boon, personally, even with 2G Fiber.

vachina2• 1 month ago

I have a Series X with a very similar spec just sitting there collecting dust. I hope one day it will run linux like the PS5 and run Steam lol.

CagedCoder• 1 month ago

For some reason I never considered this route, despite following the PS5 Linux developments... is there a specific reason that the XSX is harder to homebrew than the PS5?

It would be incredible to convert my dusty XSX to a linux box

sedatk7• 30 days ago

is there a specific reason that the XSX is harder to homebrew than the PS5?

Xbox 360 was notoriously hard to reverse engineer at the time. Maybe for similar reasons.

asmnzxklopqw• 1 month ago

Are they crazy to ask for this price? Few months ago I have bought a minipc with amd 8845hs 8/16c, 32GB RAM, 512GB NVME for €519

MYEUHD3• 1 month ago

Can you check how much that mini pc costs today?

vondur2• 1 month ago

You can get a Miniforums PC with the Radeon 780m for $699 US, but I don't think the graphics performance is on par with the SteamBox. I'm not sure on the reliability of these tiny PC's either

https://www.amazon.com/MINISFORUM-Desktop-Computer-Output-Gr...

Tiberium2• 1 month ago

I think a lot of people expected it to be in the ~$600 price range, maybe ~$800 at worst. RAM prices made it quite expensive...

LukaD• 1 month ago

Yes, so many people were claiming that it will be around that price point. That seemed straight up delusional to me. Memory price has roughly quadrupled and 32GB DDR5 basically cost the same as the original cheapest steam deck.

ErneX8• 1 month ago

It’s not just the ram now, it’s also the storage. A double whammy.

robmccoll• 1 month ago

For reference, a PlayStation 5 is $600-650 for the base models (lower performance than Steam Machine) and $900 for the Pro model (likely higher performance). I know this is a PC and thus an open platform, but for most buyers in living room gaming, that's the competition. I don't think this will reach mass market success, but I'm not sure that was the goal. Who are they selling to?

Note: I ask as someone with a Steamdeck sitting on the desk in front of me and a custom-built computer under my TV running Linux.

kiernanmcgowan• 1 month ago

My guess are people who want to PC game but don't want to deal with building a PC themselves - there's a decent market of pre-built gaming PCs that this would be competitive with.

https://www.newegg.com/Gaming-Desktop-PC/SubCategory/ID-3742

mikepurvis2• 1 month ago

And there's a valid market there, but as someone who just spent half my Saturday morning debugging a CPU throttling issue on my kid's 2020-vintage Lenovo Legion laptop, I feel like a pre-built is in some ways the worst of both worlds, like you don't get the savings and fine-tuning that is something you assembled yourself, but you still get all the fun of debugging driver issues, weird performance stalls, and who knows what else.

That said, I've never had a Steam Deck or tried to seriously game on Linux, so I may be out of touch with how much smoother the picture is in an all-Proton world.

(the laptop issue turned out to be something in the firmware asserting BC PROCHOT for some reason; for now we can periodically clear it with the ThrottleStop utility, but who knows what the actual underlying problem is)

amunozo4• 1 month ago

Custom gaming PCs are huge and ugly, which is a concern for me (and my partner). Size and comfort are the main advantages.

ygouzerh• 1 month ago

Indeed, they are hitting a weird spot, their pricing category is stuck in between people who just want to play without breaking the bank account, who will go for a PS5 or XBox, and hardcore gamers who will go directly for their own custom build PC

mrec• 1 month ago

I'm sure they were originally hoping for mass-market success, but given the RAM drought and ensuing pricing, I'm guessing the best possible outcome at this point would be to break roughly even and learn, so that they can put out a more competitive revision if and when prices ever return to Earth.

With Windows becoming increasingly hostile, I do think there's room for a hardware/software integrated "just works" offering in the Linux PC space. Plus software pricing is probably a lot more competitive than console (dunno, never had anything to do with consoles, but my impression has always been that hardware is a loss-leader there).

mohamedkoubaa2• 1 month ago

Mass market success doesn't mean overnight success.

TiredOfLife5• 1 month ago

The only thing about price mentioned during announcement, before rampocalypse, was that it would cost much more than a console.

kibwen3• 1 month ago

Unlike a PS5, a PC has all the games that I want to play. And to drive home the irony, right now I'm actually using my Steam Deck to play a game that was originally for the PS3 (Valkyria Chronicles). Legitimately purchased, even!

bigyabai12• 1 month ago

Now that Bloodborne is "on PC" (wink wink) there's kinda no reason to own a PS4 or PS5 in my opinion. Persona 5 was the only other holdout, but now P5R has a great PC-native release.

mock-possum2• 1 month ago

More properly, this is competing with prebuilt gaming PCs, surely?

lunar_rover• 1 month ago

At best it'll take over Steam hardware survey as the standard spec of PC gaming.

I can't see anyone other than enthusiasts buying it over a normal console or Windows laptop.

Creamsicle472• 1 month ago

Playstation price is also increasing FYI

ErneX8• 1 month ago

Reviews are saying it’s actually similar to base PS5 in performance.

inigyou24• 1 month ago

They make different performance playstation 5s?! What happenes to the console compatibility story? You used to expect any game to work on any console because they were all near identical.

maccard3• 1 month ago

It got messy but pretty much all ps4 games work on ps5, and all ps5 games run on the ps5 and ps5 pro. On Xbox, everything runs on series S and series X.

redwall_hp• 1 month ago

They still are. Any PS5 will play PS4 games. The PS5 Pro is a mid cycle spec bump that allows some newer games to have slightly better graphics. The games are still hard required to function within the expectations already set for the first PS5 model. I played Ghost of Yotei just fine on a non-Pro, and it targets the newer model.

We're also nearing PS6 time in the next year or two. It's already six years old.

pjerem• 1 month ago

Except that unlike a PS5, games are plenty, cheaper, and you probably already have a huge library even before buying it.

I’m not the target but I can see the point.

yieldcrv4• 1 month ago

has that still been accurate in the last half decade?

indie devs have easy access to release on PS5, latest Xbox, Switch alongside Steam simultaneously

the subscription any of those users have (a prerequisite for online or multiplayer access) also comes with many many free games, games that are otherwise $4 - $25 without the subscription

people already in those ecosystems have been accumulating (unplayed) titles just like Steam users meme about, and as soon as they sign in on their new console all are available

theshrike797• 1 month ago

I have about 500 games in my Steam library and maaaybe 20% of them are available for the PS5 (which I own).

And I've paid full retail price for maybe two of them, the vast majority is from 50-90% sales. You don't get those for the PS5 that much.

I also don't have any need for a "Gaming PC", what I've always wanted is a console but with my Steam games. This is it.

aNapierkowski• 1 month ago

yeah i wonder if SteamOS gets a more official generic release or if it stays pointed at Steamdeck and Steam machine directly the only differences between this and a "Gaming PC" are the OS & tiny form factor (which are both quite relevant)

but youre exactly the target market for this it sounds like

I think you could kind of get there with a gaming pc that boots up steam big picture immediately? but it would feel hacky vs this for sure

protimewaster2• 1 month ago

Games at a certain point in their life are cheaper on console. At least, physically. I remember being shocked at this years ago, because I expected PC to be cheapest. But, a few years back, I went through and looked up a bunch of AAA games that were about 6 months old, and a lot of them were cheaper to buy physical, on console, from Amazon or another retailer. Cheaper than they'd ever been available for on PC, according to IsThereAnyDeal.

I think it's partly because, on console, the sellers / devs have an incentive to reduce the price of physical copies, because they need to compete with used copies. They killed used copies on PC, so they don't need to compete with that market.

r0fl• 29 days ago

How do you find time to play 500 games?

Even if a game takes 5 hours that’s 2500 hours

That’s mind blowing to me

vablings2• 1 month ago

I think it was supposed to be priced in below the PS5 Pro but due to ram supply issues and just general silicone allocation issues it was not to be. The steam decks $200 price bump tells as much

gymbeaux4• 1 month ago

The Steam Machine makes sense if it costs the same or less than a current-gen console, but a whole grand for this feels icky. I paid around $300 for the original Steam Machine (Alienware Alpha) in 2014. It played Fallout 4 better than the PS4 and Xbox One which cost about the same. The "tradeoff" was that you had to maintain the PC's OS, which at the time had to be Windows 10.

gymbeaux4• 1 month ago

The PS5 base has 2 more physical cores (4 more threads) than this Steam Machine so I'm not optimistic that the Steam Machine outperforms the PS5.

(both "semicustom AMD" so probably effectively the same architecture)

lowbloodsugar4• 1 month ago

Zen 2 vs Zen 4 though. pS5 probably slower for CPU tasks

rgreekguy• 1 month ago

A PlayStation 5 also requires you now to be online every so often (30 days?) for even your single player games.

lreeves• 1 month ago

This is completely untrue and was based on some weird TikTok rumors.

protimewaster2• 1 month ago

Doesn't Steam do that too? For a long time, offline mode in Steam didn't work for many people, and, when it did, it wasn't reliable for being offline for long periods of time. Is that all sorted?

al_borland2• 30 days ago

I picked up a PS5 Pro before Christmas on sale for $599. It seems I made out like a bandit. I assumed prices would go out due to all this AI mess and knew I’d want one for GTA.

Watching the LTT review of the Steam machine, it also reminded me why a console holds a lot of value. A lot of their video was about fiddling with settings per game to get a good balance of performance vs visuals. Something I never have to think about with the PS5, especially the Pro.

While I like the idea of PC gaming, and even more so what Valve is doing, trying to move the industry to Linux, the reality of PC gaming has always felt like a huge pain. As much sys admin as actual gaming.

If the Vavle platform are popular enough, they could get presets with a lot of games, but that remains to be seen.

andrew2025• 30 days ago

The Steam Machine is likely slower than the base PS5 in terms of GPU performance. As a proxy, the memory bandwidth is 448 GB/s on the PS5 and in the range of 256 GB/s for the Steam Machine's VRAM

LinXitoW4• 29 days ago

Right now, noone that can avoid it should be buying ANYTHING with RAM or SSD in it.

We're truly screwed if things don't calm down at least a little....

_jas• 29 days ago

Curious as I’ve been thinking about doing the same, what are you running on your Linux box for your TV? You have to deal with family and little kids too?

everdrive• 1 month ago

The prices I think a lot of us expected. I know Valve is being pressured by the market, but I can't imagine buying one for this price, even if I'm really excited for the Steam Machine. That said, the Steam Deck is now so expensive I don't think I can justify replacing mine when it breaks.

BadBadJellyBean4• 1 month ago

At least it's repairable so unless you break the motherboard you can probably fix it.

sailingparrot• 1 month ago

Why a randomized reservation order? [...] we wanted to create a system that would be less frustrating and more fair for everyone. A launch that starts at a specific day and time tends to reward bots, people with fast internet connections, talented gaming fingers for quick F5/refresh reactions, and those who can schedule their life around that moment. By accepting reservation signups over the course of a few days, without any incentive to be first, we're hoping to take away some of that friction.

This is nice.

iLoveOncall10• 1 month ago

It's not worse than a traditional launch, but it's also not much better. Make 1,000 Steam accounts, which are entirely free, and you get 1,000 times more chances of getting one than others.

To be fair I don't think they'll be scalped a lot because the price isn't attractive already and alternatives are plenty.

Ekaros4• 1 month ago

You must have made a purchase on Steam prior to April 27th 2026.
Limit one signup per household. We will use payment method, shipping address, and other information to eliminate multiple entries.

Seems like they have chosen some reasonable options here. 2 months ago having purchase and trying to detect households. Likely also including phone number, Steam Guard client and family sharing.

xinayder3• 1 month ago

Steam accounts newer than April do not qualify, plus I think you need to have spent at least $5 to qualify for the reservation queue (i.e. not community limited)

flutas2• 1 month ago

The account has to have bought something on steam before April 27th. They also are verifying addresses via the accounts.

Are there any criteria for signing up?
Customers must meet the following criteria to be able to sign up:
You must have a Steam account in good standing.
You must have made a purchase on Steam prior to April 27th 2026.
Limit one signup per household. We will use payment method, shipping address, and other information to eliminate multiple entries.

garrettjoecox• 1 month ago

Do you really think a fresh steam account will have equal footing? I'd be surprised if that was the case.

Even Nintendo has been setting fairly strict requirements to pre-order some of their products, like requiring 50 hours of playtime on the original switch to pre-order the Switch 2

e28eta• 1 month ago

It also reduces the DDoS effect of telling all your customers to repeatedly hit your web servers at a specific day & time.

tmoertel2• 1 month ago

Yeah, this is a promising solution to scalping. Previously, if you had only small numbers of consoles available at launch, scalpers and their bots would claim a large share of them. With Valve's new policy, that share is reduced to s/g, where s is the number of verified Steam accounts controlled by scalpers and g is the number of legit gamer accounts. Since s is likely to be much less than g, s/g is close to zero, and scalping is dramatically curtailed. Almost all of the initial batch of consoles will go to legit gamers.

baggy_trough• 1 month ago

Scalping is a good thing, because it gets consoles in the hands of those who want them the most, as evidenced by willingness to pay.

gdhkgdhkvff• 1 month ago

So what you’re saying is we should see an increase in account hijacks and spamming account creation as scalpers now try to optimize for max s.

Show me the incentive structure and…

hiccuphippo• 1 month ago

This is also possible because they are only selling through their website, while other consoles go through retailers. I'd actually prefer a retailer just for doing this over one that was first come first serve.

inigyou24• 1 month ago

Fusion Festival (happening this week), aka European Burning Man (but not exactly) does this.

ajmurmann9• 1 month ago

Does it solve scalping? It seems like there is still money in sighing up with the goal to resell. Granted this is better in that I don't have to race the scalpers.

Till the sales price matches the market value scalping will exist. The best way to address that is a vickery auction. Till then scalping will continue.

numpad04• 1 month ago

It's surprising that the whole Western world is discovering the threat of organized or scripted scalping just now, when it's been a problem in places like Japan for over a decade. Account age requirements, lotteries, quick subject matter quizzes to chase away hired line-sitters, hidden ID code on tickets to ban scalpers on auction site pics, randomized queues for sales page etc etc has all been in use for years. It's been so commonplace that various city-run COVID free vaccine programs had different forms of them.

oh_no• 1 month ago

so i think you're a bit off. it's s/g but g is legit accounts who want to buy the steam machine.

we could say it's 5000 scalper accounts, and 50000000 gamer accounts. but it's not 5000/50000000, it's like 4500/20000. which isn't bad! but scalpers will still be way over-represented, because they'll be trying to buy it when most steam accounts won't.

now one fuzz factor is the queue system, as you're not putting down money to get in line i expect a lot of people who wouldn't otherwise sign up will, in case they decide to buy one when given the chance. so we might have 40000 gamer sign ups, but only 50% will pull the trigger. this also gives scalpers an out should the resale not be worth it.

(obviously all numbers made up)

ocdtrekkie4• 1 month ago

Scalping is much easier to solve, people just wouldn't like it: Lock the device to the purchasing Steam account for a year.

user142• 1 month ago

scalpers and their bots would claim a large share of them

Is there any actual data on this? I know people don't like scalpers but I wonder what the actual percentage is.

lmm• 1 month ago

Japan has done this for concert tickets for years. It works great.

fdye• 1 month ago

I've never understood why anti-scalpers just don't work backwards from shipping address. Are these scalpers all really keeping hundreds of actual physical addresses they can receive packages at? Like if you see the limited product has 100 orders going to the same building, or apartment, or whatever then flag it before it goes out. Limit PO Boxes, etc.

Sure they can find mules to buy+receive one and then sell to the scalper, but the more steps you put in the better. Same for the people scamming Sam's club by buying memberships, ordering limited items, then refunding the membership. Just lock orders to members older then >1yr and make sure it only ships to the actual physical address attached to the membership. Flag multiple memberships at the same address.

I've run a modest shipping op and the second I saw even a couple orders of the same product going to the same address I would halt it and do additional verification.

dismalaf2• 30 days ago

Scalping? What kind of scalping market will there be at these prices?

soerxpso• 30 days ago

I would be careful granting that s is less than g. There are lots of incentives other than scalping for people to create extra illegitimate accounts on Steam, and one individual can often control hundreds of bots, whereas a legitimate user almost never has more than one or two accounts.

himata41133• 1 month ago

I am more surprised there's people lining up to buy this when it's genuinely cheaper to get a used PC off a local marketplace. I feel like this is unnecessary as I am pretty sure they'll be able to fill it in one shipment.

retired11• 1 month ago

For €1039 you can even get a mini-ITX PC that fits nicely in your living room. Install SteamOS to get a similar experience. Only thing you will not get is the HDMI CEC functionality.

Lwerewolf3• 1 month ago

I get to support people that are very involved in making sure that a long list of x86 win32 software that I want to be able to run plays well with linux and osx (not-quite-directly, but the crossover folks are on it) - regardless of whether it's on steam or not. Plus general linux desktop work in the "make games play well" department.

Meanwhile, MS is trying to push copilot again.

dghlsakjg3• 1 month ago

People value convenience differently.

A huge number of people would rather pay a few hundred bucks more to have a plug and play appliance with a warranty from a reputable company show up on their doorstep. They don’t have to learn anything about hardware, or how to install Linux. It just works.

Some people are happy to save the money and take the risk on used hardware.

The Steam Machine is for the former, Steam the platform is for the former and the latter.

jitl8• 1 month ago

if i was 10 years younger, sure I’d build my own. my roommates and i build our own gaming PCS, router, nas, home theater pc, we ran our own ethernet through the house. we ran openbsd on the router and freebsd on the nas, for fun.

i’ve changed. i really do not want to spend any extra time on yak shaving outside the job.

i am happy to pay $1500 for someone i trust with a fantastic track record to do it for me. plus its so cute!!! it will look great in my new apartment with the red faceplate. most gaming things are not cute.

fooster• 1 month ago

It is neither cheaper or easier to get this build?

gt02• 1 month ago

In Australia, it wouldn't even need to be a used PC. The Steam Machine is $1600 AUD here, you can get a brand new gaming PC for that. Not a particularly amazing machine of course, but you can walk into a shop and buy it right now.

srmatto3• 1 month ago

I would love to see a generalized FOSS reservation system that could be used for just about anything that would help address the issues Valve listed. It could be as simple as a short lived deployment (1,3,7,14 days) that writes out the entries to a Google Sheets. I have encountered so many people trying to come up with their own approach to this problem that I think it would be worth solving. Maybe I can find time to work on it later this year.

wiether• 1 month ago

Seems weird to base a FOSS reservation system on... Google Sheets?

mannanj2• 1 month ago

Would love to know if you decide to work on this, or if otherwise, want to collaborate. feel free to email me hello@mannan.is - or maybe I'll begin work on this before you and we can share notes

edit: I don't particularly care for Google Sheets, just the idea of solving the underlying problem.

throwaway212332• 1 month ago

I don't get why companies don't take advantage of the demand.

For example: Start the bidding at BASE_PRICE (BP) + 2400. Then reduce the price by $1 every 3mins over the course of 5 days. Until the BP is met and then just carry on queuing.

You could buy it early if you want it that much or just wait an extra couple of days and end up in the queue at the BP.

I don't know if it would create pressure on that second it ticks over to the BP, so then its BP+1 - well I guess the nash equilibrium would be pushed up.

iamtheworstdev• 1 month ago

because the less wealthy get mad about it

eximius• 1 month ago

Holy fuck, not everything in this life needs to be profit maximized.

thatguy0900• 1 month ago

Most companies need customers that don't hate their guts, that's why they don't do this

speedgoose• 1 month ago

Because it damages the brand and many people will remember the product as being heavily overpriced and never come back.

wqaatwt• 1 month ago

Because they want to maximize longterm profitability and believe (which makes sense to me) this approach would harm that

pibaker2• 30 days ago

Because public image matters. Steam has built a reputation for being customer friendly. Coming up with a Byzantine pricing system for your highly anticipated new hardware will not be well received by the steam users. The extra short term earning will be a drop in the bucket compared to what steam is already making from taking 30% off most game sells, but the reputation damage will linger forever.

Sohcahtoa822• 30 days ago

The funny thing is, someone paying $3,400 for a Steam Machine would be an idiot.

Internally, it's equivalent to a mid-grade PC from 2018. You're not playing AAA games in 4K on this thing.

dismalaf2• 30 days ago

Because long-term this destroys goodwill.

WarmWash4• 1 month ago

I would be curious how the public would react to a Dutch auction, where Valve launches the console at a $10,000 price tag, and every ~hour drops the price by $100 until they are sold out. It creates the illusion that buyers are "breaking the line" when buying high, so it's their fault (not valves) for the high selling price. This would also eliminate scalpers.

philistine4• 1 month ago

The problem with a dutch auction is if you don't know how a dutch auction functions, it looks like you're getting royally screwed. That's why they're usually reserved for professional settings.

jojobas4• 30 days ago

This basically makes the vendor the scalper, and the public would react accordingly.

Zenst2• 1 month ago

Interesting, as it sounds like a lottery reservation system, which is kinda a neat way to deal with many issues.

I'm always supprised that companies don't do a tiered price release, offer it at 200% price, you get it, 150%, you lower down the list and then 100% lottery time, that way they gain from those who can afford to pay more(maybe able to subsidise other sales later and price cuts down the line). Why feed scalpers when you can coin it directly and then offer a lower price to those who are prepared to wait a few more months or so.

agilob• 1 month ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

In governance, sortition is the selection of public officials or jurors at random, i.e., by lottery, in order to obtain a representative sample.[1][2][3]

In ancient Athenian democracy, sortition was the traditional and primary method for appointing political officials, and its use was regarded as a principal characteristic of democracy.[4][5] Sortition is often classified as a method for both direct democracy and deliberative democracy.

HerbManic3• 30 days ago

While it sounds nice in principal, it basically just means cashed up people get it first. But there is also the fun side of it becoming a status symbol I guess. Drive up future demand.

internet101010• 29 days ago

In my limited experience of seeing Dutch auctions in practice it actually has the opposite of the intended effect, as the people that are willing to pay the highest are also the people that will have a way to profit, just on a lesser scale.

For example, Panini (sports card manufacturer) did Dutch auctions on boxes of new card sets during the peak of pandemic collectible mania. The majority of customers that were willing to pay the highest prices on Panini's website were card breakers, which are people/companies that sell "spots" in livestream box openings (i.e. customers buy the right to all cards containing players from a certain sports team before the box is opened).

d3Xt3r11• 1 month ago

This is nice

But this is not nice:

This item is not available for purchase in your region

annzabelle4• 1 month ago

I moved to New Zealand recently from the US and am now seeing that everywhere. A lot of the time some local ecommerce platform imports the Australian version of most electronics with a markup, but we don't have official retailers for a lot of products, most notably Pixel phones. Also no Apple stores, though there are official retailers for Apple products.

racl101• 1 month ago

That's pretty cool!

brunoborges• 30 days ago

This is how tickets for sports and concerts should always be sold.

Entertainment tends to compare with airline tickets, except that with air travel, there are regular flights and competition. There is no such thing as a single flight from Paris to New York on one Saturday at 9pm on a window of a few years.

Andrew_nenakhov2• 30 days ago

Why a randomized reservation order?

Lies, they just want to protect themselves from the German Tank Problem [0] type of analysis.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_tank_problem

selcuka2• 30 days ago

they just want to protect themselves from the German Tank Problem type of analysis

How could you estimate that when they don't let you know your position in the queue (with or without randomisation)?

we'll send you an email with the option to purchase. You'll then have 72 hours to complete the purchase.

anthonyrstevens6• 30 days ago

I thought about this, and can not tell if you are being serious or not. I can see arguments for either.

petterroea• 30 days ago

Living in Japan, most popular concerts are handled this way. It really really sucks to not get a ticket, and it sucks even more that we need to do it this way because of scalpers. But hey, if it means I overall have a better chance of getting tickets (at list price at that), hey, I guess it is worth it.

I wish there were better ways of defeating scalpers.

jillesvangurp• 30 days ago

Exactly, get the devices in the hands of real users instead of ebay traders trying to get rich.

ozgrakkurt• 29 days ago

This would also be a very good idea for university course selection systems

firemelt• 28 days ago

a fucking real raffle

saidinesh5• 1 month ago

$1049 .. Damn.

Here's hoping my $135 BC-250 arriving tomorrow works without any issue.

Either way, congrats to Valve!

sergiotapia• 1 month ago

Thanks to Valve, I've now been using Omarchy as my operating system for months now. Gaming just works on Linux now. It's crazy, used to be a pipe dream!

I'm buying the Steam Machine as well to game on the couch. Give me 4k 60fps and that's all I need. The Steam Controller is also fantastic shape on my hands, very comfortable.

john-titor• 1 month ago

Care to explain what Omarchy has to do with Valve?

getcrunk• 1 month ago

I assume they are referring to the general tide of improvements valve has brought to gaming working generically on linux, and that they are using omarchy to experience it

the_af• 1 month ago

Gaming just works for me with Steam and Ubuntu. Steam no longer filters out Linux games to its own category, it simply assumes most games work now (and they do!).

jrepinc11• 30 days ago

Same. Gaming exclusively on Linux (openSUSE Tumbleweed) for the last 2 years or so and also loving the Steam Controller.

radium3d• 1 month ago

I imagine Valve Software wanted to release the Steam Machine for $549-$699. The great RAM hoarding of 2025-2026 killed this product on arrival sadly.

xinayder3• 1 month ago

According to LTT the original price was in the $800 range, but thanks to Sam Altman it increased to what we saw today.

yaro330• 1 month ago

I think that was already in the RAM crisis, so that was priced in. I think it would be a lot cheaper w/o the whole price boom.

Insanity3• 1 month ago

LTT was only speculating, they did not know the actual price as far as I remember. (They had a video doing some educated guesses, or maybe a WAN show, can’t exactly recall).

No doubt the price was lower before this hardware shortage, but the $800 is not a reliable number afaik.

BoredPositron3• 1 month ago

Don't use LTT as a source for anything. They are mainly an entertainment channel with a giant track record of fuck ups anything data related.

blahblaher• 30 days ago

And Amodei, and Satya, and Pichai.., don't forget about them.

MBCook4• 1 month ago

Plus GPU prices. They absolutely got screwed by their launch timing, unfortunately. And they’re not big enough to negotiate better terms though that probably isn’t really an option right now anyway.

I’m not sure I’d want this at $550, but maybe. At $1050 without controller it’s a solid no.

I’m sure some people will want it. I have no interest in maintaining a PC so if I wanted to play PC games this is probably how I would do it. But the price just absolutely kills it for me.

sarchertech4• 1 month ago

The original price target was $800, so you probably were never going to buy this thing.

mixologic• 1 month ago

"killed" is a bit of a stretch. High prices on all gear is here to stay. This is the new normal. Unless that simply means that nobody buys consoles/pc's.

But you cant compare the price point with what it used to cost and imagine that its overpriced now and that people will seek alternatives. There aren't any cheaper alternatives.

zamadatix2• 1 month ago

It doesn't have to be everybody or nobody, it can be as simple as "a lot of people buy lower end gaming equipment instead".

eudamoniac6• 1 month ago

There is no guarantee that these prices are here to stay...

raincole3• 1 month ago

I don't know what you mean by 'killed.' It'd be sold out faster than hot cakes.

Forgeties7927• 1 month ago

No way. $1100+ to play games with medium/high settings at 1080p? You can probably buy a prebuilt tower that does better than that at that price.

koolala7• 1 month ago

It also killed their ability to make lots of units. They say so themselves. Selling out isn't a good thing.

jgon• 1 month ago

If you make 5 of a product and put a bunch of marketing behind it you can sell out too. People are going to use "selling out" as some sort of barometer of success but its like the lizard-man veto in politics. You'll always find some small percentage of people who will vote for the motion "the nation's leaders are a group of lizard people", but you can't use that as any sort of signal regarding the validity of the claim of the motion.

Valve could have priced this at 5k and probably found a couple thousand buyers, and if they only made a few thousand boxes they could claim it sold out then too. This thing is DOA in terms of having any major success or impact on the gaming market when I can walk down to my neighborhood PC store and either build a better PC myself for less money (at off the shelf markups no less!!!) or get a pre-built with better specs that costs less. I could buy a P5Pro and a Switch 2 combined for less money than the 2TB version, and the PS5Pro has 2tb as well!

Its actually mind boggling that Valve is coming in with a less economic product that a fucking hand-built premade at my local PC store.

wavemode• 1 month ago

It's objectively a terrible deal. It has console specs for double the price of a console.

In fact you could literally just buy a separate PS5 and Macbook Neo and spend less than most Steam Machine configurations, so even the "it's also a computer" selling point is not that big of a deal.

copx3• 1 month ago

I bought my own version of a "Steam Machine" i.e. a mini-PC powered by an AMD APU for just €676 right before the RAM prices exploded.

It is an AOOSTAR GT37 which actually outclasses the €1,039 Steam Machine in most areas except graphics. One cannot blame Valve here though, the hyperinflation of RAM prices is too blame here.

AOOSTAR GT37 (€676 a few months ago [now vastly more expensive if you can still get one at all]) vs Steam Machine (€1039 right now)

CPU: 12x Zen 5 vs. 6 Zen4 Graphics: 16x RDNA 3.5 vs. 28 RDNA 3 RAM: 32 GB LPDDR5X vs. 16 GB DDR5 + 8 GB GDDR6 HDD: 1 TB vs. 512 GB (both NVMe-SSD)

I expect the Steam Machine to run graphically demanding FPS games quite a bit better due to the extra RDNA cores and faster VRAM. However it might actually be the inferior gaming machine for CPU/main RAM intense strategy or simulation games (e.g. Stellaris).

mhitza• 1 month ago

However it might actually be the inferior gaming machine for CPU/main RAM intense strategy or simulation games (e.g. Stellaris).

On Stellaris: I remember having a pretty good experience (not stellar) playing on a 2012 AMD FX-8350 desktop cpu. The six year old midrange laptop cpu Ryzen 4650u smokes that desktop cpu.

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/1780vs3766/AMD-FX-8350-...

Just to draw out the fact that with the Steam machine you will have a better Stellaris experience than what I had 7-8 years ago. (Because I assume even better performance than this laptop class cpu)

My thoughts go more on the question if 15GB ram 8GB VRAM is enough for the next 7 years. And if Steam verified will all be split up, and become more confusing, between the 3 different devices they have.

noxvilleza4• 1 month ago

They show a 1080p/high benchmark of Stellaris on Gamers Nexus and it took 63.9s on Linux OpenGL and 67.4s on DX11 (https://youtu.be/66QzlDewigE?t=2021). I would guess the AMD R9 HX 370 in your GT37 will smash that.

bdavbdav• 1 month ago

That’s a beast for €676. Good buy.

Unicironic• 1 month ago

I still think it's a great concept and a really accessible way to get a great computer. But I agree, I thought this was going to land in the $500 to $700 range. That said, I also bought a mini PC for $250, and that same PC is now going for $600. So I don't really think steam can be blamed for that

caconym_5• 1 month ago

killed this product on arrival sadly.

Rather odd to talk about an as yet unreleased product failing in the past tense.

powersurge3603• 1 month ago

You may be unfamiliar with the colloquialism. This one is exclusively for unreleased products.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_on_arrival#:~:text=In%20a...

trashface2• 1 month ago

Over $1000 for a machine with only half a terabyte of storage, especially for gamers, is just brutal.

globalnode• 30 days ago

I'd like to buy one, but its a bit pricey for those specs. $1600 AUD?

B-Con3• 30 days ago

I'm simply impressed they're releasing at all. This has to be literally the worst 6 month time window in the last 20+ years to launch a new computing device at scale and have to build the vendor contracts and inventory from zero.

Fire-Dragon-DoL4• 30 days ago

Why dead on arrival though? If you want to buy the same kind of pc, price is the same.

You can buy a PS5, of course, but that's a different walled garden.

If you are in the market for a 3k pc, sure do it, but if you are in the market for a 1k pc, why not a steam machine?

vondur2• 1 month ago

Interesting with the memory. It is 16GB plus an additional 8GB for graphics, or is it just 16GB with 8GB reserved for graphics?

Rohansi12• 1 month ago

16GB DDR5 + 8GB GDDR6

andruby• 1 month ago

It is 16GB plus an additional 8GB for graphics.

postepowanieadm• 1 month ago

It's GPU's VRAM or some sort of shared memory? I have never seen mixed ram before.

neko_ranger• 1 month ago

Unfortunate for them on the pricing of components. This won't do so well (right now), but I think the Frame will exceed expectations.

metamet• 1 month ago

Naw. I think they'll sell every single one they're able manufacture for the next couple years. The pre-order list will probably fill most of those.

trashface2• 1 month ago

Interesting that they went with AMD for GPU, but not too surprising. My experience with a nvidia 5060 on my laptop is that nvidia's drivers on linux still have no idea how to reliably wake from sleep. Fixing that just not the priority for them I guess - datacenter GPUs doing AI probably never sleep and just idle at 50 watts or whatever.

Tiberium2• 1 month ago

It was kind of expected since Steam Deck (obviously) had an AMD APU, and AMD works much better with mainstream Linux projects in general.

jrepinc11• 30 days ago

And since for AMD it is an open source driver Valve can also hack on it and squeze more performance out of it for their own specific hardware configuration.

bjord2• 1 month ago

valve themselves also personally employ multiple major contributors to the amd linux drivers

https://www.phoronix.com/news/AMD-Marek-Joins-Valve

singingtoday• 1 month ago

I understand why it costs that much, but it's too much.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not commenting on the value, but rather the markets ability to handle it.

MBCook4• 1 month ago

Yeah. But they’re only other choices to just sit on it for a few more years, which point they would need to put different hardware in and it would just increase costs.

This may be the best option of a couple of terrible ones.

Gigachad24• 30 days ago

My hope is this is just a soft launch that people who really want can get now, but that they revise it in the future to either be massively more powerful or much cheaper.

patmcc• 1 month ago

Yeah. I don't think they're gouging, I totally understand how expensive RAM and storage and GPUs are, but...oof. I just can't justify it as a 'fun' purchase.

Lord_Zero• 29 days ago

Same, I could have maybe justified $600 to my wife, $800 would be really pushing it. But 1k+ with a controller? There's no way when we have other things to save for. I am sure young single people will still buy it and it will sell out, but my Series X was $550 a few years ago and ill enjoy that in my living room for a while longer.

LinXitoW4• 29 days ago

I mean, can the market really handle any of these prices? If we're truly stuck with these increasing prices for another year or so, whole sectors might get "restructured", including gaming, simply because people cannot afford the devices they depend on.

Keyframe4• 1 month ago

Yeah, I don't see this succeeding at these prices. Succeeding in a sense to come close to Switch 2 / PS5 (Pro) levels.

mathgeek• 1 month ago

I don't think we could ever expect a specific gaming PC to compete with the volume sold of gaming consoles that have exclusives people really, really want to play.

kipchak• 1 month ago

I don't think the goal here is to necessarily sell a bunch of hardware units, but to create a new product category of devices which buy games from steam, like the steam deck did with handheld gaming PCs.

Narishma6• 1 month ago

It was never going to do those numbers, regardless of price.

BadBadJellyBean4• 1 month ago

Sad about the price. Maybe it comes down some day.

dgellow3• 1 month ago

Given the current state of the global market it will likely take a few years for prices to come down

BadBadJellyBean4• 1 month ago

Yeah I think so too. It's a shame. For maybe around $300 less it would be an awesome product. At least I have a good gaming PC at the moment.

haunter4• 1 month ago

Prices and I mean the price tag will never come down again. That was an exception for technology and gadgets for a few decades but I'm not sure it will happen again.

inigyou24• 1 month ago

Semiconductors always go through boom and bust cycles - so say stock market analysts. But I'm not sure how long they typically are? (This is a boom not a bust for them)

mohamedkoubaa2• 1 month ago

Prices coming down? In this economy?

pseudosavant11• 1 month ago

I know the price for PC parts is terrible these days, but $1049 for a 6-core 16GB RAM, with a 512GB SSD, and no controller, is a terrible value.

For reference, the PS5 Pro has more than twice the number GPU CUs, an 8-core CPU, a 2TB SSD, a controller, and costs $899.

mock-possum2• 1 month ago

Right, but it’s a PS5, not a PC - you’re paying less for the privilege of letting Sony 100% control what you use the device for, including not being able to play your own games that you’ve paid for. Try doing that on a PC. Try checking your email on your PS5, or steaming the media of your choice.

threetonesun4• 1 month ago

Sure, I have to use my gaming console as a gaming console, much like I use my smart thermostat as a thermostat and don't check email on it.

Rohansi12• 1 month ago

Even if you only used your Steam Machine to play Steam games it's still probably a better deal. Multiplayer and cloud saves are free so you don't need something like PlayStation Plus. Games are generally cheaper and Steam sales make them even cheaper. You also don't lose access to older games if you get a better system.

fwip2• 30 days ago

The PS5 has an internet browser, you can do all that.

Rohansi12• 1 month ago

Not that it matters as much for a gaming console but the PS5 Pro CPU is definitely the slower one.

bryanlarsen2• 1 month ago

The PS5 Pro has 16 GB unified memory, the Steam Machine is 16GB + 8GB. That'll be where some of the price difference comes from. But most likely comes from Sony locking in long term contracts before price insanity.

pseudosavant11• 30 days ago

Unified memory is a lot more flexible and efficient though. You don't have to have assets loaded in RAM and also VRAM for the CPU/GPU to use them. Don't forget about how much more RAM a general purpose OS like Steam OS can consume versus a gaming specific OS too. The PS5 Pro also has an extra 2GB of DDR5 system RAM too.

My old Ryzen 3700X gaming PC has 16GB of RAM and 8GB of VRAM (RTX 2070 Super) and there isn't any game that runs better on it than my Xbox Series X. And the GPU in the Steam Machine is slightly worse than an RTX 2070 Super.

legitster4• 1 month ago

Different value props. The target audience for this already has an extensive Steam catalogue. To buy a PS5 Pro is going to require re-buying all of your games for it.

Also, you can build a decent PC for $1049, but getting it into a decent form/noise factor is going to ratchet that price up. Add in the proprietary CEC stuff that Valve has done for it and it's not as terrible as it seems.

reddalo2• 1 month ago

To buy a PS5 Pro is going to require re-buying all of your games for it.

Even if I didn't have a Steam Library, I wouldn't buy the PS5 anyway: no Steam Sales there. And Steam Sales are a godsend.

pseudosavant11• 1 month ago

A slow gaming PC that is small and can turn on my TV is still... a slow gaming PC. And one of the main PC benefits, upgradeability is non-existent for the parts that matter (e.g. GPU, VRAM, etc).

0x4573• 1 month ago

To buy a PS5 Pro is going to require re-buying all of your games for it.

No? You can plan all your PS4 (and regular PS5) games. Plus some PS3 and PS One (IIRC) other games.

Rapzid4• 30 days ago

To buy a PS5 Pro is going to require re-buying all of your games for it

Why would I re-buy all the games I own?! The vast majority of people one-and-done games and movies. There are a handful they go back to, and that's it.

CHILDREN replay games cycling through them ad-infimum because their entire concept of time is like 3x less than we've been waiting for the next GTA.

And they don't have money! Adults are the majority of the market now.

Any other behavior from adults, who are seriously time constrained, is niche. And that's fine if someone wants to spend their adult time on earth replaying games, but let's be honest. It's niche.

izacus10• 1 month ago

For reference, the PS5 Pro has more than twice the number GPU CUs, an 8-core CPU, a 2TB SSD, a controller, and costs $899.

Will it run my Steam library of games or do I need to also pay 5000$ again with inflated prices?

pseudosavant11• 1 month ago

The irony there is that the Steam Machine can't actually run the full Steam library since most games aren't made for Linux. Most run on it via Proton, many even run well, but it is very far from "all the games play without issues".

Can you imagine if the PlayStation Store sold games on the PS5 that you couldn't play there because they were actually Windows games?

Narishma6• 1 month ago

It will run your PS4 and PS5 libraries.

koolala7• 1 month ago

For reference compare it to a PC.

seanalltogether• 1 month ago

If Valve wants users to compare the Steam Machine to a PC, then it's going to be outdated in 6 months.

cainxinth• 30 days ago

SM: AMD Zen 4 6C / 12T

PC: AMD Ryzen 5 7600X 4.7 GHz 6-Core ($170)

SM: AMD RDNA3 28CUs 8 GB

PC: AMD Radeon RX 7600 8 GB ($280)

SM: 16GB DDR5

PC: 2 x 8 GB DDR5-5600 CL40 ($225)

SM: 512GB NVMe SSD

PC: Samsung 870 Evo 500 GB 2.5" SSD ($283)

Other parts the PC will need:

- CPU Cooler ($18)

- Motherboard ($100)

- Case ($60)

- PSU ($60)

SM: $1,049

PC: $1,196

littlecranky678• 1 month ago

Well, and you pay 120$/year for the privilege to play games online on that PS5. That is one of the reasons SONY can subsidize the PS5 unit price and sell under cost. Valve is not in that position, because people would buy it as office PC replacement.

balls187• 1 month ago

Valve very much is in the position to subsidize the costs; they charge 30% royalty per game sold.

Valve often boasts that they have a very high Rev / Employee number.

quacker• 1 month ago

This more a dig at Sony than a reason Valve can’t also sell their hardware as a loss leader. They are massively profitable from their cut of Steam sales anyway. And part of PS Plus is a catalog of games and monthly games, similar to Gamepass. Valve could easily have a profitable subscription model for games or services if they wanted to.

hbn4• 1 month ago

Also a PS5 only runs PS5 games which Sony gets a cut of whenever you purchase one.

With this thing you could buy it and then install your favorite Linux distro on it and never give Valve another dime. If they ate the cost, businesses would buy them up as the best value for the compute and they're not buying Steam games.

viktorcode• 1 month ago

That is one of the reasons SONY can subsidize the PS5 unit price and sell under cost.

PS5 hardware sales started generating profit in the first year. Only for the first few month the sales were "subsidised".

MYEUHD3• 30 days ago

Playstation plus essential is $80 per year

WithinReason2• 28 days ago

Why would anyone buy a $1000 office PC when you can buy a $300 office PC?

sowbug2• 1 month ago

It makes more sense to focus on its value as a console platform than its price as a PC.

The lower the price, the more boxes sell, hopefully making the platform large enough for publishers to target.

The higher the price, the better specs the box can afford, increasing the platform's longevity.

The hidden value you don't see in the specs is that publishers will target this platform specifically for a certain amount of time.

mwkaufma3• 1 month ago

PS5 sells at a loss & makes up the difference collecting rent on a closed system. With Steam you're buying an open system.

smith70182• 1 month ago

Does Valve take a cut of software sales on Steam? If so, why do we expect Sony to sell its consoles at a loss, while not holding the same expectation for Valve?

njovin• 1 month ago

I would guess that users of the Steam machine would mostly be as locked-in to Steam purchases as PS5 users are to PS Store purchases.

I stopped PC gaming about a decade ago and my current daily driver is a Macbook. I periodically play games on my a PS5 or XBOX, but there are a ton of great games on my Steam wishlist.

I feel like I'm the exact target market for this (although I'm not going to buy at this price point at this time). I don't want to bother with Windows and would love a 'console' allowing me to play most Steam games without a lot of hassle.

izacus10• 1 month ago

PS5 NEVER in it's lifecycle sold at a loss. That hasn't happened for generations now.

Telaneo6• 30 days ago

https://www.pcmag.com/news/sony-says-499-ps5-no-longer-sells...

That article is from 8 months after it released. Notably it doesn't count the Digital Edition, but I doubt it also got sold at a loss for that much longer.

cowpig• 1 month ago

Can I serve my media library off of my NAS with the PS5? I am legit asking because I just got on the list hoping to use this thing as my home entertainment system

tianreyma• 29 days ago

Not sure if anything has changed but back when I had one the only thing I found that was supported was Plex

doom2• 29 days ago

For reference, the PS5 Pro has more than twice the number GPU CUs, an 8-core CPU, a 2TB SSD, a controller, and costs $899.

PS5 Pro had a launch price of $700, which already felt steep. How is $900 not even worse value? Even if it's "better" than the Steam Machine, let's not pretend that it's actually a good value for the hardware.

kats2• 29 days ago

But a person can't really use their PS5 as a home PC.

aranelsurion• 1 month ago

So unfortunate with the timing, I wish they shelved it for a few years instead. At any other time this could've been the thing to entrench Steam, PC and Linux as finally THE gaming platform.

At this price and features it'll probably just be a footnote.

YuechenLi3• 1 month ago

Surprised that they have 4 USB-A and only 1 USB-C. With their power profile, Steam Machine should be powerable by a single USB-C cable on extended power range which should reduce the need for the power supply altogether and greatly simplify mechanical as well as thermal design, although the power electronic design would be more complex as a result.

I would also be expecting Wifi 7 support as well as unified memory considering they ordered custom AMD silicon. Understandable that it is a rather conservative design for their first generation though.

diath• 1 month ago

Why is it surprising? This is essentially a pre-built PC in a small form factor and most PC peripherals are USB-A.

Reubachi• 1 month ago

My 4 year old (maybe 5?) work laptop has 3 usb C ports. My macbook is all usb c, and my home media/gaming PC has a mix and match.

All my cables I would connect to my home PC/macbook are USB C. IE bluetooth adaptor, sd card adaptor, external ssd, mouse/keyboard, a soundbar etc.

I have several chinesium clones of dewalt batteries/tools, IE lights, compressors etc. They all have USB c output.

"most pc perihpials are USB-A" is not exactly correct for some time now. (not that I'm a fan.)

Eric_WVGG• 1 month ago

I haven’t seen a new product with USB-A in years. It’s long past time to move on.

krzyk• 1 month ago

No?

The only PC peripheral I have with USB-A is a mouse dongle when I'm lazy and don't connect bluetooth - and that one I connect to the monitor.

All others are usb-c.

mort962• 1 month ago

A USB-C PD power supply which supports 130W is probably gonna be more expensive than whatever power supply they're using now...

Gigachad24• 1 month ago

There’s also the issue that users would plug in their own random usb power supplies and most of them wouldn’t work. Some would work for 15 minutes before overheating and lowering the power output.

TiredOfLife5• 1 month ago

And steam machine uses almost double that.

OkayPhysicist4• 1 month ago

Xbox 360 controllers (and their knock-offs) are still extremely common choices for PC gamers who want a controller. Xbox because they have good windows plug-and-play, 360 because there are still plenty of $20-ish dollar ones available, as opposed to the ~$40-50 range for the Xbox One controllers.

Wired Xbox 360 controllers (and most of their off brand alternatives) have a non-removable USB-A cable.

cassianoleal11• 1 month ago

There's plenty of cheap adapters for these use cases.

Acrobatic_Road2• 30 days ago

Series X controllers are easily worth that extra $20-$30 for the jump in quality.

TiredOfLife5• 1 month ago

Steam machine uses about 200W. Can you even buy any 240W pd power bricks. Quick search on amazon shows that all that advertise 240w can only output 140w max on single cable

Gigachad24• 30 days ago

It took me a bit of digging but Framework sells a single port 240w USB-C charger https://frame.work/au/en/products/power-adapter-240w?v=FRAKM...

That said I would not trust this as a PSU for a computer which uses almost all the available power output and does not have it's own internal battery. Most USB-C chargers are not designed to run at 100% capacity for extended periods and could not handle sudden spikes over the rated capacity. Even for desktop PSUs you always want to get something that has a good headroom over the actual power draw for stability.

makeitdouble• 1 month ago

These are USB3-A, so USB3-A to USB-C cables will properly work at full potential for any of your USB-C peripherals.

It's a bummer if have none of these cables around, but it's still more elegant than adapting USB3-A stuff to USB-C.

unixhero• 1 month ago

My phone has 1tb storage since 2022...

andy_xor_andrew• 1 month ago

This is a weird thing to call out, when there's so much else to talk about (price, specs, etc) buuuuuut-

Check out the gameplay video partway down the page, where the two people are on the couch playing Cuphead. Right under "Your Steam library in more places."

It's just... a real clip of real people playing a real game and reacting in a real way. It's funny. I know it's stupid to call out, but how many exaggerated versions of this scene have you seen before? And Valve is smart enough to say "Let's just film two people playing a real game and snip a nice, realistic reaction shot from it."

imustbeevil2• 1 month ago

I'm not sure I understand, I'm just seeing a very clearly staged 2 second clip of product usage and reaction like you'd see in any commercial.

debugnik2• 1 month ago

This one is admittedly very natural compared to how cringey they usually get in gaming ads. Which says more about the industry than about this particular clip.

rustyminnow• 1 month ago

In any other commercial they'd be laughing and grinning ear to ear with their fakest smile instead of wincing from dieing in Cuphead. Definitely still staged but refreshingly so.

orphea2• 1 month ago

Nah, I have to agree with andy^andrew.

This is how staged reaction looks like: https://www.residentialsystems.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/0...

The Steam's clip is actually nowhere near like that.

leokennis• 30 days ago

Days of our Lives is staged and so is The Godfather.

Yet one is not like the other.

Valve staged a scene of two people playing a game like how most people play a game. Just like that, there are many small human touches to this Steam Machine page. The messy cable picture where they show off the led strip, the honest and plain FAQ. Etc.

We don't have to glaze Valve for doing this, but we can still appreciate it.

redox993• 1 month ago

If you sampled 100 steam players at random, it would look nothing like that.

poly2it2• 1 month ago

No average pilot.

boca_honey• 1 month ago

Yeah those people are definetly not a realistic sample of the average Steam user. I wonder why they chose them in particular.

JMiao• 1 month ago

those random players have gaming pcs

if you sampled 100 blackberry customers at random, they'd absolutely hate a software keyboard

and so on

_8L34K• 1 month ago

I think your bigotry override got tripped - the person above never claimed they were representative of some imagined average, just that it was two people actually playing video games...

brechin2• 1 month ago

Based on https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/ I would imagine out of 100 Steam players, most are playing at a Windows gaming computer with an Intel CPU, a bunch with Windows/AMD, then a few with a Mac, then one with a Steam Deck.

Most of those are probably NOT plugged into a TV, so in that way I agree that these are not typical Steam users. That's why the Steam Machine was developed, to bring gaming back to the couch in a way that the Steam Link didn't succeed at.

nearlyepic• 1 month ago

First time seeing an ad? If you sampled 100 F-150 buyers they would look nothing like the people in the commercials.

dathinab3• 30 days ago

and you might also end up with 100 people with punk hair stiles, or firefighters or whatever

Games are so wide spread through all parts of society and Steam is the largest platform for them, sampling 100 people is fully non representive.

Whatever stereotype of two people on a couch you pick, there are not just thousands but more like many 100,000ths to millions of people not matching the stereotype at all. I mean think about it steam has daily active user numbers in the multiple tens of millions.

My best guess is, the people on the photos are related to whoever created the photos in some arbitrary way. It's a pretty common practice for startups when you need photos like that and have no need for "professional actors/models". Like employees of you or who ever you might have hired to do the photos, or some of their friends etc. You still need to singn a simple contract but it's much less time intensive, complicated and annoying to do compared to trying to hire models (of any kind including such made to look like "gamer stereotypes") .

rsynnott2• 30 days ago

Yes, all ads are made by sampling 100 users of the product at random.

I mean, you could say this of I think pretty much literally any ad. Were you previously unaware of advertising?

madeofpalk• 30 days ago

Ignoring the sitting in front of the TV thing, I think if you sampled 2 steam players at random, they would look nothing like any other 100 random steam players.

patja• 29 days ago

I am guessing the BMI would track. Unless they make unlikely changes including spending more time away from that couch, these two are looking at health consequences that will probably make them a burden on society by the time they hit middle age.

raincole3• 1 month ago

I don't get it. It's a quite typical commercial clip. Just perhaps less dramatic. What's special about that clip?

Recursing• 1 month ago

I also don't get it, looks like any other ad

jamilton• 30 days ago

A lot of video game and console ads are much more sensationalized.

Zenbit_UX2• 1 month ago

I wasn’t going to say anything until I read this comment but that clip of the gameplay and the clip of the two people playing are not from the same source. The one showing the gameplay has a tower of books or possibly a jenga tower on the coffee table that doesn’t exist when seeing the gamers. It’s just editing magic and stitched together to have exactly the effect elicited by your comment.

malfist3• 1 month ago

The books are beside the TV, not on the coffee table. You can't see them in the second shot.

abustamam• 1 month ago

That's basically how I looked playing Cuphead with my wife except I think there was a bit more swearing coming from her

uni_baconcat• 30 days ago

Just scroll a bit further, you can see more clips just like any other commercial shots from a studio set. I don’t think that’s a point you can praise Valve.

retired11• 1 month ago

I hope they will release a version with a replaceable CPU and GPU. For a company that does so well on repair ability I don’t understand why they solder everything on the board. I prefer a mini-ITX system where I can easily change the components.

prhn• 1 month ago

I want to buy one just to raise the signal that Linux support is important.

When these machines were announced I switched to Fedora as a daily driver on my high end gaming rig.

It’s been awesome. I still have to go back to Windows for music production unfortunately. I may switch to Mac for that so I can completely abandon Windows.

I run an optical HDMI cable from my office to my TV and get to play games and use Linux in 77”.

Something feels awesome about that.

inigyou24• 1 month ago

Let me guess, DAWs? Have you tried Reaper (FOSS) or Bitwig Studio (commercial)?

intrikate• 1 month ago

Reaper is neither Free nor Open Source.

tuvix• 1 month ago

Seconding Reaper, great software. Renoise is also extremely fun to use if you’re comfortable with trackers (for midi input not that they track you) and you make electronic music

Melonai• 1 month ago

As a sibling comment pointed out, Reaper is not FOSS, it's fully proprietary. What makes it stand out is its great Linux support, and very generous licensing.

If you want to venture into the FOSS DAW realm on Linux you have to go to LMMS and Ardour. I've played around with them, they're a little bare-bones, but they do work. Issue is I haven't been able to use them properly, because I just can't stand to look at them, they are afflicted with the medium-size open-source project curse of looking particularly horrid. I hope this isn't taken as an affront to any of the developers behind these projects, a DAW is a hard task, but I keep asking myself, out of the set of developers who work on these projects, is there really no one who feels the same way as me? Am I just afflicted with some weird pixel-peeping autism-esque disorder that makes me stare at the constantly-reocurring-throughout-all-FOSS-applications clump of jarringly gradient-ed grey buttons with white icons on them, their round corners contrasting with each other because they're clearly placed way too close together than they were meant to be? (I swear I see this in every mid-scale project using QT and older GTK!)

And I also need to confirm, this isn't just a "slight annoyance" for me, I have genuine issues when I have to concentrate on a project within some application that is suffering from the FOSS UI affliction, my mind wanders to looking at those buttons again, or those #00FF00 greens, or at some label that has clearly seeped a few pixels downwards out-of-alignment with the button it was placed in...

Ugh, I know I have some issues for sure, but I know someone else has to care about this too? It's the main reason why I fail at using non-textual FOSS software, and have to resort to Logic Pro or Ableton!

Sorry for the rant, I had to get it out of me. I wish I had more time in a day, then perhaps I could go to these projects and help out with UI, but I have a feeling my proposals will be rejected, even if I had the time to make them, I have found most FOSS developers are quite happy with how their UI usually looks like, including many people here on this forum.

bitmasher92• 1 month ago

It’s always fantastic to read a success story of migrating to Linux gaming from Windows. As Windows gets worse and worse there will be more people joining us.

Even without buying you can send Linux gaming signals by playing on Linux and participating in the hardware survey.

awesomeusername• 29 days ago

I just did this at home, and my 9 year old, without my bias or prompting, was pointing out that sea of thieves and MSFS are both microsoft games but run better on Linux

I can't believe what a non-event it was switching the kids over

gonzalohm2• 1 month ago

You are lucky. A lot of the games I play with friends use kernel level anticheat crap that doesn't work on Linux

connicpu• 1 month ago

I'm somewhat lucky in that I didn't have to be the one to force that issue, another friend in my gaming group already made the decision that he would switch to Linux and no longer play any games that did not work on Linux/Proton. So it was pretty easy for me to just switch last year.

dijit3• 1 month ago

I work in AAA; more people using Linux means we'll actually get buy-in for working with Linux as a platform.

Right now Producers and HQ don't want to support it because "theres no money there" and they're bolstered by a crew of developers who have only ever touched Windows who will reinforce the notion that Windows is all you need (because they've sunk their entire career into the platform).

I remember bringing this topic up a decade ago and basically being laughed out of the room, slowly those laughs will become uncomfortable silences, then token support from the passionate, then proper initiatives.

It takes time, yeah, but we're so much further today already than we were 10+years ago.

GZGavinZhao• 1 month ago

*sad poro noises

marcus_holmes2• 30 days ago

But you're playing with friends, right? So you don't actually need anticheat at all. Or are you playing with friends and random assholes from the internet?

I'm curious because if a game requires anticheat that means there's an intention that I'd be playing with people who would cheat if they could. And I don't want to have anything to do with people like that. I don't really understand why anyone wants to spend their time playing games with assholes from the internet.

frollogaston15• 30 days ago

I've only ever played a couple of games with kernel-level anticheat. The rest have some other reason they don't work in Linux.

archagon2• 1 month ago

How do you use a controller with your TV? Do you route USB over there as well?

d3Xt3r11• 1 month ago

I too want to buy one to support the ecosystem, but sadly, Valve doesn't want me to.

This item is not available for purchase in your region

soundworlds• 30 days ago

I also work in music production (for video games) and fully switched to Linux + FOSS about a year ago.

I'd say it is a lot more doable if you make electronic styles of music. Harder if you make classical styles, as many of the big sample libraries don't support Linux yet.

Just in case you're interested, here's a list of everything I use: https://johnoestmannmusic.com/tooling/

Parae2• 29 days ago

If you make electronic music using only virtual instruments and effects, it's ok. But if you play live, record live bands with lot's of mics and need to use physical hardware. Neither Mac nor Linux are an option.

Lot's of interface simply work best with Window.

hypertexthero• 30 days ago

Ditto.

I use Macs for work and PC for games, and this little box seems a good opportunity to play The Legend of Linux on a desktop or a couch, and make it true.

sourcegrift• 30 days ago

Please buy pinephone instead.

whazor• 30 days ago

The Steam Machines raises the bar on PC Console gaming.

Because:

- GPUs don't support HDMI CEC by default, nor does the operating system offer it

- Suspend mode on motherboards often suck

- Many game controllers with 2.4Ghz don't properly import USB Wake events. Or the motherboard didn't implement it properly

I see the Steam Machine as an expensive open source concept car that moves the needle for us PC gamers.

mlrtime• 29 days ago

Hasn't all this been mostly solved on the Nvidia Shield Pro for ~7 years now?

JopV• 29 days ago

A much better way to raise that signal, is to use that money to buy native Linux games instead.

ActorNightly2• 28 days ago

All it would take for Linux to be equal is nvidia getting their shit together and putting together drivers for Linux.

But because everyone in the world wants to give them money right now, chances are that is not going to happen.

rootsudo• 1 month ago

They released it. Companion cube.

byteflip• 1 month ago

My steam deck is underpowered as a living room gaming PC.

Wish it was cheaper but would look forward to a “just works” experience including sleep/instant game resume.

Add my thousands of already owned Steam games and it makes me excited for a great couch gaming experience. It’s the reason I don’t get a PS5/Switch cause I don’t wanna rebuy all the games and they are not on sale as much.

skupig5• 1 month ago

If you already have a powerful desktop PC in your house, streaming via Sunshine/Moonlight is pretty much perfect these days.

cassianoleal11• 1 month ago

I honestly can't understand this. It's ok for games where latency and lag don't matter much but otherwise it's pretty bad.

I have even connected 2 computers directly with an ethernet cable to rule out my networking gear and it was ok but very very far from perfect!

Not to mention the experience is clunky at best. Switching resolution, losing settings, dealing with encoding/decoding, etc.

pcchristie• 29 days ago

What do you stream it to? I tried the Google Streamer 4K and it was terrible. I couldn't work out if it was latency on the Streaming side or PS4 Controller via Bluetooth latency (or both). It took forever to set up and frankly it just wasn't that good.

bsimpson• 1 month ago

I was wondering if this would be a worthwhile upgrade to my Legion Go Z1 Extreme.

Sounds like it's in the same vicinity for graphics power. Not worth $1k for a tiny bit more RAM.

I do wonder if this will give me any useful presets, in the same way the Steam Deck does. I have no interest in tweaking graphics settings one at a time.

weberer3• 30 days ago

Have you tried Steam Remote Play? It allows your desktop to render games and stream it to your Steam Deck that's connected to your TV. Or to any other device really.

hari1123• 1 month ago

Steam Deck is probably better value

sudobash1• 1 month ago

I am pleased to see hardware not being locked down as a selling point:

Yes, Steam Machine is optimized for gaming, but it's still your PC. Install your own apps, or even another operating system. Who are we to tell you how to use your computer?

It feels very commonsense that you should be able to run whatever you want on the computer that you have purchased, but it is surprisingly uncommon.

tonymet7• 1 month ago

And I like knowing that I will own the hardware long term. I have so many bricks at home with great hardware and locked boot loaders.

all22• 1 month ago

The urge to tear down the stack of cellphones I have and pull the boot flash chip hits me occasionally. It would be a substantial project, though, so I haven't done it. Yet.

retired11• 1 month ago

I do hope they will release drivers for the Steam Machine, otherwise the openness isn’t very useful. Or at least make it possible for others to make drivers by publishing specifications.

Edit, reply to bjord as I am rate limited: HDMI CEC, the chipset, GPU drivers, controller receiver etc.

Edit, reply to robhlt: Thanks! Hope we can get that ported to Windows

bjord2• 1 month ago

drivers for what else, exactly? valve is already regularly upstreaming work in major open source linux drivers (and has been for a long time)

for example: https://www.phoronix.com/news/Valve-Old-AMD-Linux-Love-Song

robhlt2• 1 month ago

For HDMI CEC they've already published their user-space daemon: https://gitlab.steamos.cloud/holo/linux-cec

asattarmd• 1 month ago

They need to do that because, in some sense, they're competing with Gaming PCs, not really with Gaming consoles. Gaming consoles sell their consoles at a discounted price because they can recoup a lot of it when selling games. Steam can't have a markup on games because they share their marketplace with other PCs.

tuna74• 1 month ago

Steam has a very high markup compared to its competitors like Epic Games Store.

basch• 1 month ago

You could still offer this, similar to the ad tier and ad free tier of a kindle, or a carrier locked phone.

$799 for a locked down version, $1049 for an unlocked version. Opportunity to pay $300 to unlock it later at any time. 5% discount on purchases on a locked device.

poly2it2• 1 month ago

I would assume it also has to do with if not fundamentally manifesting from Steam being an organisation of technologists. They don't want to put out a project which has a worse operating system than their workstations.

philistine4• 1 month ago

Can you point me to any statement that any current console is being sold at a loss?

All I've seen is that everyone is doing at cost nowadays. The PS4 Pro was the last subsidized console.

ThatMedicIsASpy• 1 month ago

That is why the frame will be the most interesting to the people on HN. A VR PC you can do whatever u want with.

ApolloFortyNine• 1 month ago

You can install whatever apk you want on your Oculus Quest.

socalgal23• 30 days ago

Except without color AR it will not as many of the interesting things HNers want to do require it.

moffkalast3• 30 days ago

At a price point of 10k if we extrapolate to its release.

theshrike797• 1 month ago

Xbox Series S/X, PS5 and both Switches are pretty much commodity hardware.

Nobody has even hinted that it would be nice to have a 3rd party store or the ability to run whatever OS on them freely.

I keep wondering why.

izacus10• 1 month ago

I guess you weren't listening because all of them have healthy homebrew communities and people defeating the DRM.

I'm not sure if you're being dishonest or just ignorant of the console hacking scene.

ebbi2• 1 month ago

Probably because it's very niche. Talking to many friends, and an increasing number of posts on various console subreddits, there's lots of comments from PC gamers that embraced the console life due to it's simplicity. This has increased since the PS5 Pro released - "Close to PC-level graphics, without the PC-level costs and mucking around with settings"

There is a certain appeal to this for many people that hacking it to run your own OS isn't really sought after.

willis9364• 1 month ago

Valve gets it. I very much want to support them and vote with my wallet. Unfortunately the Steam machine isn't a good fit for me. I will buy the frame in a heartbeat though. HMD with a FOSS OS? That's in its own class.

cryptoegorophy• 1 month ago

One can still be a billionaire and not use shady tactics.

socalgal23• 30 days ago

Color AR is a thing Frame doesn't support so sadly it's behind the times and I can't go back

valicord• 30 days ago

And yet Steam Controller somehow only works with Steam...

B-Con3• 30 days ago

Even though I balked at the Steam Deck prices on the recent inventory restock, as they were up ~30% presumably due to the same hardware shortages, I got one anyway. Prices won't drop anytime soon and if any for-profit organization has earned my loyalty, its Valve.

When I used it I was somewhat incredulous that I could simply exit Steam mode have an actual Linux desktop environment, where I could literally do what I wanted. It was my computer, a proper general purpose computing machine, and it was (willingly* in my control. No sneaky root needed.

tuyiown2• 1 month ago

I like that we can write the story that Microsoft sold their software with the home computer on the idea of productivity at home while the actual incentive was entertainment, and valve ends up justifying buying gaming hardware with the incentive that it can do productivity.

veber-alex3• 1 month ago

I don't understand, what is so special about this?

They are selling a x86 PC. All x86 PCs sold by everyone are open and you can install whatever you want.

It's commodity hardware packaged into a small box. There is nothing special here.

Trying to sell it as it if Valve are more consumer friendly here is nonsense.

AlienRobot• 1 month ago

I think it's because if it was someone else (e.g. Epic), they would have locked down the hardware and sold it like a console or smartphone where you can only install things from their app store.

danhor• 1 month ago

The PS5 and Xbox are also very close to being an x86 PC, but you're not installing your own OS on there even though there are few technical hurdles if the manufacturer removed the mechanisms to prevent that.

archagon2• 1 month ago

I think what's special here is:

1) Full compatibility with SteamOS. You won't have to fiddle with drivers/hardware/whatever to get it working[1].

2) The physical hardware is maximally condensed, more so than you'd be able to do yourself with a SFF build.

I'd have definitely considered this if I wasn't already doing my own SFF stuff. Gaming on the Deck is a delight and I'd love that console-esque experience for my primary gaming PC as well.

[1]: Incidentally, it looks like they're working on broader support. Sweet! https://www.theverge.com/games/953411/valve-steamos-desktop-...

a21282• 1 month ago

Every console on the market right now is locked-down proprietary garbage, that's the basic reality. The PlayStation 5, the Xbox One, they are also technically x86 PCs as they run on x86 processors, but they are specifically locked down to prevent any use outside of their narrow use cases that are optimized to make them money. Valve is really the only company that's developing proper consoles with a custom operating system and custom AMD chips while not locking down the hardware, despite the strong incentives of locking people into paying them 30% forever and preventing access to competing game stores

strix_varius2• 1 month ago

All x86 PCs sold by everyone are open and you can install whatever you want.

What exactly do you think an Xbox is? PS4 & PS5?

seabrookmx2• 30 days ago

It supports HDMI CEC, it has a built in dedicated radio for the steam controller, it ships with Steam OS, and will receive support from Valve.

If you are comfortable building a custom PC and fixated on the spec sheet sure, it's not that exciting. But there are some rough edges with PC couch gaming that are sanded off with this machine.

Thaxll• 1 month ago

I mean it's a PC, you can install whatever your want on a PC.

amelius• 1 month ago

Yes, a Personal computer as opposed to Apple's computer.

jitl8• 1 month ago

and it makes Steam Deck the best console ever made.

i picked up Darksiders 3 a few weeks ago to play on my deck. at some point i realized i was pretty underleveled but i didn’t wanna grind.

so, opened chatgpt in desktop mode and uploaded my save, asked it to write me a script to set my souls/xp/money to whatever number. it analyzed the save and spat out a bash/python script. after a chmod +x it worked flawlessly. done from bed took like 15 mins to figure it out end to end.

no other what other (handheld) console in history combines the depth of library, the slick console experience, and also lets you chmod +x.

lfkdev• 1 month ago

chmod +x makes it executable. Also, at this point just use a trainer

tripleee• 1 month ago

The steam deck is way too under-powered to be "the best console". Best handheld, maybe, if you really value portability.

something765478• 29 days ago

Out of curiosity, why didn't you just ask chatgpt to modify the save file directly?

ondiendkendkw4• 29 days ago

That’s a depressing tale

foo12bar2• 30 days ago

Reminds me of the PS3 and its OtherOS feature.

kakacik• 29 days ago

You write this on the forum where often in apple-based topics folks here defend locked down system ie on phones for themselves as something actually superior. Its often paid PR or folks to deep in the topic to have objective opinions (or simply employees/shareholders) but still, I've had that talk few times and downvotes were flying left and right.

dd8601fn3• 29 days ago

I’m fine with both. My phone and my “console experience that’s more open than an xbox” are wildly different scenarios, for which I have different needs and expectations.

There are alternatives for both, if/when I ever want them.

ondiendkendkw4• 29 days ago

You’re comparing apples to oranges and complaining none of them are tomatoes. Not a valid argument by any stretch of the imagination.

tootie• 29 days ago

I got a Steam Deck for my son. Docking it to an external monitor with mouse and keyboard in desktop mode is just running a nice desktop Linux with KDE Plasma by default. I showed him the basics and it's perfectly usable for his school needs. And he can still put it in his bag and play Skyrim on a train ride.

Levitating2• 29 days ago

It's also convenient since they're now facing multiple anti-trust lawsuits.[1]

[1] https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/dutch-non-profit-set...

lawn• 1 month ago

It's interesting how so many are complaining about price and how it's dead etc.

Yet it will still be out of stock for a long time.

mrguyorama• 1 month ago

The repeated insistence that a company can only possibly be successful if it reaches every human being on earth is killing the world.

A company that spins up a division, builds a product, sells 100k of them, and winds down is a success

Keep in mind this entire venture from Valve is also about ensuring they can't be made a vassal of Microsoft.

Fogest• 1 month ago

Valve isn't doesn't have to appease any public shareholders every quarter. There are likely no real expectations apart from making some profit which I am sure they will easily do. Then they just do like they have done with the Steamdeck and leave it on their store as an item they keep in stock and make some decent side income on. Throw it on sale for all their big sales and get some nice sales bonuses off it here and there.

I think ultimately there goal is to push more people towards Linux so that more games get developed there. All of their hardware pretty much targets the Linux side of gaming, so they really are trying to get rid of the Microsoft monopoly on PC gaming which I think is great.

Torkel• 1 month ago

"Internal power supply, AC power 110-240V"

I wonder if they mean that? Japan is 100V.

etchalon2• 1 month ago

Summary - Get a PS5 Pro.

alecsm2• 1 month ago

But I don't want a PS5.

I think most of people who wanted (me included) a steam machine are now between buying it or not buying anything at all.

etchalon2• 1 month ago

Fair.

ErneX8• 1 month ago

The good news today is that Steam OS will be available for any PC soon.

rvz2• 1 month ago

As I was saying. With those specs, you might as well get a PS5 [0] even with a PS5 Pro it would still be cheaper than the Steam Machine.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45908208

efilife• 28 days ago

But you are severely limited on what you can do on a console

ChrisArchitect3• 1 month ago

Associated announcement post: https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/45479024/view/6852...

HelloUsername• 1 month ago

Why isn't this URL included in this post?

ChrisArchitect3• 1 month ago

Updated

dang2• 1 month ago

From last year:

Steam Machine - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45903404 - Nov 2025 (1514 comments)

For balance:

I don’t need a Steam Machine - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45943992 - Nov 2025 (272 comments)

alecsm2• 1 month ago

What a great machine it would've been without these stupid prices we have now...

charcircuit2• 1 month ago

If Valve learned to operate on a proper schedule instead of Valve Time they would have been able to stockpile these parts and release with better prices.

dang2• 1 month ago

Related ongoing thread:

Steam Machine game testing - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48632989 - June 2026 (19 comments)

ChrisArchitect3• 1 month ago

Steam Machine

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48632884

pphysch• 1 month ago

Valve could have made a $2-$3K rig that outperforms other consoles for 4K gaming but I'm glad they didn't. It's genuinely unfortunate the components market went crazy at the same time.

I hope this and the steam deck-likes continue to be successful and incentivize developers to optimize their games for last-gen and portable hardware. I think the "steam deck compatible" certification has already been fairly good for that.

danielodievich• 1 month ago

back in 2019, I was thinking of getting an MBA and as part of the exploration, shadowed an MBA class at University of Washington for a day. It was so fun. One of the things they were discussing in the class that day was a case study of Valve, specifically around the Steam Machine. The team's consensus was that Valve was carefully arranging money in a barrel, lovingly soaking it in high octane gasoline, and was about to light a match.

iknowstuff• 1 month ago

this Steam Machine hadn’t been announced back then? Not even the steam deck, which has been a massive success.

stryan• 1 month ago

We know they've been kicking the idea around since the first line up and I believe pretty decent leaks saying they were working on it were out around 2019.

hilariously• 1 month ago

Yeah there was the steam link, but that was also way before 2019, so not sure what they could be referring to.

amlib9• 30 days ago

Of course it was, they are talking about the 2012~2015 (not sure about the exact date) steam machine that was released and failed. It took a long time for enough pieces to fall into place that would lead to the success of the steam deck and now the, too soon to call a success, launch of the new steam machine (2026).

jsiepkes• 1 month ago

Proton, the Steam machine, the Steam deck, etc. were probably never about making money. It's Valve's "Plan B".

They started with Proton after Microsoft suddenly made a move with the Windows store and also started bolting down Windows a bit. As with most things Microsoft that initiative quietly died over time. But at that time Valve probably couldn't afford to take any chances. It probably also made them realize they had build a castle on someone elses land.

If you are making money in the amounts Valve is, then even the simplest risk analyses is going to show that "Microsoft rug pulling you" is one of your few existential threats. Even though the probability is low or medium-ish at best, the impact is massive. Even anti-trust isn't going to save you. By the time Microsoft gets convicted, you are already dead. Just look at Netscape.

ndiddy• 1 month ago

Yeah people forget about it now because it ended up being a failure and Microsoft rolled it back a couple years later, but Windows 8 was basically an attempt by Microsoft to take over software distribution on Windows. They made an entirely new API (WinRT) as the main API for the platform, and all WinRT software had to be distributed via the Windows Store. The existing Win32 software could only be run inside the "Desktop" app, and the flagship Windows 8 device, the Surface, could only run WinRT software. This is when Valve started supporting Linux and came out with the first generation of Steam Machines.

kibwen3• 1 month ago

This only goes to show how MBAs are destructively myopic.

Valve understands that inextricably tying themselves to Windows is a long-term death sentence. SteamOS represents a lifeboat for when Microsoft goes full iOS and decides to lock down Windows in exchange for taking 30% of all software purchases. Valve has been taking this threat seriously since at least 2010, which is why they've been investing in Linux gaming. Both Steam Deck and the Steam Machine are further steps toward complete independence from Microsoft.

ragazzina• 29 days ago

Why is the gasoline high octane in your metaphor? It's not like it's going to burn better.

Tangurena24• 29 days ago

If you're going to be burning barrels of $100 banknotes, why settle for plebian unleaded when you can use artisanal premium high-octane, if not avgas?

SCdF• 29 days ago

Valve makes it very very easy to be a PC gamer, and, importantly, slightly harder to be a PC gamer who buys games in places other than Steam.

Yes you can buy games on GoG or Epic and play them on a steam deck or a steam machine. But it's juuuuust enough faff to be annoying enough, that you'd rather just get them on steam. I know people (and am a person) who have rebought games they already own so they are on steam, to make playing between steam deck and desktop more reliable.

It's the same with the steam controller. You _can_ use it with games outside of steam, but it's enough of a faff that you find yourself avoiding it.

It's incredibly effective, and why they are an effective monopoly in PC gaming.

SkitterKherpi• 1 month ago

I like the idea, but I am worried that it's yet another step on the road towards personal multi-purpose tower PCs built part by part no longer being a thing.

emadabdulrahim• 1 month ago

I'm not familiar with SteamOS and Valve hardware in general. Could I play something like Overwatch on this, and connect keyboard and mouse? Could I play other PC games like World of Warcraft?

Creamsicle472• 1 month ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48633563

nananana9• 1 month ago

It's just a Linux box, you can do anything that you can on any other Linux machine (including install Windows).

Linux more or less runs most Windows games. The ones that don't run are ones where the developer is going out of their way to make them not run - mostly with kernel-mode anti-cheats that just find themselves staring at the wrong kernel.

Steam makes that pretty seamless and Steam games "just work". For non-Steam games you need to do some tinkering, it's stuff that most people browsing this forum can do.

sparkling• 1 month ago

Dual-booting SteamOS for gaming and some regular Distro for daily work would be neat.

crooked-v• 1 month ago

Note that the "just" is overlooking that it's more locked down than a typical Linux box, in that the OS filesystem is read-only and all app installs live in userland (though you can turn off the read-only behavior). For what it's worth I'm very much a fan of it as a default for a mass-market machine, but you'll run into weird gotchas if you want to do "programmer stuff" with it.

daemonologist• 1 month ago

Yes you can connect keyboard and mouse; Overwatch (https://www.protondb.com/app/2357570) and WoW (https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iI...) should both work well, as do the vast majority of single-player games. Some multiplayer games with particularly invasive anti-cheat may not, so if you have anything else in mind best to check before buying.

Forgeties7927• 1 month ago

Wow that LTTlabs article was damning. The language is optimistic but this thing can’t possibly move steamdeck-numbers of units at $1100+ with that performance. DOA if you ask me.

axus• 1 month ago

Can we use it for AI?

dude2507112• 1 month ago

You have my permission. Just do not share any learnings. There is enough LLM trash around as is.

ErneX8• 1 month ago

The Verge: Nearly twice the price of PS5 for PS5 performance.

That’s rough.

chrishare• 1 month ago

Rough but true. This has PMF but not at this price.

randomstate• 1 month ago

What a sad time to be buying a gaming PC, it seems that my 7yo rig bought for the same price is just as powerful.

Peaches4Rent10• 1 month ago

I say, be happy this means your 7 year old pc will be future proof for longer!

Insanity3• 1 month ago

Hope the Frame is available for pre-order soon as well! I know I’m going to pay more than the HW was worth a year ago because of “AI”, but I’m really looking forward to that one.

LoveMortuus3• 1 month ago

Since it’ll have a mobile SoC with baked in memory I’m hoping that the price won’t be too inflated!

goda90• 30 days ago

It was my understanding that SoC memory comes from the same manufacturing processes as other RAM, it just gets integrated differently.

tonymet7• 1 month ago

A question for both developers & gamers – why are we continuing to push hardware capacity upward to untenable costs? 2013 games are awesome, I still play them. Why not continue targeting that capability and sell $250 consoles instead of $1250 consoles?

dude2507112• 1 month ago

You are describing indie games.

tonymet7• 1 month ago

not quite. Indie games don't yet publish titles with the scope or ambition of 2013 AAA titles.

I mean publishing titles with the polish & breadth of content of Arkham City , 2013 Tomb Raider , Titanfall 2 etc.

pelotron• 1 month ago

A question for the ages.

indie games community has joined the chat

OkayPhysicist4• 1 month ago

The problem is that the market has basically bifurcated. In the Indie space, people want novelty, and that's too risky for AAA (even 10 year old AAA) scale games. Over in the modern AAA space, you've got a more reliable user base (in that they're more eager to buy slight changes to the same game over and over), but you're competing more on "Wow" factor. And ever-better graphics have been a pretty easy way to convert investment into "wow", without much risk (compared to changing game mechanics more, which might kill your golden goose).

I find it far more plausible that AI-assisted game dev will help indies catch up in scale to 10 year old AAA than the modern AAA studios deciding to throw in the towel on the graphics arms race.

tonymet7• 1 month ago

I would argue AAA are avoiding the safe bets by forcing "new experiences" into safe money-making genres.

At Xbox Showcase, many of the popular beats were bringing back elements from Halo or Gears of War that fans missed.

The formula for making hits seems to be pretty clear, but the studios are bucking it.

dmitshur• 1 month ago

Interesting that its HDMI is 2.0 and not 2.1. Hopefully it's still possible (for those that really want) to connect modern 4K TVs at 120 hz via the DisplayPort 1.4 output.

cassianoleal11• 1 month ago

That's likely because the HDMI Forum don't allow open source HDMI 2.1. [0]

That said, there are signs that it's coming to the AMD drivers. [1] [2]

[0] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/hdmi-forum-to-amd-no...

[1] https://www.techpowerup.com/348723/amd-readies-full-open-sou...

[2] https://www.fosslinux.com/157755/hdmi-2-1-on-linux-complete-...

Gigachad24• 1 month ago

Seems like a case of under promising and planning to over deliver later. The hardware seems to be 2.1 but they haven't sorted out every feature in the drivers yet.

ThatPlayer4• 1 month ago

The DisplayPort 1.4 instead of 2.1 is also interesting. The RX7000 series came with DisplayPort 2.1.

DisplayPort 1.4 should be enough to do 4K@120hz. Not enough bandwidth for HDR at the same time though

c0rruptbytes2• 1 month ago

i'm in, i think prices are gonna suck anyway, i own a playstation and that shit sucks, i want to do more couch co-op with my partner and the steam library opens up so much indie games

can i build a mini pc myself? probably but meh

alexashka2• 1 month ago

For comparison - cloud gaming such as Nvidia's Geforce NOW is at ~20$/mo for 4k resolution with a monthly subscription one can cancel anytime.

That's what, ~4-5 years of gaming on a superior GPU without the headaches of hardware failures or upfront cost of 1000$?

Yikes Valve. The only folks buying gaming PCs these days are people eeking out an advantage in competitive 3D shooters or folks unaware of how far cloud gaming has come.

snootypoot3• 1 month ago

yikes, you will own nothing and be happy.

punpunia• 1 month ago

Cloud gaming is nowhere near the same experience as playing locally. There are a lot of games where milliseconds matter; it's big enough for me and my friends to try Geforce NOW and say, "No, this isn't good enough for a lot of games." You are kind of saying, "the bus only costs $4 a day, that's 30 years of using a car."

xboxnolifes• 1 month ago

No matter how superior the GPU, the latency from streaming will never be able to compete if you're outside of a major hub.

I couldn't imagine playing a game by streaming inputs to a server 30ms away, which then streams those inputs another 30ms to the game server, and then having that round trip.

60ms screen delay and 120ms total delay.

alexashka2• 1 month ago

Fair. There's a free 1080p Nvidia Geforce NOW tier anyone can try to see if latency is an issue for them and the games they play.

One more data point - you're getting 1080p medium settings (for latest games) with a Steam Machine at ~1000$ upfront vs 4k max settings but 20-50ms added latency (for most people) for ~20$/mo without any longterm commitment.

That's where we're at. I'm in the 2000$ upfront to get max settings, minimal latency camp myself but I consider that to be a niche, luxury purchase category.

not_a94• 30 days ago

OK. What if I want to mod my singleplayer game? Or, God forbid, make mods for it?

IAmGraydon• 1 month ago

Man...I'm certainly glad a happened to build a gaming beast rig in January of 2025. The RAM alone (64GB DDR5) would cost nearly as much as the entire rig now.

jrepinc11• 30 days ago

Yeah I can feel you. I built mine just a few months before that terrible "AI" slop bubble scam hypte started. The only mistake I regret now is that I only went with 32 GiB of memory and said to myself I can upgrade later to 64 GiB if I need more. Well luckily most of the time I don't but yeah sometimes it could come in handy. Not for games but for other work. Ah well, still happy I was lucky to do it before the AIpocalypse

binarycleric• 1 month ago

I was interested until I saw the price. Gonna pass on that.

butlike3• 1 month ago

The only thing that I get with consoles that I don't get with the Steam Machine is a guarantee; a GUARANTEE that the games I buy will play on the system. If I but a game and it says PS5, I know it will play. A list of specs on the Steam Machine landing page does not absolve this for Valve.

legitster4• 1 month ago

On the Steam store they've done a great job with their certification program for the Steam Deck.

Also, I don't think their target market is people who don't own any Steam games yet. It's going to be people with already extensive back catalogues on Steam.

butlike3• 1 month ago

I disagree. I see this becoming an Xbox/PlayStation killer/contender.

Peaches4Rent10• 1 month ago

True. But if it doesn't work, a refund is quick and easy

mariopt• 1 month ago

Now game devs can optimised their game for it and Steam Machine will get royal treatment. It's not unusual for a PS5 game to run slow on a PC with much better hardware due to not being optimised. The Nintendo switch is a great example, pretty old hardware but the games run well (for their intended experience).

Many people are complaining about the price but you can bring you entire steam game collection and even use as a PC if you want, I sold my PS5 once it became a useless brick cause Sony prevents you from running Linux.

legitster4• 1 month ago

I'm tempted even at this price.

I've tried various iterations of a gaming HTPC over the years, and they've all been pretty miserable. That lack of any reasonable or stable CEC solution this whole time so far has honestly been an oversized anchor this whole time. And I think Valve is doing a bit of a disservice not advertising it more.

diseasedyak• 1 month ago

Same here, I know why it costs as much as it does, and that doesn't deter me. I want it for my living room, and to just mess around with. Will enter the lottery and hope my number gets picked!

scott01• 30 days ago

Yep, and I feel many commenters in this thread are comparing value propositions only in terms of specs. I’ve built a number of Mini-ITX cases, from 5L to 20L, and they are a pain to work with and maintain. In some cases it’s impossible to make a reasonable filtered airflow, so dust builds up very fast, and a teardown to do clean up is pretty annoying. Steam Machine looks very straightforward to maintain. And it’s also tiny and quiet.

throwawayk7h• 29 days ago

I'm skeptical that they have working CEC. The steam deck, for example, does not. It also doesn't work reliably with many TVs. I'll believe it when I see it.

tiahura4• 28 days ago

Does your tv not come with a remote?

raffael_de4• 1 month ago

What is the appeal of Steam Machine as a dedicated gaming device? Isn't it going to be old in a few years and then you have to get rid of it because upgrading components isn't a viable option? Isn't that quite the opposite of anything that deserves to be associated with them term "hacker"?

jpk2f2• 1 month ago

Compact, convenient, console-like experience that pulls games from your existing steam library. Same niche as a normal console, just not locked down in the same sense. If it weren't for the price I'd consider one, but I'd rather limp along my existing systems for as long as possible (and it sounds like SteamOS support for broader systems is improving).

benoau2• 1 month ago

Isn't it going to be old in a few years and then you have to get rid of it because upgrading components isn't a viable option?

I expect to get the rest of this decade out of my Steam Deck so IDK, very different to my normal expectations for a computer. The Steam Deck also defines a floor that will allow compatible games to be very performant on the Steam Machine so I think that will help the Steam Machine have a decent lifespan.

I also think on some level we need to start resigning ourselves to getting 10+ years out of our computers!

Gigachad24• 30 days ago

I fully believe that the current PC hardware should be able to play essentially any game for a very long time. And the only reason we are being pushed to upgrade is because games are pushing poorly optimized graphics with mandatory features like ray tracing. No game play experience is impossible to achieve on the steam deck level hardware.

I'm hopeful that with the insane hardware prices right now, studios will be forced to actually make their games work on older hardware.

terribleperson3• 1 month ago

With current hardware prices, I'm not sure it'll be 'old' in gaming terms in a few years. I'm expecting the PS6 to be only a moderate upgrade over the PS5, not arrive for another year at least, and probabky take 5 years to overtake the PS5.

theshrike797• 1 month ago

Do you usually want to upgrade components in a console?

raffael_de4• 1 month ago

I'm pretty sure you got my point.

d3Xt3r11• 1 month ago

I doubt anyone's associating the Steam Machine with the term "hacker". The "hacker" type crowd already game on Linux, they're not the target audience here. This is for the normies, for people who want to play PC games with a console-like experience, without any hassles of manual setup and tweaking that the hacker crowd normally are into.

raffael_de4• 1 month ago

fyi: this very web site is called ... hacker news.

not_a94• 30 days ago

for people who want to play PC games with a console-like experience, without any hassles of manual setup and tweaking that the hacker crowd normally are into.

Until they want to play Fortnite/Roblox/whatever else.

snootypoot3• 1 month ago

thanks to sam altman and jensen huangs bubble this will cost 2500$ next year at this time

ElijahLynn• 1 month ago

Why so many USB-A ports and only one USB-C?

ReliantGuyZ• 1 month ago

Because most PC peripherals (mice, keyboards, microphones, controllers, USB headphones, detachable hard drives) are still USB-A on the other end of their cable. Yes this is changing, but in this case I appreciate them acknowledging the reality on the ground and not creating a situation where there are many dongles afoot.

Gigachad24• 1 month ago

Most peripherals these days have a fully detachable cable so it can be whatever you want. Usually they include some garbage 10 cent C to A cable in the box that you throw in the bin and replace with a good quality C to C cable.

I could understand having both C and A on the machine, but having the one C port on the back seems like a mistake since that's the port I'd think you'd most want quick access to to plug in flash drives and such if you wanted to copy files from a phone or laptop. While the back ports are where you'd stick the fixed receivers.

butlike3• 1 month ago

They should include the (entire) Valve game library for free with purchase for the first 6 months to drive adoption.

xlmnxp• 1 month ago

I think Apple Mac Mini's prices make since now, only if you can install Linux on them

nottorp4• 1 month ago

16 Gb system ram... i'd bet that they originally planned it with 32.

Note that you can order more storage but not more RAM. Although that may also be to force vendors to target this exact architecture.

Also: oooh internal power supply! Someone thought about elegance too.

koolala7• 1 month ago

You can upgrade the ram yourself.

lowbloodsugar4• 1 month ago

You probably can. Not sure target market can.

nottorp4• 30 days ago

You can, but why would you when all steam deck/machine certified games will run fine on this hardware?

Unless you buy it because it's an x86 based mac mini. That may be true for quite a few early adopters, who knows.

tough• 1 month ago

I lost access to my 10y old steam account due to their 2fa app getting auto-removed from my iPhone.

I couldnt produce 10y visa statements from another country i lived in.

Since then I just dont use steam, shame cause i like the hw

saltamimi8• 1 month ago

It's just dead-on-arrival.

I'm not convinced this hardware is "an extension of PC gaming, not a console" when the hardware is generations out of date. To credit Microsoft, Sony, and other players, the reality is that unless you are "in the game" for decades, you HAVE to provide a convincing differentiator from the other console markets.

Steam had this with the Steam Deck and personally, I see the world moving to thin clients that play games via some remote desktop infrastructure. It makes no sense to buy this hardware even if it was 500-700 dollars.

In my opinion, it would've been worth the money to just buy a gaming PC, put it in a garage, hidden room, etc with the networking gear, then stream it over the network to a Steam Link or using Apollo/Artemis/Moonlight/Parsec; anything.

Tangential to this discussion: Steam is in the unique position to create a kernel anti-cheat. I know that's not popular. But they are the only ones with the install base AND ability to pull it off in a such a fashion that wouldn't be so god-awful. It's clear that multiplayer gaming isn't going to go away from kernel anti-cheat. It's also clear that developers are still going to target Windows-only with Steam Deck support as a best-kept basis.

I don't see the Steam Machine/Deck as a competitor until they solve the kernel anti-cheat portion. Until then, it can play games that are older, not popular, or single-player which is a valid market but not one that I am a part of, anyway.

EDIT:

S) It's not meant for you.

   A) Sure. But you're telling me people are going to pay $1,050 to couch-potato games? I don't see that market and I'm not really sure how you would swing that.

S) But it's on-par with the PS5.

   A) Which isn't a valid differentiator. The PS5 is 6 years old and not $1,050. Even if it was $600, that's not a good deal.

S) It can be a regular PC.

   A) Sure. But you could also save money and put a regular PC behind or near your monitor or TV.

S) I just want to game on hardware that's good enough.

   A) I get it, but there's so many cheaper options out there. Honestly, it'd be better value to get a Steam Deck, get a docking station, then hook that up to your TV than to buy this.

Dead-on-arrival doesn't mean that this doesn't serve a niche. The niches this serves just really cannot be this compelling. You cannot tell me you have $1,050 laying around just to spend on this machine that comes with 512GB of storage.

I don't get it. I don't get the market segment that does want this when there's so many better options on the market.

buellerbueller2• 1 month ago

It's just dead-on-arrival...the hardware is generations out of date

Some people say this same thing about the Nintendo Switch and its successor, but here we are, with the former closing in on highest selling console of all time, and the latter tracking above that.

saltamimi8• 1 month ago

I don't remember anyone saying this about the Switch and at the time, the reviews for North America at least were very positive.

ilivethere• 1 month ago

Not OC, but I believe the RAM price surge is what will kill the Steam Machine. For the same price, you can get a gaming laptop with better specs.

CobrastanJorji2• 1 month ago

Sure, but I didn't buy a Switch because of its power or because of its form factor. I bought it because that was the way to play Zelda.

Scroll_Swe4• 1 month ago

Because a console is a console.

Look at the PS2. Incredible games on bespoke custom harware.

We didnt know how good we had it.

rjh29• 1 month ago

Who thought that? The switch was an explosion when it launched.

veber-alex3• 1 month ago

Nobody cares about the Switch hardware, they but it to play Nintendo games.

This is just a x86 PC.

terribleperson3• 1 month ago

I think calling the hardware generations out of date when it performs on par with a PS5 on new games is a bit inaccurate.

I would, admittedly, be interested in an anticheat that reboots the machine for deck into a secure mode.

pkulak• 1 month ago

it performs on par with a PS5

Wait, really? I looked at the specs and saw like 2/3 the CUs of a PS5.

saltamimi8• 1 month ago

The Zen 4 cores in it is Ryzen 7000 Series, we're on 9000 series.

The GPU is on par with the 3060 12GB and RX 7000 series GPUs which are older.

The PS5 is six years old! This is a brand new machine!

arbll4• 1 month ago

Same here. My home computer only runs Windows because I play competitive online games. It would be incredible if Valve built some kind of certified, locked-down kernel, but I doubt that will happen.

The online discourse around this is also incredibly toxic, filled with utopians who don’t understand how serious cheating is in these games, or that kernel anti-cheat, while not perfect, is the best solution available today.

Lwerewolf3• 1 month ago

...and then you have hypervisor-based cheats, hardware cheats and whatnot. I'd say that AI flagging of suspicious cases + additional targeted scrutiny is the way forward - for competitive platforms, that is. That, and trust factor - I practically never get bad games when I play alone in cs:go/cs2 (~20k mmr eu, lem/smfc prior to that) - both in terms of somebody cheating and in terms of people that are full of themselves in one way or another. I'd say that combining these techniques should be very effective.

throw109202• 1 month ago

filled with utopians who don’t understand how serious cheating is in these games

FWIW, the easiest way to dispel the fallacies pumped out by these individuals is to ask how much time they've sunk into a reasonably contemporary competitive online game. I almost never meet people who have these delusions about anticheat being ineffective that also has actually invested significant (>500) hours into the games that they're appropriate for.

(people who work with spam and fraud/abuse prevention also usually don't have these delusions, because the underlying economics are similar. turns out that actually having experience with a thing is enough to disillusion most people of stupid ideas about that thing, who know?)

dylanz2• 1 month ago

I think it's far from dead-on-arrival. I don't want to buy a PC, put it in a garage, etc. I want a little box I can easily hook up to my TV and play Steam games on. This scratches that itch. I'm old and want convenience. I know a lot of other people in my peer group who are going to pick one up too. Also I don't play any competitive games where I care about anti-cheat. I just want to play my RPG/JRPG's on a big screen and I want it to be plug-n-play.

saltamimi8• 1 month ago

There's better options at this price point, I'm afraid.

Even buying an old tiny micro PC that's 10th gen Intel would've been a cheaper buy.

Scroll_Swe4• 1 month ago

Put it in a garage?

lmao bring up the wife factor, please.

We are devs here. We can have and build gaming PCs I hope?

Yes I will gatekeep.

Yes it is the best as I can get and play anything I want.

treis2• 1 month ago

I think dead on arrival is too extreme but the niche is certainly hard to see. The "just works" crowd will buy consoles and the "max performance" crowd won't be happy with this value. The niche is something like "willing to tolerate some headaches but not so much as to build my own PC". That exists but seems small.

Feels like they should have gone cheap. Undercut the switch and be the cheapest way to play games on your TV. We're pretty far past performance equalling more entertainment. A 150-200 box to play indie side scrollers is a niche that exists.

tuyiown2• 1 month ago

The hard truth is that as much as you think yourself as a "proper" gamer, this segment always has, always will, _not_ be the proper target segment. Don't forget that mobile gaming has more revenue than everything else… combined. They have a play on this, and as much expansive as it looks, it's mostly due to the hardware inflation, and compared to alternatives, it won't look bad at all. For the segments that matters.

saltamimi8• 1 month ago

I don't see a market of people who want to pay Valve $1,050 to play Steam games on a custom Linux machine with old hardware that won't support big name games that have kernel anti-cheat on them.

I really don't see the vision Valve is looking for here.

neogodless6• 1 month ago

In my opinion, it would've been worth the money to just buy a gaming PC, put it in a garage, hidden room, etc with the networking gear, then stream it over the network to a Steam Link or using Apollo/Artemis/Moonlight/Parsec; anything.

I'm someone who has built dozens of gaming PCs, and wired my house. I also have zero interest in doing the above... if I have to pay few hundred extra to get a Steam machine hooked up to a TV without all that hassle... I'll do that.

It's not the absolute best value for gaming. It's not horrible in current market conditions but it's also not targeting "best value for gaming" anywhere in the marketing materials. It's hardware that can play your Steam library on your TV. There are harder, less expensive ways to do that, as there have been for ages.

If you're a console gamer, there are less expensive, just as easy options to play console games, so it's definitely not suited for that market.

It's really only catering to people with disposable income that want a cute way to hook up a Steam-capable machine to a TV. It's not a huge market, nor is it a non-existent market.

It was probably a bigger market at $750 than $1050, but we can't have nice things.

a2dam• 1 month ago

"For a Linux user, you can already build such a system yourself quite trivially..."

"No wireless? Less space than a Nomad? Lame"

baud1472582• 1 month ago

In my opinion, it would've been worth the money to just buy a gaming PC, put it in a garage, hidden room, etc with the networking gear, then stream it over the network to a Steam Link

Well if you scroll down the page, it's presented as a selling point of the machine

ecshafer• 1 month ago

I see the world moving to thin clients that play games via some remote desktop infrastructure.

You can barely code in such an environment to a satisfactory degree. You want to stream 4k games with low latency?

aerhardt• 1 month ago

Google Stadia worked like a charm. I put hundreds of hours into it without a single problem. The tech felt like magic.

saltamimi8• 1 month ago

What are you coding over the network such that the network is a bottleneck?

maxglute2• 1 month ago

In my opinion, it would've been worth the money to just buy a gaming PC, put it in a garage, hidden room, etc with the networking gear, then stream it over the network to a Steam Link or using Apollo/Artemis/Moonlight/Parsec; anything.

During covid, instead of getting second budget gaming PC, I setup janky multi-seat program (Aster), to split single windows machine where I could play locally and someone else could play on steamlink. There's so many games out there that you can run multiple instances simultaneously. Or simply stream desktops to media room paired with a good remote.

It was very janky, setup, streaming DRM (or not). But justifies world of spending on one highend system than multiple mid / tier. The Aster program was designed for low income nations where you split a single workstation into like 8+ substations (i.e. education). TBH if Valve sold a 2-3k steammachine super host that can stream multiple games to different thin client, and value proposition is this is the only entertainment unit for your entire house, I think it would pique interests. Maybe tile different streams into one client for splitscreen playing. Sell those controllers.

not_a94• 30 days ago

Steam is in the unique position to create a kernel anti-cheat

Valve has a long-term policy of being utter trash at game security.

I know that's not popular. But they are the only ones with the install base AND ability to pull it off in a such a fashion that wouldn't be so god-awful.

Epic Games does fine (though they did it by purchasing an anticheat startup).

EDIT: Oh, you're talking about making an anti-cheat focused Linux kernel build? Meh, still would not trust Valve on that front given their long-standing policy of not giving a shit.

__natty__• 1 month ago

The biggest win for me from this product is pushing developers to release on Linux.

mariusor2• 1 month ago

Sadly I don't see that happening. Game devs have gotten used to having their cake and eating it too by developing for Windows and using Proton as a crutch to get the the Steam OS certification too. flibitijibibo was right: linux porters have probably gone out of business.

Gigachad24• 1 month ago

Releasing an actual Linux binary doesn't really matter that much. Proton is just a better experience. Even when games did include a linux build you were usually better off telling Steam to run the Windows one in Proton because it just ran faster with less bugs. A Windows binary is just more portable, more stable long term, and a better experience.

What we actually need is developers testing their games on Proton to make sure they run well day, releasing graphics presets that run well on the hardware, and simply not blocking Linux through anti cheat.

curvaturearth• 1 month ago

Yes, Steam Machine is optimized for gaming, but it's still your PC. Install your own apps, or even another operating system. Who are we to tell you how to use your computer?

This is glorious

wxw• 1 month ago

Eagerly awaiting the steam engine release.

CodesInChaos• 1 month ago

What's the competition in the gaming-capable pre-built mini-PC category? How does it compare to these on price/performance?

ErneX8• 1 month ago

“starting with the SteamOS 3.8 release, you can put together your own Steam Machine using whatever PC parts you want”

That’s great.

mbmbn• 30 days ago

But, will it properly support NVIDIA GPUs? That’s was the biggest pain point for years.

bigyabai12• 28 days ago

Yep, Valve is working with Nvidia to create an installer with the proprietary Nvidia drivers bundled in.

FWIW, Nvidia's Wayland experience has been very usable with post-550-Series drivers. If you have an Nvidia GPU that supports more recent drivers, chances are that it will work like a charm.

jhack• 1 month ago

The pricing is all out of sorts. Close to $500 more expensive than a PS5 for worse performance. I understand this is a PC and you can do other things with it, but if you're buying a gaming device to play games this is a horrible value.

godshatter2• 1 month ago

If you have hundreds of Steam games you bought through sales events, then that changes the calculus a bit.

nxc182• 1 month ago

Does it? Do people actually play those games? I thought people just liked buying them and never playing the vast majority of them.

Alchemista• 30 days ago

How many people who are that invested in their Steam library don't already have a mid to upper range PC?

amlib9• 30 days ago

If that's the cost of a _working_, well supported and _viable_ open platform, than so be it. People, especially the ones here at hacker news, ought to give way more value to this, else we lose it all.

zerolines• 1 month ago

no thank you.

IOT_Apprentice• 1 month ago

I’d just like to buy steamOS and install it on my ryzen 9 desktop and my Ryzen laptop.

jrepinc11• 30 days ago

No need to wait and buy anything. Try any gaming focused Linux distributions and you can already have this. Check out CachyOS, Nobara, Bazzite ...

grahar64• 1 month ago

"This item is not available in your region" :(

Fraterkes• 1 month ago

It's funny how this (imo) almost feels like an inherently inert topic to discuss:

Is it dumb of them to do this? Not really, they got unlucky with the timing and they already designed the machines. Selling them below cost to subsidize steam-sales would probably create bad incentives for them.

What will this mean for Valve's future? Nothing, they're still a relatively lean company with a money machine.

Will this dissuade them from creating hardware in the future? Probably not, the Steamdeck was really succesfull and they've got more than enough resources to do a few failed experiments.

fluoridation7• 1 month ago

Selling them below cost to subsidize steam-sales would probably create bad incentives for them.

They could have sweetened the deal somehow, though. Maybe owners get a discount on games or something. It was bad timing, but it's not like they can't afford to take a bit of a hit for good will.

gigatexal• 1 month ago

Small, quiet, underpowered and some games you can’t play because of stupid kernel level anti cheat and expensive. Not quite DOA but not the hyped thing I was looking for.

awill• 1 month ago

I wish they had a few different options with better specs. Or maybe a shell with the case/fan/mobo etc.. where you can just add CPU/GPU/RAM. I'd love that, and would be willing to pay extra to get something a bit more modern.

I want a Steam Machine for my living room, but these specs are just terrible for 2026. According to Digital Foundry, this $1200 machine is worse than a $500 6-year-old base PS5.

deng• 1 month ago

Well, when they announced it (7 months ago) I got laughed out of the room when I said this will be at least 1k$ because of the RAM crisis, and people quoted famous Youtuber "Moores Law is Dead" that this thing has a 300$ BOM and will be 600$ max, probably just 450$...

tpurves• 1 month ago

An unfortunate series of events that this thing ended up with these specs at 1,049.00. It was supposed to be cheap and cheerful. At first Steam took an opportunistic deal to buy up a bunch of near-obsolete-already chips from AMD to build a low-cost box around. Then years of delays and an explosion in DRAM and SSD prices and here we are.

4 year old chip design on an equivalently old process node, not that unlike nvidia selling 2-3 year old chips as the spark. Thanks to AI boom, consumer market really just getting the warmed-over leftovers here from AMD and NVDIA.

sedatk7• 1 month ago

Insant buy for me because as an owner of a PS5 and Xbox One X, I’ve been using my Steam Deck a lot for gaming on TV using the dock. It works really well. This is just the dream version of that setup.

jrepinc11• 30 days ago

Similar here. I have the PS4 here and rarely even use PlayStation these days. Mostly it is just PC (now runing Linux even for gaming) and Steam Deck. I was thinking about upgrading to PS5 a year or two ago bu then did some calculations and it is more expensive then it looks at first (PlayStation+ is in practive not optional and it is 72 €/year at minimum, games are quite more expensive themselves than on the PC, and well there is a lot less choice in games). So I have basically just started moving my game library to Steam and PC (GoG and similar other sources store), just makes more sense with PC and now Steam Machine makes inot the a console form factor while still having all the power and freedom of PC. So yeah an easy decision to go with Steam Machine. Sure price of the hardware itself is not exactly very attractive but yeah not so much different to what is normal these days in PC hardware (fsck all these terrible "AI" slop scam bubble corporations). Would love to see a cheaper bare-bones edition without RAM and SSD inside but even without this I think Steam machine will be quite a nice replacement for PS4.

simpaticoder2• 1 month ago

Most people don't know if they'll like the living-room PC gaming experience and at this price not enough people will even try. That's sad to me. It could be that with the right hardware and software the experience would be even better than a console, and if that happens then all the other good features of the Steam Machine (it's relative openness, the fact that you own it, etc) could shine. But without proving that people really like the experience, the rest is irrelevant, and lots of early adopters were just priced out of the experiment.

janaagaard• 1 month ago

Why all USB-A ports instead of USB-C? (I counted 4 USB-A and just one USB-C.)

Narishma6• 1 month ago

Because most peripherals that are likely to be used with it are still USB-A. Things like mice and keyboards and gamepads and headphone and whatnot.

Gigachad24• 30 days ago

Budget reasons would be my guess. The USB-C port here is 10 gbit while the USB-A ports on the machine are USB 2.0(front) and 5gbit(rear) speeds.

While they could have and imo should have just put usb 2.0 C ports on it, users have an expectation that USB-C ports are fully functional high speed ports. On most machines you can plug something in to any USB-C port on a device and they all work the same.

Mr_Eri_Atlov• 1 month ago

Damn, that's expensive for PS5 performance

gymbeaux4• 1 month ago

Circa 2013 you could get a Steam Machine (made by Alienware/Dell) - the Alienware Alpha - for something like $300. Granted they were clearing them out at that time, but $300 was a no-brainer when consoles cost about the same and had significantly weaker hardware.

Now we're expected to pay almost 2x the cost of a current-gen console for what is probably near-identical console performance? Doesn't make sense. I appreciate Valve being in the hardware business and I understand that inflation/the AI bubble are hurting PC components but a grand for this is a terrible value. I mean let's see what the benchmarks look like, but "Semi-custom AMD Zen 4 6C / 12T" sounds like what's in the PS5 and Xbox One. Actually those have 8C/16T CPUs.

sylens• 1 month ago

The 2013 Steam Machine is as different from this device as it could possibly be. Proton didn't exist back then and Steam Input was still in (relative) infancy.

gymbeaux4• 26 days ago

Both are console-sized x86 based computers that can run Windows or Linux. Both even lack a 3.5mm headphone jack (maybe that’s too old for a 2026 computer though). Both have a low TDP that means they will never compete with a traditional gaming computer.

I’m not sure what Proton has to do with anything.

let_rec• 1 month ago

Yes, Steam Machine is optimized for gaming, but it's still your PC. Install your own apps, or even another operating system. Who are we to tell you how to use your computer?

Valve gets it

keoneflick• 1 month ago

Disappointing to see the release and still no implementation of multi-user sign on for local multiplayer games (like all true consoles).

As I noted when announced, it's something that doesn't get headlines, but a real barrier for enjoyment for a console-like PC. Hate being stuck with 'guest 1' and 'guest 2' or whatever. Many games want each player to progress and without true multi sign on, it just doesn't work. Hence games dropping local multiplayer on PC.

x______________• 1 month ago

Does anyone have a rundown of Steam OS?

lowbloodsugar4• 1 month ago

PS5 performance at PS5 Pro price to target Nintendo Switch demographic?

catigula2• 1 month ago

Honestly seems kind of pointless in an era of cloud gaming :)

tokai3• 1 month ago

What? Cloud gaming flopped years ago.

Rapzid4• 30 days ago

It's been flopping for like 16 years now lol.

branon• 1 month ago

I respect what Valve is doing here and I loved the Steam Deck but a prebuilt desktop PC with 16 GB system memory and 512 GB storage for $1,000+ is insulting. Those are specs that belong on a laptop or a lowend console offering like the Series S.

I think this product is going to be hamstrung by its attempts to present as a midpoint between a PC and a console. The way this is being achieved seems to be by selling a device with the specifications of a console but the price tag of a PC.

Valve already did the "this is a lowend device and that's okay" thing with the Steam Deck, and got away scot-free because nobody expected a handheld and people didn't have a ton of preconceived notions. The Deck was also a better value since it was (prior to the price hike) priced reasonably for its specifications.

The desktop PC and/or living room console modalities are both significantly more stratified. People have solidly defined expectations about price-to-performance-to-usability ratios in both of these sectors, and I worry this doesn't go far enough in any particular direction to meet the demands of either market.

Leaves me wondering who exactly this is for.

ajs1998• 1 month ago

It's been a while since I built a PC but that price seems very fair

aeturnum4• 1 month ago

This device does sit between mac-mini-esq lower power devices and compact enthusiast builds and, like the Steam Deck, it's an attempt to build a new segment. That said, if you think paying $1000 for this kind of hardware is some kind of exception, I think you should go take a look at what you can get on the prebuilt gaming PC market. You get a little less because the Steam Machine has a small footprint, but if you're looking for a nice little machine you don't overpay by much.

user439284• 1 month ago

No it does not. The Late 2024 M4 Mac mini benchmarks x1.6 faster in ST and 2x in MT.

The Mac mini costs $600.

WithinReason2• 1 month ago

Here, try your hand at assembling one much cheaper at the same performance:

https://pcpartpicker.com/

bgirard• 1 month ago

I don't recognized the CPU/GPU and PC building isn't my field so I could way off. But here's my honest attempt at it without paying a premium for the form factor which isn't an important feature for me:

PCPartPicker Part List: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/3WkCdq

Price: $1021

InitialLastName3• 1 month ago

I just did one [0], mostly with regards only to specs and price (rather than quality). It comes out to $150 more, roughly 4X the volume, and about 3 hours more of my time in effort, all to get something that won't be as well-supported by games. What am I missing?

[0] https://pcpartpicker.com/list/KY3VW9

elAhmo2• 1 month ago

My 15 year old Mac Mini has the same amount of RAM as this machine in 2026. I bought it used around 7-8 years ago for 200 EUR.

0x073• 1 month ago

Was 16gb planned since the beginning?

Maybe they lowered to 16gb to reduce the price.

karel-3d2• 29 days ago

Mac Mini in 2011 had 8GB max?

deburo2• 1 month ago

The disk and memory prices are very high right now. Perhaps they could do a disk-less, memory-less variant.

bitmasher92• 1 month ago

I was a bit confused by the term “disk” until I realized you’re talking about NVMe.

A relic from “Hard Disk Drive”, which was about two persistent storage technologies ago.

Peaches4Rent10• 1 month ago

Nope. Just built a pc this Jan. Ram and GPU prices are insane.

This is what you get for the price. Maybe a 100-50 max difference.

I've been looking at building a TV box for a while and this was the number it was hitting

ZekeSulastin2• 1 month ago

You did look at the Steam Machine's specs/benchmarks, right? I'm fairly certain that the build you just made well exceeds what Valve put out.

robotnikman• 1 month ago

I blame Sam Altman and all the other AI bros for this and everything else in consumer tech increasing in price

itomato2• 30 days ago

For people who are already throwing money at Valve on a monthly subscription and might otherwise have bought something from Sony or Microsoft, or more likely, will also buy something from Sony or Microsoft.

The consumerist mindset accepts this device.

marc_g• 30 days ago

There's no monthly sub for Steam.

zamalek5• 30 days ago

People who are willing to spend $71 on not having to build it themselves. That's the premium according to GNs best-effort like-for-like build.

cyberrock• 30 days ago

To me it's not even the comparison with builds that's damning; it's the comparison with handhelds and other mini PCs. Most people excited by this probably have a Steam Deck or another handheld, so they have to be into playing a very specific slice of games that can run slightly better than the handheld.

For example, Forza 6 on high 1080p is 60 for SM vs 40 for high end handhelds and 30 for SD. Even at the original price, is it really worth $750? Not to mention that many handhelds and mini PCs also have USB4 ports that one could attach a retired GPU to get 60fps+ @ very high 2k, but the Steam Machine has no such port and only one NVMe slot.

So this is for people who are allergic to the existing solutions (plugging in your handheld, using Moonlight) or just like the brand, but I know it's going to still sell out. I just don't want to hear about extensibility, eco-friendliness, or cost effectiveness from a certain segment of gamers after this.

TomK323• 30 days ago

Who knows, maybe once the AI bubble has burst they will surprise us with a replacement mainboard for this second gen. If they want to keep it in sale as long as the Steamdeck it would make sense to offer gamers a simple way to upgrade their existing machine when Steam's ecosystem is already open to all sides. Maybe they'll even outsource that mainboard upgrade to ASUS, MSI or others. Once we see a teardown we can make a better prediction.

fxwin• 30 days ago

Those are specs that belong on a laptop or a lowend console offering like the Series S.

Unfortunately, valve (and we consumers) have to recalibrate our understanding of which prices qualify as "insulting".

jeppester• 29 days ago

I don't disagree that this device is very likely too expensive to sell well.

But! The price is not insulting. You can built a slightly faster PC for a little less, but that PC would be ~10 times larger, it would be louder, it would lack features like HDMI-CEC and good wifi/bluetooth. It really wouldn't compare for living room usage.

In order to get anywhere near the size of the Steam Machine, you'd have to exceed its costs.

remix2000• 29 days ago

Isn't CEC available for all in-tree GPU drivers using DP-to-HDMI passthrough? (although I do imagine Nvidia would still be preferred for a custom build, perhaps with a USB CEC injector)

muyuu• 29 days ago

If you look at how extremely overpriced console hardware typically gets away with being, this is not a bad deal if the system is durable, relatively quiet and there are good games well optimised for it. The deal is sweetened by the fact that you will be eventually be able to upgrade the RAM and storage easily and for cheap if/when prices eventually come down from the current AI insanity levels.

ectospheno• 29 days ago

I have no interest in maintaining a gaming PC but want to play indie games that don’t launch on console. I also have money. I’ve been considering it.

LoveMortuus3• 1 month ago

I don’t understand why it doesn’t have a headphones jack…

dtj1123• 1 month ago

Is there anything actually worth playing in the steam frame? The hardware looks incredible, but my understanding is that the current state of VR games is less than brilliant.

j2kun• 1 month ago

Yes, Steam Machine is optimized for gaming, but it's still your PC. Install your own apps, or even another operating system. Who are we to tell you how to use your computer?

Indeed, thankful for that.

LoveMortuus3• 1 month ago

I was hoping that Steam Machine + Steam Frame would be around 1000€ or there about.

thelonelyborg• 1 month ago

would be amazing.

nekusar• 1 month ago

Sigh. I've been in line for a Steam controller since May 8. Not a peep.

I dont have much hope in getting that, let alone this.

kryllic• 1 month ago

My first thought was "I wonder how this would work as a small-factor game dev machine" and lo and behold, there is a clip of someone working in Godot running a debug version of their game. Very cool to see Valve market this as Linux PC rather than strictly gaming.

fluoridation7• 1 month ago

It's even worse value for productivity, though, because the CPU is purposely throttled to prevent overloading the thermal solution and the PSU.

morserer• 1 month ago

I can't find evidence for this anywhere. Can you provide a source?

CafeRacer• 1 month ago

Is this US only?

d3Xt3r11• 1 month ago

According to Tom's Hardware, it's North America, the United Kingdom, the European Union, and Australia.

https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/console-gaming/valv...

flocked• 1 month ago

Crazy. A Mac Mini costing nearly half as much as based on the released benchmarks, the same performance playing games with Crossover.

asdff2• 1 month ago

Not a lot of games play nice with crossover. I wish I could dual boot windows on this m3 mbp like I could on my old 2012 model. I feel like tf2 performance is actually worse on kegworks with the m3 pro than it was when I would dual boot windows 10 on the 2012 computer. So many lag spikes. A bunch of explosions will go off and the game will stall for a moment and you just get fragged. There are plenty of games that also won't let you play multiplayer at all due to anticheat not playing nice with wine.

"native" macos games on the m series aren't even that much better because they usually just run through a rosetta layer that seems to lock FPS at only 40. Fans will spin full bore because the game is so unoptimized.

nottorp4• 30 days ago

Will Crossover survive the dropping of Rosetta 2 that is coming?

minraws• 1 month ago

1050$ I am very sad about the price. Like orders of magnitude sad.

I would have hoped for ~600$ with the economic realities maybe 800$, but 1000$+ just feels like too much doesn't valve have like a multi-billion dollar muscle couldn't the folks make it a tad cheaper...

I guess we can only blame the current market conditions at the end of the day.

delbronski• 1 month ago

Dammit, I don’t think this is going to be as popular as the Steam Deck at this price. I hope they don’t shelf it and I can buy this in a few years for a reasonable price once the big AI labs go bankrupt.

jrepinc11• 1 month ago

I would love to see Valve release a cheaper bare-bones edition without RAM and SSD.

sssilver• 1 month ago

I don't understand the specs of this computer. At the end of the day, will this "Semi-custom CPU" and "Semi-custom GPU" run modern AAA games at 4K?

Peaches4Rent10• 1 month ago

4k with upscaling is the promise.. don't know if it will hold

otto-riz• 1 month ago

I can't find anything that indicates the expected wait if you get in the reservation queue. Maybe I've been burned by too many Kickstarters.

oliver66677• 1 month ago

This is Framework level pricing.

Provides some of the worst value for money on the market ($1,049 with no controller, additional $70 for controller): worse than the PS5 ($599), Xbox Series X ($599), Switch 2 ($449), and DIY PCs.

Peaches4Rent10• 1 month ago

Framework provides adequate price to value, what are you saying?

This doesn't have the best value

Gigachad24• 1 month ago

The MacBook neo is cheaper, faster, and higher quality in every way.

sedatk7• 30 days ago

Good luck playing PC games on PS5 or Xbox Series X.

smcleod• 1 month ago

Yikes twice the price of a PS5 in Australia! I will still be buying one though. I'm looking forward to moving away from Sony after having a PlayStation in my living room for 16+ years. I really like Steam's ethics / how they treat their customers - and the steam deck (while under powered) has been fantastic.

notnmeyer2• 1 month ago

anyone talking about hw performance is not the intended market. if you have a gaming pc, like building systems, etc, you are not the intended market.

this is for folks who want steam games in their living room and dont want to build their own system.

xtracto• 1 month ago

I've built my own PC several times and am a hardcore Linux enthusiast.

However at this point in my life, the best gaming experience i get is from XBox live/online subscription. I got to the browser, click on a game and start playing without caring for anything else. The most complicated thing i have to do is connect an Xbox gamepad for games that require it (I prefer keyboard +mouse whenever possible).

I wish Steam had something like that for the games I've bought. I've got several games in the library, I cant play some of them because currently I have a Mac m4.

notnmeyer2• 1 month ago

yeah, so this was exactly my scenario. i have an xbox and ps5, but bought a steamdeck about 6 months ago to play indie and windows games... its been utterly amazing. i dont care about specs, or graphics, or framerates (within reason). playing on steam still feels like it did when i was young.

maybe im misunderstanding, but you exactly like the person that a steam machine is for.

baby3• 1 month ago

The deck is such a good console compared to the switch and switch 2 that I can’t be stop being happy that they released this now. How is Valve, a tiny company, doing so much better than Nintendo?

chrisco2552• 1 month ago

They're not. The Deck is hundreds of dollars more expensive than the Switch 2. The Switch 1 sold 155 million units, making it the second most popular console of all time. Switch 2 is also selling very well.

bigyabai12• 1 month ago

I don't think by "better" they meant financially. It sounds like they own both consoles and are surprised to replace their Switch use with a Deck.

Which tracks, to my wit; my Switch 1 is a buyers remorse product. If I knew that a Linux x86 handheld was eventually getting made, I'd have never bought it.

TiredOfLife5• 1 month ago

Switch 2 is faster, lighter and cheaper than Steam Deck.

baby3• 27 days ago

Tried playing split fiction on the switch 2 and it was so horrible I haven’t played anything since then. I’m picking it up again today for starfox but basically only use it for nintendo games.

Peaches4Rent10• 1 month ago

The big problem isn't that this pc is weak, it's that games aren't well optimized

panicinducer• 1 month ago

You could build the equivalent PC for quite a bit cheaper or a PS5 and 7 full price AAA games for the same price. No way this is a console-killer, but will be a nice novelty for Gaben fans for whom $1049 is not a significant amount of money.

SoMomentary• 1 month ago

Just today I was thinking about threading the needle on that and making my own Steam Machine with an AMD BC-250 board. Maybe I still will, it'd be a 10th the price and I do love to tinker.

cloudengineer94• 1 month ago

Not sure who the target audience is for this.. indie gamers? But yeah I saw the news piece about the 750$ before memory craziness set in, still a lot.

Aeolun• 1 month ago

The Japan situation is so fucking weird. Why can I only buy Steam hardware from a website that someone seems to have set up on a weekend, and where half the inventory is out of stock…?

zero0529• 1 month ago

I hope this is successful, like it or not this might be one of the best ways that Linux can reduce the Microsoft Windows monopoly. I would actually go as far as to say that it has to succeed.

chrysoprace• 1 month ago

That's my hope as well. I don't need/want a Steam Machine, but I want it to succeed, especially if it forces better support for anti-cheat.

Maybe it'll become a cheaper entry-level machine in a couple of years if they can keep producing them.

nelox• 1 month ago

Steam Engine, surely?

jokoon3• 1 month ago

So SteamOS is just arch linux?

I guess there are important differences?

jrepinc11• 30 days ago

Yup it is Arch Linux, that basically boots into Steam client with Big Picture mode. And if you switch to desktop mode you get a standard Linux with KDE Plasma desktop environment.

d3Xt3r11• 30 days ago

It is immutable and has versioned image releases (unlike Arch, which is mutable and rolling release).This adds stability, makes the system less prone to breakage, and easy to rollback (factory reset).

Ans of course, the biggest visible difference is that this boots directly into Steam big-picture mode, where you operate the UI using a controller (although it does support KB+mouse), which makes it ideal to use connected to a TV, like a regular gaming console.

Gigachad24• 30 days ago

SteamOS is highly customized and managed by Valve. It doesn't have the Arch repos or pacman. Updates to the OS come from Valve in large releases rather than per package. All apps installed either come through Steam or Flatpak.

So it's Arch in the same way Android could be called Linux.

jokoon3• 29 days ago

so the available software is a bit limited then

I can still customize and configure things, or not really?

does that mean I can't customize the OS, like shortcuts?

RyanOD2• 30 days ago

I like this randomized reservation approach.

What if, in addition, a nominal fee was charged just to have a chance to purchase a Steam Machine? Let's say $3 (or whatever). Then, all that money is donated to an organization like Extra Life or Game for Love?

In that way, someone with 5000 scalper accounts knows they're going to be out $15k just to get in line. And everyone else who is trying to buy just one isn't sweating the nominal fee.

I'm genuinely asking.

sedatk7• 30 days ago

They already require you to have made at least one purchase on Steam before April.

RyanOD2• 30 days ago

Ahhh, there it is. That's a good approach.

pclowes• 30 days ago

I really appreciate Gabe's approach of treat the user as THE USER not the thing we are trying to use.

Very tired of every interaction with every tech company and subscription service making me feel used rather than served.

bigtex2• 30 days ago

For reference to the current prices of consoles:

Nintendo Switch 2 $449.99

Xbox Series S (512GB/1TB) $379.99 – $449.99

Xbox Series X (1TB) $649.99

PlayStation 5 Slim (Digital) $599.99

PlayStation 5 Slim (Disc) $649.99

PlayStation 5 Pro $899.99

From reading posts on X/Twitter, I got the feeling that PC Gaming enthusiasts truly believed this was going to compete with console gaming and those players would flock to the utopia that is Steam OS and managing hardware. At this price I believe its way too expensive to temp console gamers and Steam supporters will probably balk about the specs to price ratio.

Eji1700• 30 days ago

The main market to me is going to be ibuypower people, so a console gamer who wants to jump to PC but doesn't want to self build.

I've been screwing around on pcpartpicker on and off for today, and I don't see a clean way to get steam machine specs for less than $800 if you build it yourself, and closer to $900 if i'm being honest (and in no way will it be SFF).

I think the big thing will be if steam can commit to this like the deck and get better performance over time. Consoles out perform their hardware thanks to lots of optimization, enforced by knowing you're stuck with/always going to have the same specs.

The steam machines success to me pivots completely on if they can capture a market of customers who want to jump from console and don't want to become hardware savvy (which has not gotten as easy as it should).

Compatibility and performance in the next 6 months is going to determine a lot.

And if someone better than me wants to check my PC Part picker work: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/HCtXkD

I've got $766 for CPU/MB/HDD/GPU/RAM.

westpfelia• 30 days ago

No case. No custom made motherboard that supports HDMI CEC. Lack of developers specifically developing around valve hardware like they did with the SteamDeck.

CivBase• 30 days ago

Idk why anyone thought this would be a "PC console killer" type of product. Consoles are subsidized because they act as the entry point to closed hardware/software ecosystems. You can't do that with a general purpose PC because it's an open ecosystem by definition.

But there are economic benefits to an open ecosystem. The Steam Machine has a gigantic back catalog of games that can be had for cheap. You also probably already have all the peripherals you'll need for it. And of course they don't charge for online play.

That last part alone makes up for the cost after just 2-3 years.

Rapzid4• 30 days ago

TMK Sony and Nintendo don't lose money on console sales.

cryptonym2• 30 days ago

This is a general purpose PC but it's also designed for Steam. Valve will get back a fair amount of revenue on games sold for usage on said machines. They could sell it with little to no margin (maybe they are doing it) while increasing gaming time and potential revenue. Sure, games can be had for cheap and so far it seems to be profitable.

ajcp• 30 days ago

And all those consoles (save the Switch maybe) are heavily subsidized by those companies to compete at that artificial price point.

According to LTT Valve made the conscious decision NOT to subsidize the Steam Machine to let the market compete. I very much respect that and will be willing to pay the premium because of that and:

- using my purchase to vote for/encourage the growth of the Linux ecosystem.

- as a PC gamer I'm already highly invested in the Steam platform with all of my other gaming purchases.

weberer3• 30 days ago

Just round up the penny for the more honest price.

Nintendo Switch 2 $450

Xbox Series S (512GB/1TB) $380 – $450

Xbox Series X (1TB) $650

PlayStation 5 Slim (Digital) $600

PlayStation 5 Slim (Disc) $650

PlayStation 5 Pro $900

Steam Machine 512GB: $1050

Steam Machine 2TB: $1350

d3Xt3r11• 30 days ago

Switch 2 is going up by $50

HighGoldstein• 30 days ago

The PS5 (which is realistically the main competitor) has the caveat that to get even something as basic as multiplayer you need to pay a $10-20 monthly subscription, so you can multiply that by however many months you plan to own it and add it to the price.

TomK323• 30 days ago

I'd like to factor in the cost of games, but then my Steam library might be a little bigger than the average... Am I willing to pay €60 for a game? Rarely. Am I willing for the spring/summer/winter sale on Steam? Yes!

intexpress• 29 days ago

Switch 2 performs very well for the price. It is getting the same games as PS5 etc.

bigtex2• 29 days ago

Also, many popular online multiplayer games, like Call of Duty, will not work with SteamOS

dejan_kocic• 30 days ago

it would be nice if steam os could be downloaded officially

next_xibalba• 30 days ago

I'd love to know how the demographics of steam's actual users compare against those represented on the marketing page (https://store.steampowered.com/hardware/steammachine).

Acrobatic_Road2• 30 days ago

Sorry Valve. I know its not really your fault but I refuse to give you my money this time. Instead I'm executing plan B: converting my Steam Deck into a workstation. It's the best hardware I have and while it can't play everything smoothly what it can run well is practically endless.

ddxv• 30 days ago

I feel like Framework really missed this boat with their desktop PC they released last year. They could have used that + a gamepad to have captured so much of this.

bgdkbtv• 30 days ago

I will definitely be getting this regardless of price or specs. I'm no hard core gamer and I play Balatro, Vampire Survivors and occasional online Halo 2 with friends. This is perfect.

Too bad YouTube doesn't have a proper API for building 3rd party clients. I would love to build one and use it on my SteamDeck and on the big TV with the SteamMachine.

LowLevelKernel• 30 days ago

$1000 !!!

Lucasoato• 30 days ago

Steam Machine, like our other hardware products, is made up of many components that we source from manufacturers around the world. The price at which we sell our hardware is a direct result of the cost of these components. We felt like we had a good understanding of how those costs might change over time when we first started sourcing them for Steam Machine back in 2023. That understanding was born from the many years of data we all have about the evolution of PC hardware prices – primarily, that it tends to get cheaper over time as new technology arrives.
Over the past year or so, that has changed quickly and significantly, most visibly for RAM and storage components. There are a variety of reasons, all of which are affecting hardware products everywhere. The overall effect is that our original goal for the price of Steam Machine is no longer viable. So the prices we're sharing today reflect the state of the world for manufacturing; or, more accurately, it reflects the price of the components as we've secured them over the past 6 months.

Take notes about the tone, the communication style, the honesty that you can feel by reading those words. There are no problem that can’t be alleviated (if not solved) with good communication to your customer, and you can bet that Steam knows damn well theirs!

giancarlostoro3• 30 days ago

I have a feeling it would have cost drastically less if we didn't have a RAM / storage crisis, which is really sad.

NothingAboutAny• 30 days ago

there's probably ~$150 in the ram and ~$100 in the SSD alone, not to mention everything else. we gotta have data-centers though because, uh.. well, we gotta have em.

starkrights• 30 days ago

I’ve seen from a couple of places that a valver has commented that they can’t say exactly what the original price goal was, but that you can get an idea from the price increase of the steamdeck (~$200 usd)

That wouldve put the steam machine somewhere around the $800 mark for the base edition, which would’ve been so, so much sweeter of a value proposition.

shantara• 30 days ago

The original price should have been in $700-800 range, pre-RAM and storage pricing escalation, which would have changed the equation drastically. I even considered getting it as a mostly streaming box for a living room, intending to play only the lighter games on device. But for the announced price and after delays, it just doesn't make sense financially. As is, you're grossly overpaying for the level of GPU performance Steam Machine offers.

Gigachad24• 30 days ago

Valve's communication around this release has redirected all rage towards Sam Altman rather than the Steam Machine.

bigyabai12• 30 days ago

The "rage" is largely surrounding the price, not the Machine hardware itself. The Deck sold like hotcakes at $400.

We'll see actual outrage when the masses defer new smartphone upgrades due to price bumps.

embedding-shape3• 30 days ago

That's the beauty of the "There are a variety of reasons" part, whatever you believe to be the reason, Valve seems to agree with you, biases or not.

OtomotO5• 30 days ago

Don't forget Trump and Hormuz!

juleiie2• 30 days ago

I love it

I won’t buy it

But wow what a nice communication

That’s gonna look great on post mortem report

cubefox3• 30 days ago

There are a variety of reasons, all of which are affecting hardware products everywhere.

I'm pretty sure the price increase is exclusively caused by LLMs.

Forgeties7927• 30 days ago

I totally get where they’re coming from but sadly it doesn’t change the fact that $1100+ is a tough sell for the benchmarks they’re hitting.

port11• 30 days ago

Given the price of components right now, I don’t know. 1k for that small of a form factor seems acceptable. It’s a nice addition to the living room, could likely play a role in cancelling expensive video streaming subscriptions. Might also run some local LLMs. Seems decent.

elxr• 29 days ago

They know it's a tough sell. Fortunately for everyone in the market, you can still find used CPUs/GPUs/RAM pretty easily and save a decent amount if you're ok with building your own.

Valve doesn't need this to do well to survive. And you don't need a steam machine (or any >$1000 machine) to play PC games. Just wait it out or buy used hardware. Hell, even an rog ally x plays just about anything (and also supports steamOS), and you can still get that at reasonable prices.

ricardobayes• 30 days ago

Still, how does a PS5 cost half, and arguably, has better/fast hardware? I can't imagine Sony selling them at a loss.

joe_mamba2• 30 days ago

PS5 has a lot parts in high volumes negotiated years in advance so they can leverage lower prices than valve. Valve ships like 10% max of the volumes that Sony sells.

wil421• 30 days ago

Why can’t you imagine it? The console makers have been selling at a loss for 3 maybe 4/5 decades.

Edit: looks like it took 10 million PS5s to break even. The article is 5 years old I wonder if it’s true in 2026.[2]

The existing industrial arrangement at the time was that of a bundled console-plus-cartridge business model, where the console manufacturer (say, Atari with its VCS/2600) sold the console at a loss and cross-subsidized it with the money made on cartridges sold with a huge profit margin.[1]

[1] https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/how-nintendo-bled-atari-g...

[2] It took Sony years to stop losing money on PS3 sales, but the company stopped selling the PS4 at a loss around six months after its debut in 2013. The PS5 has taken ever so slightly longer, but it’s clearly not repeating the costly exercise of the PS3 despite early reports suggesting Sony was struggling with PS5 pricing due to expensive parts.

[2] https://www.theverge.com/2021/8/4/22609150/sony-playstation-...

zipy124• 30 days ago

The PS5 can only play games that you pay Sony a tax to play. The steam machine can play any game, including those bought outside Steam and thus without paying valve a tax.

This means the PS5 is subsidised, whereas Valve hardware does not tend to be. They have confirmed that internally all divisions must be roughly profitable/break-even.

empath753• 29 days ago

They were originally sold at a loss, then became per-unit profitable at some point, and now they might be eating a loss on them again. But they lock in hardware prices years in advance.

seabrookmx2• 29 days ago

The base PS5 does not have better hardware. Though the PS5 Pro outperforms the Steam Machine and is still cheaper than it..

deathlock• 29 days ago

From the FAQs:

Is this the Valve console? We think of Steam Machine as an extension of PC gaming, not as a console. The traditional console model is to sell hardware at a loss and make up the revenue with subscription services or by selling games that are locked-in to the hardware. We think this can make sense for a single business in the short term but that open ecosystems are better for customers over the long term. PC gaming's history proves this: The openness of the PC gaming space has enabled it to be the primary driver of hardware and software innovation for decades. The strength of PC gaming is the ability to play the games you want on the hardware you want. Steam Machine is a solution to these problems (and we think it's a great one), but it's not the only solution, and we don't want it to be.

artyom• 29 days ago

Most of the general, watered down tone of Corporate America that we love to hate comes from the legal department, usually at the late-stage point when they make all the decisions in a company: product, business, launches, strategy, direction, etc. Everything needs to run through legal, and they have a final say on everything, including every public communication.

That's why I'd love an interview with Steam's legal head. Sounds like they'd have some wild stories to share.

empath753• 29 days ago

This is why Apple locks in supplier prices years in advance.

Aperocky• 29 days ago

That would only works until it doesn't. The suppliers got supplier too and those in turn have their own supplier. I don't know about any specific contract but I bet there's a force majeure or price excluding input cost somewhere.

voxic11• 29 days ago

Computer hardware prices tend to go down over time so in general this is a pretty bad strategy. Of course in rare times like these it can pay off.

mattstir• 29 days ago

Apple is also an absolutely enormous company. Even if Valve wanted to lock in prices, they're simply too small for RAM manufacturers to notice on their radar, unfortunately.

Strom2• 26 days ago

If Apple locks supplier prices for years in advance, then why is it raising the prices of all its products? Just greed?

tiahura4• 29 days ago

Is that the coupon code that brings it down to a competitive price?

Telaneo6• 30 days ago

Oof. Great machine. Wrong price.

I'll be getting one eventually either way, hopefully after the RAMpocalypce has ended, just because I enjoy collecting consoles and games, and I want to support Linux through SteamOS. I'm sure I can find a place for it in my life, but it's not something I need.

bryanhogan2• 30 days ago

My prediction was that they would bundle it with Steam store money or other games to bring the "end price" below a 1000 Euro, surprised to see I was wrong!

pseudosavant11• 30 days ago

I think this put this all in perspective for me. If Microsoft came out with this exact hardware (with Windows but still open and you could load SteamOS on it), at this price point, people mock Microsoft to death about how this product is a joke.

righthand3• 30 days ago

It’s called the Xbox and the reason it wasn’t at this price point is that Microsoft has the capital power to subsidize the cost at risk of the Xbox division not being profitable. Valve doesn’t have such freedoms on hardware it seems.

pseudosavant11• 30 days ago

The XSX costs 43% less than the cheapest Steam Machine, even though it has twice the SSD and includes a controller. Microsoft isn't subsidizing it that far.

bigyabai12• 30 days ago

with Windows but still open and you could load SteamOS on it

You're describing Every Computer Ever.

pseudosavant11• 30 days ago

As opposed to an Xbox, which doesn't do that. But the XSX also costs 43% less.

IshKebab4• 30 days ago

Every x86 PC ever. That's not true for ARM machines or Mac. Or the myriad of other closed platforms that are computers.

Stevvo• 30 days ago

Might be the first hardware Valve has priced correctly. All previous hardware was underpriced leaving it unavailable for months/years on end.

righthand3• 30 days ago

A Framework Desktop is the better deal and more capable machine IMO. Also upgradeable.

JoshTriplett• 30 days ago

One disappointment: you have to have already made a purchase, which doesn't help if owning a Steam OS machine is the first time you will be buying and playing anything from Steam.

casey2• 30 days ago

DOA lol, I built a computer 6 years ago for less with 64GB of DDR5. I can't imagine anyone buying this. Maybe they can hold out for 5 years and add some more ram and sell it for 25% in true Steam fashion.

osti• 30 days ago

If AI is so good, then why don't we have perfect compatibility layers between OS's for games yet?

mberning• 30 days ago

I really don’t get the bellyaching about the price. They are going to sell as many of these as they can make, so there is no sense in subsidizing the price. Maybe in the future they will, especially if Windows continues on it’s current trajectory.

rvz2• 30 days ago

Unfortunately, the only game that matters this year is GTA 6, and it only plays on consoles such as the PS5 and the Xbox.

So unless it releases on the Steam Machine or PC, then the sales of the Steam Machine are going to be really poor.

That is even with the price of the Steam Machine being more expensive as well. You might as well buy a PS5 Pro or Xbox at the point.

crossroadsguy• 30 days ago

I wish there was a clear Mac Mini alt. With lots of drawbacks of the mac mini fixed e.g. a very simple way to connect to tablets (iPads, Androids tabs) as screen and ability to connect to any keypad and mouse, natively (I am sure a linux mini pc box will have that already - at least I may not need a "connector hardware").

I really like the idea of travelling around with my iPad but have a very small but sufficiently powerful computer tucked away in my bag (along with needed cables) if I need it (because, well, Apple is not going to let their iPads unleash their capabilities).

There are some around (even in my geography) but all of them seem to be half-heartedly done.

hinkley• 30 days ago

We think of Steam Machine as an extension of PC gaming, not as a console.

But is that really so bad? I don't want to say 'sell it at a loss' but loss leaders don't need to bankrupt their companies in order to do their job.

If you sold them at or below cost then people would figure out how to buy 100's and make server farms out of them. Particularly for this hardware. The awkwardness of the hardware being made up for by the subsidy from the manufacturer. But pricing them at break-even would still be good business.

theredleft• 30 days ago

absolutely amazing value

juleiie2• 30 days ago

I don’t know for who this is if you can easily build a better mini pc yourself for cheaper

It’s dead on arrival

This is gonna be such a litmus paper test for the most fervent valve suckers

danielabinav160• 30 days ago

cool

amatecha3• 30 days ago

So awesome. If I needed/wanted a gaming PC or "family TV" gaming machine, I'd snag this for sure. I've had the Steam Deck since launch and it's really quite well-executed and I've logged hundreds of hours on it. SteamOS is totally decent and the level of polish has been continually improved. The price for the Machine is totally acceptable considering the market currently, particularly considering these [0][1][2] would be my options if I had $1500 CAD to spend on a gaming PC right now -- all machines with 8gb VRAM GPUs and 16GB of RAM.

[0] https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX00135058

[1] https://www.canadacomputers.com/en/armoury-gaming-desktops/2...

[2] https://www.canadacomputers.com/en/gaming-desktop-pcs/275404...

dimgl• 30 days ago

I'm gonna be real here. I think they should have cancelled this release.

nazgu1• 30 days ago

We have pricey PCs, consoles and other electronics, but at least we have AI

foo12bar2• 30 days ago

It was never about us.

OtomotO5• 30 days ago

Sadly not a good fit for my needs.

My 2021 machine is still more powerful (apart from the GPU maybe, but that one is from 2022 and has 12GB memory) and I can't justify buying this for that amount.

Would've loved to have a dedicated machine for gaming, but alas.

donkeylazy456• 30 days ago

weaker hardware than BC-250 compute card. volvo what is going on?

numlock862• 30 days ago

I have doubts in their reservation process, though. I signed up for the controller reservation as soon as it started (after they just gave the first batch to scalpers) and it was mentioned that they prefer genuine accounts. My account is over 22 years old at this point and has regular transactions going on. Countless games with countless hours, almost daily activity. I even got the Index back in the day and still use it.

Anyway, upon registration I was informed that my account was "not eligible". You are welcome, I guess.

prartichoke• 30 days ago

Do you have an active VAC ban? If not, it may be worth contacting them to ask why, they're quite responsive

numlock862• 30 days ago

Do you have an active VAC ban?

No, and never had one. My account is as clean as pristine as it gets. I already mailed them but never got an answer.

sevenseacat• 30 days ago

Honestly, it seems pretty enticing for a PC-just-for-gaming-but-not-a-“gaming-PC”, if you get my meaning.

I have no need for it right now, but when the next big Windows-only game comes out, it’ll be pretty tempting. (The last Windows gaming I did was when The Elder Scrolls Online came out…)

Cort3z• 30 days ago

"This item is not available for purchase in your region"

This is such a bummer. I live in the European Economic Area (EEA)

borosuxks• 30 days ago

We have too good consumer protection laws for Valve. Makes my view of them negative, so I'll go elsewhere when I can.

hamburgererror• 30 days ago

I hope they will add the expected performances for a given game on the store pages, just like the required specs are specified.

rm30• 30 days ago

the title is misleading, somebody could think that a startup launched a new steam based machine after the Hormuz closure

musha68k• 30 days ago

With those unfortunate specs a used PS5 + Steam Deck OLED is the better deal to me.

HDR on that screen is just something to behold and UHD-BD drive is the cherry on top.

https://github.com/streetpea/chiaki-ng

I could see myself buying the undeniably beautiful GabenCube at spec if the price were at or only slightly above SW2/PS5 level; as an additional device to play the outlier game that is exclusive to "PC" and Steam Deck / Macbook Pro not delivering enough oomph for it to run satisfactorily.

Fire-Dragon-DoL4• 30 days ago

I know many people keep pointing at PS5 as the competition, but I'll throw this in:

I can buy a game on PC and play it on the go, I don't have to buy anything else.

The Steam Deck+a PC places Steam in a different league than the PS5 (for now).

Nintendo Switch 2 is way closer, however the games are different (I don't love Nintendo games).

Finally for those of us with a big Steam library and kids, buying a Steam machine or a Steam Deck means I will spend ZERO on games (I can confirm)

fragmede3• 30 days ago

Until the next Steam sale. Steam Summer Sale is coming up!

Fire-Dragon-DoL4• 30 days ago

Lol! I know right?

Jokes aside, I figured out techniques to avoid buying all together, which is great. I already spent plenty.

TiredOfLife5• 30 days ago

The Steam Deck+a PC places Steam in a different league than the PS5 (for now).

It places it in same league as PS Portal and PS5

Fire-Dragon-DoL4• 30 days ago

No the PlayStation portal streams, there is an enormous difference there.

I can already stream any steam game on any android and iphone out there

utopiah• 30 days ago

Wondering how it’d benchmark against https://www.tuxedocomputers.com/en/TUXEDO-Nano-Pro-Gen14-AMD... in an even smaller form factor and similar price range for specs.

unrevokeapp• 30 days ago

Honestly, it seems overpriced (as expected). But it's much smaller than PS5 and according the first reviews it runs much cooler. Still not my cup of tea.

dbg31415• 30 days ago

The original NES cost $179 at launch, or about $550 today.

And for premium games we spent $45, or about $150 today.

theknarf• 30 days ago

I wish it was available in my country.

wraptile• 30 days ago

there are re-shipping services that will re-ship the item to you for an extra fee. The fee can be quite high though.

calini• 30 days ago

Man it's so unfortunate that this launch coincided with the component crisis, forcing the prices to be just outside the range of people that were debating between getting this and getting a console, it would've made so much more of an impact if the prices were $200 lower.

mateioprea• 29 days ago

well, is there a better alternative for the money? I'm asking because i'm in the market for this

bryanhogan2• 29 days ago

I'd say that heavily depends on what you see as alternatives. For some the Steam Machine is filling an unmet need in the market, for others it's a more expensive gaming pc or gaming console.

As we are on HackerNews, there's a good chance that you can build / setup your own pc with better specs which you might want to look into and then decide.

bookofjoe• 29 days ago

https://poshmark.com/listing/Valve-Steam-DeckHDMI-64-GB-Blac...

DanielHB2• 29 days ago

I think the steam machine is more important as a benchmark for 3rd parties developing their own Steam OS based systems. Although I am sure Valve would be happier if it was popular on its own merits too.

brachkow2• 29 days ago

It is interesting to know how it compares in terms of performance to 500$ Mac Mini with Crossover?

Of course Crossover support is worse than Proton, so it will not be viable alternative in real gaming scenarios. But Proton is made by Crossover team.

And Apple hardware is 2x cheaper.

360MustangScope• 29 days ago

Due to the memory and storage crisis, you actually cannot buy the $500 mac mini anymore. It starts at $799

brachkow2• 29 days ago

Just checked what your claim, and... its even worse – 1000$ in my part of EU (m4 + 16gb, aka base configuration)

Etheryte• 29 days ago

Your mileage may vary, but I've never gotten reasonable performance out of Crossover. I have a decked out Mac for development and most of the games I've tried in Crossover still need you to turn the settings to damn near lowest possible.

bigyabai12• 29 days ago

If Mac Minis were viable for gaming, everyone would get one. Unfortunately, Crossover has very spotty support and GPTK starts fraying at the seams on CPU-heavy titles.

The upcoming Steam Frame will be the real make-or-break moment for ARM PC gaming. Up until now, nobody has seriously attempted to make ARM work for the "Steam Deck" segment of users.

frollogaston15• 29 days ago

Too bad there's no Proton for Mac. Ironically the Windows Steam itself is the hardest thing to run in plain Wine on Mac. There are lots of games that work fine in Wine by themselves, but just getting Steam to launch them is a mess.

The fact that my Mac can run any games at all is just a happy accident. That's not what I got it for.

fithisux• 29 days ago

Is it supporting ReactOS as rumored?

throwaway20372• 29 days ago

I saw a bunch of reviews (written and YouTube). It seems that the Valve development team behind this product was disappointed by the final cost. If this machine was built 2-3 years ago, can anyone estimate how much cheaper the cost would be? I assume this biggest price hikes have come from memory (RAM) and storage (NVMe).

lemiffe• 29 days ago

around 800 usd according to LTT’s video (near the end)

sylware• 29 days ago

The bus is not PCIe between the system and the GPU?

mikelevins2• 29 days ago

I was interested in the Steam machine, but I might not get one because I cannot log in to my Steam account, for no reason that I know. Steam's web-based process for resetting my password always gets stuck after successful completion of the captcha, regardless of which device or OS I use to do it, the accessible-to-Google procedures for getting past that blockage have not worked, and the email address that one could once use in this situation now just sends an autoreply that says no one is monitoring it anymore.

So I have exhausted all of the obvious routes for logging into my Steam account. Perhaps there are additional routes to discover, but I'm not particularly motivated to look for them at this point. If just getting logged in is this painful, I'm not particularly optimistic about the experience of buying or owning the thing.

swinglock• 29 days ago

Steam Support can probably get it sorted.

mikelevins2• 29 days ago

Probably, if I could contact them. But all the links I turned up lead me back to the captcha black hole, and the only email address I've found elicits a reply telling me that nobody is reading it. Perhaps something is reachable through additional effort, but I'm not particularly motivated to keep searching further. Perhaps someone there reads HN and would like to know this happened to someone, in case they want to fix it (for someone else's benefit if not for mine).

DiskoHexyl2• 29 days ago

For the inevitable minisforum machines comparisons - it's not as bad for Valve as it seems. You can't just add a dedicated GPU to a cheap miniPC with an integrated graphics- power delivery and airflow will have to be different, and you may be surprised to find out that even the cheapest mini PCs with dedicated graphics aren't significantly cheaper than a Steam machine (if at all).

And then my personal experience with these cheap no-brand mini-computers is that their Linux compatibility is spotty, BIOS updates are non-existend, quality control is severely lacking, and you have basically no support. They are also often pretty loud, overheat and die within a year or two. If something doesn't work properly, you are on your own- the manufacturer will have forgotten about this model in a couple of months, and user base is so low that it's unlikely someone will find a workaround.

So comparatively, a Steam Machine would be much preferable to me, considering that it will likely work out of the box with no compatibility issues, will have a typical valve support (which, judging by Steam Deck, is quite fair), is well-built and near silent.

The problem is once the price crosses a thousand, I'd rather add, say, 500 eur, and get a much more powerful machine. I see a point for the cheapest bottom of the barrel gaming pc/handheld (which would be 700-750) with many performance tradeoffs, but this doesn't look like a good enough upgrade from that. A 12+ GB RTX4070-class videocard, 24-32GB of RAM and maybe even an 8-core CPU for $1500+ would likely be more usable in the current market

Forgeties7927• 29 days ago

which, judging by Steam Deck, is quite fair

I love my Steam Deck but let's not forget that it took a solid 2-3 years for it to really become a somewhat turnkey, stable experience. They shipped it in a near-beta state. Flipping between gaming/desktop mode induced a fail state probably 30% of the time until a year ago, docking to TV's can still be very frustrating (aspect ratio and latency are almost always wonky until you tinker with it a fair bit) and isn't nearly as smooth a transition as with the switch, there used to be a VERY frustrating lockout where if your deck wanted to update and you weren't on your home network it wouldn't log in, just all sorts of really frustrating points of friction.

Again I love my deck, it's an incredible and capable device. But it was very clunky those first 2-3 years. It really only matured in the last 12-18mo or so. Hopefully the SM is a stronger experience day/week/month 1.

DiskoHexyl2• 29 days ago

My bad- support is too wide of a term, and I meant it in a sense that Valve is quick to respond when their hardware stops working.

I got my deck fixed after the warranty period, for example, with very little fuss. They even payed for the shipping of the broken device to them

redundantly• 29 days ago

I love my deck, it's an incredible and capable device. But it was very clunky those first 2-3 years

I got the Steam Deck on release. It was a near solid device for me from the get go. Only had the occasional crash/reboot, but I wouldn't describe it as having been clunky.

throwaway3141552• 28 days ago

flipping between gaming/desktop mode induced a fail state probably 30% of the time until a year ago

That doesn't reflect my experience at all.

Levitating2• 29 days ago

For the inevitable minisforum machines comparisons

It appears the Steam Machine is much more powerful than what a typical mini desktop pc would offer, while staying cool and quiet.

Gamers Nexus review: https://youtu.be/66QzlDewigE

DSMan195276• 29 days ago

For me the problem is that the target performance is in a weird spot - low enough that it's not amazing, but high enough to still be very expensive if you don't plan to play games that actually require that performance.

A cheap $300 mini-PC is a lot weaker but it can still play plenty of indie and other games just fine, ultimately that's what matters. For me, I would have considered buying one of these if they had one at a $300 to $400 price point even though it would have been significantly weaker, but at $1k it's just impossible for me to justify.

gilbetron• 29 days ago

Very late to the discussion, but many people see the price of the Steam Machine and balk at the high cost, even if they understand the reasoning. However, this isn't about the Steam Machine. Computing has just gotten more expensive. This is the new reality going forward, Steam Machine is just on the front edge of the wave. (Until, and if, RAM manufacturers catch up).

draginol• 29 days ago

With the scalping issue, the issue isn't whether can we detect scalpers to which anti scalping mechanism has the lowest false positive cost to it?

The random reservation order takes the scalping issue out of the fulfillment part and into allocation making it a lot harder on the scalper.

LarsDu88• 29 days ago

Expensive, but corrected for inflation, around the price of a ps3 at launch, and the ps3 was sold as a loss leader when it came out

sedatk7• 29 days ago

GamerNexus found out that an equivalent DIY machine would cost $979 in parts only to give a perspective on the pricing. It would probably be bigger too due to the discrete GPU.

Forgeties7927• 29 days ago

So you'd save $150-$200 building it yourself, around 15-20%. Seems reasonable to me.

neogodless6• 29 days ago

$1049 - $979 = $70 (7% savings)

m3kw9• 29 days ago

looks like DOA from reviews

nickv• 29 days ago

The thing I'm most excited about here (other than Yay! Valve!) is that this will bleed towards making projects like Bazzite even better.

leipie• 29 days ago

No half-life bundle mentioned (yet) :'(

jrepinc11• 29 days ago

An insightful video by Gamers Nexus:

Excellent Repairability: Steam Machine Tear-Down and Accessing RAM and SSD

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glXA3ObwSwQ

Schlagbohrer• 28 days ago

Me, praying nightly for the gods to watch over Gabe Newell. We all know that the day after he sells the company or passes away, Valve will be "MBA-ified" into slop by the nameless executives who will take over afterwards and squeeze every penny of profit out of it, screwing over the customers as much as possible.

Steam Machine launches today

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