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Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

boilingsteam.com

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Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#31

Post by pweaver »

The analysis seems mostly[1] solid but the conclusions are all wrong. The steam machine was sold out and wait-listed. Value doesn't charge until you are removed from the wait-list so these numbers reflect the number of manufactured units per week (e.g. manufacturing capacity and/or distribution strategy) of the steam machine and not demand. This is only a minimum demand. To get the demand you would need to derive info about the length of the waiting list.

[1] The unit mix would be what valve picked as the initial mix and not necessarily the market average. Also, the sales numbers would include the steam controller if you selected that option but I don't know if there is good data on whether any of the initial reservations had the steam controller.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#32

Post by cgearhart »

YawningAngel wrote: post #27
tenuousemphasis wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an Nvidia branch of Bazzite, and it works great. I'm even surprisingly able to play Star Citizen, which is notoriously finicky.

Can you explain what the point of Bazzite is? I don't really understand what it adds over installing Lutris onto whatever distro you would otherwise have used

I like my steam deck and got tired of waiting for the steam machine. I asked one of the AIs for something similar and it told me to install Bazzite. Took me an hour and I got the Steam-like UI that I wanted. I did not explore other options because my problem was solved.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#33

Post by brookst »

pweaver wrote: post #31

The analysis seems mostly[1] solid but the conclusions are all wrong. The steam machine was sold out and wait-listed. Value doesn't charge until you are removed from the wait-list so these numbers reflect the number of manufactured units per week (e.g. manufacturing capacity and/or distribution strategy) of the steam machine and not demand. This is only a minimum demand. To get the demand you would need to derive inf…

I read the analysis and I don’t see anywhere that it claims to measure demand.

It seems pretty clear it’s about how many units Valve is selling (charging for, shipping) and explicitly not about reservations or demand.

Valve is being smart here. It is far better to be supply constrained at launch than to have enough capacity to meet initial demand (and then far too much capacity when demand slows over time).

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#34

Post by dannersy »

fendy3002 wrote: post #8
mmusc wrote: post #3

One interesting point I've seen online is that the steam machine is more of a budget Mac than a pc. As valve controls the whole stack including the OS which creates a very streamlined experience that just works. Maybe its what will make Linux more mainstream!

Yes, sometimes it's difficult to find the correct driver for Linux and set it up. Having steam machine be start and play like steam deck really brings the console feel on PC. Moreover it's still Linux which you can use for other things, so people doesn't feel loss for this.

Nvidia has been historically tricky, but in the last two years or so (maybe longer), I have not needed to do any manual work for drivers. Sometimes, you may see some diminished performance on hardware that is brand new until drivers catch up, but that is usually just about waiting for an update on driver you already have.

I've been of the belief that 2026 has been year of the Linux desktop. As a user of MacOS for work and Linux at home, and being a former user of Windows for decades for video games, Linux has come so far that I think it has surpassed the mainstream OSes in terms of experience. The barrier to entry isn't really troubleshooting anymore, it is that we don't have any dominant desktop environment. Which is "bad" for adoption, but has been great for iteration by teams who are not bogged down by the need to support legacy users who don't want things to change.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#35

Post by pweaver »

brookst wrote: post #33
pweaver wrote: post #31

The analysis seems mostly[1] solid but the conclusions are all wrong. The steam machine was sold out and wait-listed. Value doesn't charge until you are removed from the wait-list so these numbers reflect the number of manufactured units per week (e.g. manufacturing capacity and/or distribution strategy) of the steam machine and not demand. This is only a minimum demand. To get the demand you would need to derive inf…

I read the analysis and I don’t see anywhere that it claims to measure demand. It seems pretty clear it’s about how many units Valve is selling (charging for, shipping) and explicitly not about reservations or demand. Valve is being smart here. It is far better to be supply constrained at launch than to have enough capacity to meet initial demand (and then far too much capacity when demand slows over time).

Ya, the article doesn't specifically use the word demand but in the final section Is It Good? says "The estimated 12k to 15k weekly sales volume reflects the fact that this is not a mainstream home run." this implies that the 12k-15k is a demand number but we can't reach that conclusion with this data.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#36

Post by brookst »

AlanAzarkin wrote: post #26
laughing_man wrote: post #13

This is why I would never make it in business. I just don't see the consumer case for buying a Steam Machine. They're too expensive for the console niche they're intended to occupy.

Agreed. Those guys put together as many as four configurations that are cheaper than the Steam Machine https://www.digitalfoundry.net/features/build-your-own-steam...

This is the old “why buy a prebuilt PC when you can DIY for less”. Which is true, but completely misses the point that may people will happily pay to 1) not have to build it, and 2) have e2e warranty, and 3) have someone else do the software setup.

We can debate if it’s the most efficient use of money for a technical person, but it’s indisputable that many people get enough value to pay for the prebuilt.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#37

Post by sejje »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #30
Agingcoder wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux has gone mainstream a long time ago - from dvd players to android phones. It just hasn’t succceeded on old preexisting markets ( personal computers ) but has taken large parts of most of the newly created ones ( servers , mobile devices , embedded devices etc )

I feel like this is a little nitpicky. Clearly they are talking about mainstream for the average home computer user as a daily driver OS. Even with the steam deck it’s barely touching 5%. It’s still obscure and mysterious to the vast majority of the population in a way windows and macOS aren’t.

I've been a techie my whole life, and for me, the mysterious OS is macOS. I haven't used it since high school (late 90s), which is when I picked up linux at home.

I was never able to afford mac products as a young person, and now that I can, I wouldn't part with linux.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#38

Post by gessha »

mmusc wrote: post #3

One interesting point I've seen online is that the steam machine is more of a budget Mac than a pc. As valve controls the whole stack including the OS which creates a very streamlined experience that just works. Maybe its what will make Linux more mainstream!

It was always the disconnect between the people who made it work and the people who couldn’t that prevented wider adoption.

Re: Steam Machine: Between 12k and 15k Units Sold per week

#40

Post by omnimus »

YawningAngel wrote: post #27
tenuousemphasis wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an Nvidia branch of Bazzite, and it works great. I'm even surprisingly able to play Star Citizen, which is notoriously finicky.

Can you explain what the point of Bazzite is? I don't really understand what it adds over installing Lutris onto whatever distro you would otherwise have used

You can indeed install everything manually (it won't be just lutris though, there are many possible tweaks).

SteamOS/Bazzite/uBlue project are Linux distros with immutable core. The immutable part is tweaked, tested, fixed in time and can be easily switched/rolled back. Many people (me included) find it much nicer experience to get some battery included base that someone more competent put together and that can't be easily broken. So instead of figuring out how to put linux parts together you find immutable distro that fits most of what you need and then install just what is missing.

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