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I don’t need a Steam Machine

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Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#111
post #86
post #3

I'm looking for it as a general development machine, sometimes I do stuff that requires GPUs so if they can get a competitive price wrt. building a custom PC then I'm all in for the convenient form factor!

The steam machine as they’re marketing it doesn’t have enough RAM to be a proper development box once you start running IDEs, language servers and debuggers. They’d need to release a 64 or 128 gig sku, unless RAM is easily upgradable.

RAM is upgradable according to Linus LTT, standard modules fit. But you can't upgrade graphics/cpu AFAIR.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#112
post #108

I am kind having a similar dilemma as the author of the blog post. Gabe Cube is the least interesting announcement that Valve did for me if I look at an objective level since I just built a PC that runs Jovian-NixOS (basically SteamOS, but running with NixOS as a base). My PC is way more powerful than the Gabe Cube too (at least in GPU, a Radeon 9070), and it is already connect to my TV since SteamOS makes this easy…

I greatly enjoy the single-purpose aspect of consoles: no upgrades, no other software to manage, etc.

So a single-purpose PC-based console basically made for Steam? That sounds great to me. I don't even have a 4K TV so the performance might be just what I need.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#113
post #54
post #12

Steam Machines can become an existencial crisis for PlayStation and Xbox. A “console” that I can use as a PC? I am in 100%. You’ll get the world biggest game library at a discount, this is why I sold my PlayStation after spending 200 euros and watching it becoming useless. I also suspect a lot of game devs will optimize for steam machine and finally we’ll get a console like experience on PC. Don’t let the “low specs”…

> Steam Machines can become an existencial crisis for PlayStation and Xbox. Not really. An existential crisis to System76, Framework computer and all the other Linux computer companies. > A “console” that I can use as a PC? I am in 100%. You’ll get the world biggest game library at a discount, this is why I sold my PlayStation after spending 200 euros and watching it becoming useless. No different to getting a regula…

A 5090 is likely 3x the cost of the steam machine. You are at the extreme high end of the gaming market here and not the target of the steam machine.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#114
post #12

Steam Machines can become an existencial crisis for PlayStation and Xbox. A “console” that I can use as a PC? I am in 100%. You’ll get the world biggest game library at a discount, this is why I sold my PlayStation after spending 200 euros and watching it becoming useless. I also suspect a lot of game devs will optimize for steam machine and finally we’ll get a console like experience on PC. Don’t let the “low specs”…

> Steam Machines can become an existencial crisis for PlayStation and Xbox.

Xbox, as a console, already is in an existential crisis.

I think people have weird expectations about what the Steam Machine will cost. From what Valve has said so far (cheaper than if you build it yourself from parts), it will still cost significantly more than a PS5, and probably also more than a PS5 Pro, while having less performance than both. You will not beat the PS5 in terms of performance per dollar. Yes, games are more expensive on PS5, but most people don't work that way but just want to know whether they'll be able to play GTA6 on day one.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#115
post #96
post #14

I don't understand the "You can’t buy this without buying the Steam Controller." bit. If you want one, great, if not, it's no more necessary than with any other PC. I've been gaming for ~40 years without ever touching a controller, why would I start now?

> without ever touching a controller, why would I start now? I feel similar, but for us there's also no point to get a Steam Machine. Playing games while sitting on a living room couch in front of a TV with mouse and keyboard is not comfortable at all. Using mouse and keyboard it is better to play games at a proper desk with an office chair and I already have such a PC.

I agree that I wouldn't get it in addition to a desktop PC (for one thing, I haven't owned a TV in 20+ years so couch gaming isn't a thing for me) but when the time comes to replace my current box I might well consider whatever Steam is offering at the time. Just because it's likely to be nicely designed, thoughtfully specced and decently supported.

Memory (both main and VRAM) might be a bit on the weak side for some non-gaming workloads though. I hope we'll see those bump up once the current supply squeeze is over.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#116
post #7

I think the Steam Machine has to succeed for SteamOS on Linux to keep growing, and for the niche of the Linux desktop to become larger. Steam has already failed at this once, and it won’t try a third time. (And Windows is currently at its lowest point, so it’s the perfect opportunity.)

I think it all depends on what their mission is, what bits of the larger ecosystem does valve care about or not care about, what do they want to defend or destroy. I'm tempted to say "defending the store is existential for them" but the scale of it likely gives them an extremely big comfort zone. Whatever OS the users have isn't going to affect whether they can do commerce through them unless MS does something unhinged like getting rid of win32, or as the fear around win8 that they'd centralize all windows software through their channels.

If their mission is SteamOS, then I'm tempted to say they need to expand their area of influence beyond what they're doing with linux now which seems to be strictly game related, which likely involves whittling down the major or minor reasons people don't use desktop linux (and all the projects that comprise it) in general, not just their distro. So long as they're supporting (in one way or another) the majority of windows games in a foreign environment and the richness that mods can bring they could do with improving the experience of that relative to windows and not just the happy path of what happens if the base game launches. And that's before the enigma of anti-cheat. Then find some way to reap the rewards, if any, for doing that greatly expanded workload or investment.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#117
post #40

When I first saw the Arduino I didn't see the point - after all there were boards that cost less, did more, and the Arduino IDE seemed very barebones compared to what you could do with GCC and a custom toolchain. Then eventually I saw how much community support, ready made hardware emerged around it, to the point that after a while, not going the Arduino route was a decision you needed to justify heavily. Same thing…

> a comparable desktop experience to the commercial OSes Isn't it alteady comparable? My Linux desktop has almost the same game compatibility that Windows has, and none of the advertising and jank. Gone are the legendary days of xorg.conf. Linux has less problems than Windows now. Support from professional software vendors (Dassault, Autodesk, et al) and Nvidia could be better, admittedly, but these restrictions aren…

> Support from professional software vendors [..] and Nvidia could be better, admittedly, but these restrictions aren't very relevant to me.

Quality of support from Nvidia on linux is the reason that I went with AMD for my linux work+gaming rig. That's why probably Valve chosen AMD too. As amount of linux gamers increases, maybe Nvidia will see the light too. For me, linux+AMD+Steam stack "just works".

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#118
post #12

Steam Machines can become an existencial crisis for PlayStation and Xbox. A “console” that I can use as a PC? I am in 100%. You’ll get the world biggest game library at a discount, this is why I sold my PlayStation after spending 200 euros and watching it becoming useless. I also suspect a lot of game devs will optimize for steam machine and finally we’ll get a console like experience on PC. Don’t let the “low specs”…

Man, I got a free ps5 from my isp and was excited to have friends over for games. Come to find out that playing games with your friends apparently isn’t a thing anymore (I guess there’s fighting and racing games). What a lame-ass boring system.

This is why I've been all in on Steam for so long! The catalog is so huge, there's a massive number of fantastic couch multiplayer games. It is indeed a bit more fiddly... I've found that it's generally easier to connect my Steam Deck to the TV and play lower fidelity games than it is to fiddle with a Windows machine that needs to be prepped for friends popping in every other month.

Although, Nintendo is still doing a good job at keeping the couch-social experience alive, and building 1st party games that can be good solo experiences but really shine when played next to a friend sitting on the same couch.

Re: I don’t need a Steam Machine

#120
>In two years, you’ll upgrade your M1 to an M4+: there’s the power upgrade.

>If CrossOver is struggling to run that particular game you so badly want to play, it’ll be buttery smooth in a few years. You’re going to do the laptop upgrade anyway regardless of the Steam Machine.

The only times I've heard the fan come on on my M4 were with games like Kerbal Space Program and Cities Skylines. Having tried both of them on a variety of MBPs over the years (both Intel and Apple Silicon) I'm not convinced they'll ever run well - in fact they both play worse on my M4. Newer games like CP2077 and No Man's Sky do put in a good showing but they've been optimized for Metal.

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