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Steam Frame

store.steampowered.com

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Re: Steam Frame

#681

Post by komali2 »

tosmatos wrote: post #493
komali2 wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am incredibly excited for the new controller. The og steam controller for me was unmatched as a controller, I could never play any first person game on anything else other than mouse and keyboard, not to mention it allows playing rts or point and clicks from the couch. When they cancelled production I bought 8.

The controller looks pretty cool for sure, my biggest fear is the dpad though. I hope they go for a clicky feel like on the latest xbox controllers, and not the mushy feel you've got on the Dualshock 5 or even the 8BitDo Pro 2, which, for me, really is the only think missing from those. I'm more of a "Dpad in the top left" kind of guy, but I want it to be clicky like on the Xbox controllers :( We'll see!

I'm with you on the dpad. For me I've never found better dpads outside of retro focused controllers from companies like 8bitdo, so when I want to play a retro game with dpad I just grab one of those and use my steam controller for everything else.

Re: Steam Frame

#682

Post by Codazoa »

andoando wrote: post #234
phantasmish wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh hell yes. There was a leak of specs (via a benchmarking database) of an upcoming machine from Valve and I had my fingers crossed that it was a mini PC and not some VR thingy, saw this thread, and was sad for a moment before I spotted this post. 6x as powerful as the Steam deck (that I use plugged in anyway 98% of the time—I’d have bought a Steam Deck 2, but I’m glad I get the option to put money toward more perfor…

What is the draw of the Steam machine though? They say the price is comparable to similarly specced PC. So why not just buy/build any mini PC? There's plenty of options for that

For me it would be the small size and CEC capability. A custom built PC can't currently use CEC on HDMI to have a seamless experience the entire home theater like a console can.

Re: Steam Frame

#683

Post by surajrmal »

scheeseman486 wrote: post #673
surajrmal wrote: post #635

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If valve can convince Qualcomm to open source their GPU drivers I will eat a banana peel. They would need to write a new one from scratch (or reuse freedreno, but those are going to have performance issues).

Not the first time Valve funded the development of FOSS drivers. They've already done so with Intel's Vulkan stack on Linux, AMD (AMDGPU) and Nvidia (NVK). SteamOS's core functionality leans heavily on Mesa and there's been a lot of commits for the Adreno 750 lately, mostly coming from Linaro.

Fair enough. The problem is usually in terms of getting enough documentation and help to do this in a cost effective manner. If they manage to pull it off, I will start to second guess every phone OEM who seems to not go down this road.

Re: Steam Frame

#684

Post by scheeseman486 »

surajrmal wrote: post #622
sensanaty wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's anything like the Deck, then the version of SteamOS on it won't be locked down in any way whatsoever. You can install Windows or any other distro you want on the Deck with 0 issues (other than regular ones you'd experience anyways on any regular computer, nothing to do with Valve locking anything down).

The steam deck was not arm. Unlike the steam machine page, the steam frame page does not insinuate you can put a custom OS on it. On top of custom drivers which are not necessarily upstreamed, qualcomm socs always require closed source userspace daemons which are coupled to the kernel.

Valve have been working with Linaro to develop FOSS drivers for the Adreno 750. This is necessary, given how heavily Valve leans on having integrations with Mesa whereas Qualcomm's drivers are designed for an Android environment.

I don't see why they wouldn't unlock the bootloader, it wouldn't be the first Qualcomm-based product to allow it and in press interviews they have pressed, quite hard, that the Frame is still a PC.

Re: Steam Frame

#685

Post by FloatArtifact »

I wonder what the overhead is to stream from the headset or host PC to another monitor. VR is great but comes with a barrier of overcoming social isolation. Having the VR session on a screen would be a way to keep it social. Especially multiple VR slit screen. We want to engage the rest of people in the room beyond the players.

Watching various interviews, clearly it can be on another monitor.

Re: Steam Frame

#686

Post by gempir »

abtinf wrote: post #392

It is unfortunate that it doesn't have a strap that goes over the top of your head. It is extremely irritating that almost every headset does this, then charges extra for an actually usable strap that takes the pressure off of your face.

In the LTT Video they showed an optional top strap from Valve. So it's a thing!

Re: Steam Frame

#687

Post by [deleted] »

wolfd wrote: post #371
esskay wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've cut some fairly shallow corners, like mono vs color cameras so I imagine getting it within a decent price range has been of high importance. I really doubt it'll be any thing close to $1k.

I think it’s possible that there’s a technical reason for monochrome cameras. For example, to let in the maximum amount of IR light for tracking. Bayer filters reduce the amount of light getting in, so it might help the IR LEDs be visible on surrounding walls in the dark. Still hoping that you’re right, though.

[deleted]

Re: Steam Frame

#688

Post by Bombthecat »

gilfoy wrote: post #626
Bombthecat wrote: post #560

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, people spend 700 on consoles, the biggest barriers is comfort. As long as the headsets are heavy, I won't get one, no matter how great the graphics are or how good the game is

Bigscreen Beyond 2 is 107g

1400 Euro, yeah... No...I would like to have something light, with just enough power to stream from my pc via WiFi.

That's it. No idea why something like this doesn't exist. ( Or it exists and I don't know it?)

Re: Steam Frame

#689

Post by somenameforme »

Bombthecat wrote: post #688
gilfoy wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bigscreen Beyond 2 is 107g

1400 Euro, yeah... No...I would like to have something light, with just enough power to stream from my pc via WiFi. That's it. No idea why something like this doesn't exist. ( Or it exists and I don't know it?)

I expect part of it is that the contemporary recommendations for VR are extremely meaty - something like 2160x2160 and 120hz with stereoscopic rendering meaning you're rendering every frame twice.

That's more than 1.1 billion pixels per second. At 24 bits a pixel that's something like 26Gb/s of raw data. And that's just in bandwidth - you also need to hit that 120hz of latency, in an environment where hiccups or input lag can cause physical discomfort for a user. And then even if you remote everything you need the headset to have enough juice to decompress and render all of this and hit these desired throughputs.

I'm napkin mathing all of this, and so I'm sure there have been lots of breakthroughs to help along these lines, but it's definitely not a straightforward problem to solve. Of course it's arguable I'm also just falling victim to the contemporary trappings of fidelity > experience, that I was just criticizing.

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