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Steam Machine launches today

store.steampowered.com

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Re: Steam Machine launches today

#811

Post by cubefox »

Lucasoato wrote: post #684

> 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 ye…

> 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.

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#812

Post by B-Con »

willis936 wrote: post #267
sudobash1 wrote: post #103

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.

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.

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.

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#813

Post by sevenseacat »

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…)

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#814

Post by marhee »

fdye wrote: post #616
tmoertel wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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,…

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 s…

They do:

> Limit one signup per household. We will use payment method, shipping address, and other information to eliminate multiple entries.

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#815

Post by B-Con »

radium3d wrote: post #46

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.

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.

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#816

Post by blahblaher »

xinayder wrote: post #71
radium3d wrote: post #46

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.

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

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

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#817

Post by mbmbn »

ErneX wrote: post #315

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

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

Re: Steam Machine launches today

#819

Post by soerxpso »

tmoertel wrote: post #146
sailingparrot wrote: post #38

> 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, w…

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,…

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.
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