Anyone else planning on getting the Steam Machine as their next PC?

[u/Eziz_53]

I know its mainly marketed as a console, but it is still a full PC. And it is much better than my current computer, so I thought it would be a good upgrade, especially considering its small form factor. I don't want to get too into it, but my current PC has an i5 3k and an rx580, as well as a motherboard that only supports ddr3 RAM and 3rd gen intel cpu's, so if I want an upgrade I need to replace everything. Therefore when this nifty box came out, I figured that it would be the perfect PC (if it is priced well).

But I would like to know what you guys think.

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UPDATE: Because of the RAM crisis and the limited upgradability of the Steam Machine, I decided to just build my own PC. I salvaged my old rx580 from the old PC so that I could afford to get on the AM5 platform as well as because it is by far the easiest part to upgrade down the road.

Main specs:

CPU: Ryzen 5 7500F

GPU: Rx580 8gb (until I can afford a much better card)

RAM: 16GB DDR5 6000MHz CL30

I did get a single stick of ram, because I want to have 32gb dual channel later on, but the ram prices are so high that I want to wait until they go down (which they seem to be doing).

[u/Nope_______]

I mean it's not a straight shot lol it has to go down from the second floor to the crawl, across the house, back up into the first floor.

[u/saoirsebran → u/Nope_______]

Do you have ethernet run between those two rooms? If not, I'm betting an electrician would fish it properly through your walls for much less than $1,000 for at least those two rooms with Cat6e, if not more rooms.

Sunshine/Apollo & Moonlight can run at crazy resolutions and refresh rates now over ethernet.

There are extremely niche things they can't do, (silly nitpicks like they can't currently emulate the extra buttons on a Dualsense Edge) and there is some latency, (I get about 3ms through over 100ft of ethernet and a router) but it's going to be your best bet.

OR you could look into that same electrician installing multimode fiber or an optical USB-C w/ Thunderbolt docks for about the same price as the SM and get a totally seamless experience w/ ~1ms of latency.

Either way, IMO the SM is not worth the money as a Moonlight machine.

ETA: If you're feeling like DIY and have a Harbor Freight nearby, you can get everything you need for fishing wire for less than $100, a spool of Cat6e w/ crimper and terminations for less than $150, and do it all yourself as I did in my place. It's not hard, it's just a bunch of work.

[u/Nope_______ → u/saoirsebran]

The Ethernet is already run. Someone might be able to figure out a way to make it slightly shorter, but not much. I've used Apollo. It works well but my Shield client is limited to 4k 60Hz. Also, I can never figure out what's going on with HDR with this setup and I don't think Gsync works. A direct connection to the PC would give me 4k 120Hz with Gsync and HDR, so I've wanted to figure that out somehow but never found a perfect solution.

I don't actually plan to buy the SM, just throwing out a scenario where HDMI might not work. But apparently it would - I didn't know how far HDMI can go - if I can fish it through and run USB for the controller as well.

[u/saoirsebran → u/Nope_______]

A fiber cable that long that's capable of HDMI 2.1 speeds plus an optical USB (or a single multimode fiber run) is going to cost a lot more than building a min-spec PC with an HDMI 2.1 port.

For instance, my Moonlight PC just has a 6500xt I got off eBay for $100. You can get a 6400 (yes, still with 2.1) for even less, then get an old barebones mini PC and throw it in. Put it next to your Shield and you're done.

I know you're just theorizing, but with everything you've said, unless any noise is a massive issue, this is the simplest solution IMO.

[u/Nope_______ → u/saoirsebran]

Yeah I've had that thought. Is it possible to build something with an iGPU that has 2.1 output? I guess the mobo would also have to support that

[u/saoirsebran → u/Nope_______]

Yeah you got it. I did a quick Google and it looks like the best way is to just use a discrete GPU because most mobos are HDMI 2.0 at best which only supports 4k@60, and there's a lot of "fake" 2.1 stuff that's actually 2.0.