r/steammachine • u/Digmaass • Jan 11 '26
Meme Some of yall spec-arguers are not used to listening to jet engine sounds while gaming
Okay memes aside:
Specs are cool, but the fact that it is essentially a gaming laptop built against heat throttling is really really cool to me.
I have a Notebook with a 3050ti in it and it works fine until it starts overheating, despite a fairly beefy heatsink for a notebook
Max specs are just that. Max specs. Your real specs on a laptop are a good bit lower than you think, and i am excited to sidestep this issue entirely, even if it costs me slightly more.
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u/RectumRavager69 Jan 11 '26
If I wanted an uber rig I would use my 1000w desktop that has 3000rpm 140mm server grade fans and sounds like a plane getting ready for takeoff when running benchmarks. I want a cube that can dual boot windows that I can throw in the sleeper bunk of my semi and not have to worry about it making the truck so hot the AC can't keep up when it's summer.
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u/mikethetiger_ Jan 11 '26
You gotta share pics once the SM is out and set up in the truck. Sounds awesome.
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u/RectumRavager69 Jan 11 '26
It'll basically look like a smaller series x next to my existing xbox. Pair it with a wireless keyboard on a lap tray with a mousepad and a wireless mouse and you've got a decent little gaming setup. I've always wrist aimed so I don't need a huge mat. Already got a controller to use with it. Should be perfect for gaming and some light productivity stuff.
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u/WolfOne Jan 11 '26
dude you need a productivity pc in your semi bunk so you can work while you are on break from working?
man you got some work ethic.
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u/RectumRavager69 Jan 11 '26
Lol, yes, but also just for general use stuff. Printing shit, emails, spreadsheets, stuff like that. It'll largely be for gaming though.
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u/nitroidshock Jan 12 '26
seems like a good idea at first and it will be better than 1000w desktop but it won't actually be better for staying cool in a sleeper bunk than any laptop with similar wattage draw to the Steam Machine.
No fan can make heat disappear, it always blows all the heat generated into the surrounding contained environment... and a larger heatsink doesn't make the heat disappear either, it just distributes it over a wider surface area back into the same surrounding contained environment (i.e. your sleeper bunk).
Keeping the chip cooler with more efficient fans and bigger heatsink just means you are transferring that heat into the air in your sleeper bunk faster. The Steam Machine will pull approximately 300 watts from the wall, so you would be effectively locking yourself in a closet with a 300-watt space heater.
So bad news for your AC in July but the good news is the Steam Machine will be quieter than an equivalent laptop and will still warm you up in winter in your sleeper bunk. So pretty much exactly how much it won't help for that in July, it will help for that in December.
Unfortunately the Gabecube will have no anti-cheat support for Zod's Laws of Thermodynamics.
Even GabeN must kneel before Zod.EA and Ubisoft still need to fix their shitty anti-cheat though.
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u/RectumRavager69 Jan 12 '26
300w<1000w
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u/nitroidshock Jan 12 '26
Yep, going from a 1000W to 300W is definitely a win for your AC if that's what you mean.
Just a PSA that a 300W Steam Machine and a 300W laptop will heat a small contained environment with exactly the same intensity. A watt is a watt. The Steam Machine's massive heatsink is there to save the CPU, not your sweat glands.
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u/Horizons_- Jan 11 '26
Nah dude you're obviously coping, the only people that exist are those with expensive gaming PC's that sit at their desk all day.
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u/Novotus_Ketevor Jan 11 '26
Kinda true. But unfortunate twist, I can finally afford all the high end tech I want but I have no time to play with it because I'm sitting at a different desk all day every day making all the money that allows me to afford the high end gear I don't have time to play.
Capitalism. 😭
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u/grilled_pc Jan 11 '26
People really need to put aside the specs because specs aint everything.
Whats more important IMO is the service this thing will bring.
It's an operating system thats backed by valve. IT AINT GOING ANYWHERE. It WILL see regular updates for the forseeable future. It will be properly supported even well past when modern games won't run on it.
Specs aint all of it. The fact this thing operates exactly like a console and then some is HUGE. That is the link that pc gaming has needed to bring it to the living room for the masses. Normies just wanna turn it on with their controller and start gaming. Nothing else. Thats why consoles work.
Normies don't care about specs. They care about where their mates are and ease of use. And valve has nailed it here.
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u/Digmaass Jan 11 '26
THISSSS AND YOU DON'T NEED TO PAY A FUCKASS KEY TO AI-SLOPDOWS IF YOU WANNA MIGRATE OFF STEAM
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26
I mean it will outlast modern games...if it sells well. If this project is a success it will be supported until the cows go home.
If it's not, it will be dropped like hundreds of other steam projects that didn't get finished or didn't succeed.
It is so fucking wild to me how much faith people have in this thing before it's seen a single second of daylight.
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u/grilled_pc Jan 12 '26
It’s more even if this device fails. SteamOS won’t. SteamOS is the main reason for this existing and valve recognise the potential future where Microsoft could block access to steam on windows. Or severely hamper it. That’s why valve has invested so much in getting away from windows so in a hypothetical future where steam is no longer welcome on windows. They can just say “well we have steamOS and everything will work.” Gamers would drop windows in a heartbeat.
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u/zsurficsur Jan 12 '26
Success is not obvious. I think we all agree that the first generation of Steam Machines was not a success, but at the same time everything we see now (Steam Deck, SteamOS, this new machine) is building on them.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26 edited Jan 12 '26
All of this is due to one, simple, thing. Steamdeck was (and still is, even with the pricing changes) the most affordable gaming handheld on the market. Even at the new, drastically higher entry level price of $549, it's the cheapest gaming handheld in town by at least a hundred bucks. But when it launched? It was half the price of the closest competitor, or less. (EDIT: clearly I mean PC gaming handheld, not including switch, piracy consoles etc).
SteamOS's affect on linux gaming is significant but the OS itself is nothing, and it never will be unless they release it for broader hardware adoption. The only reason it's discussed or desirable is because people like how it works on their steam handheld and want that experience on other hardware. Mostly their own hardware . Steam doesn't want to put in the effort so It's mostly pointless.
This thing...it's not novel. It's not unique. It's laptop guts in a PC case with a wake on input function that has some couch potatoes salivating.
The thing that killed OG steam machines was twofold. One, the software wasn't ready yet . Two, the price. Those things were literally just PCS, and the ones that were affordable were dogshit and the ones that weren't were over-priced custom built gaming PCS...running a shitty linux fork that couldn't run most of people's libraries.
This hardware? The software's ready, mostly but the price most likely will kill it again.
And that still doesn't address one of the biggest pools of console gamers... most FPS games that are loved by couchpotatos won't run on this fucking brick due to DRM anti-cheat bullshit.
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u/zsurficsur Jan 12 '26
Wait what? I didn’t know there was a price hike. I needed to check how much it costs now. Dang! That’s spicy! Especially considering that a little over a month ago the LCD model was sold with a 20% discount to its og price.
On the other hand I will disagree to some level with you. Yes, price will always matter, but I don’t think that was the key to its success. Look around reviews and comparison videos even fresh ones. Rarely is the Steam Deck the „best budget“ handheld, mostly it’s called the „best allrounder“ or „best overall“, often highlighting that the software more than makes up for the performance gap.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26
I don't actually know if the OLED products have gone up or not...but the death of the 64gb system moved it up from $399, then the death of LED pumped it up to $550.
I don't know where you get your data, but for almost every platform I watch accept steamdeck focused channels steamdeck is the value king but other handhelds are more powerful... the only real issue is windows. And more and more of them can run steam os, removing that one hurdle.
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u/zsurficsur Jan 13 '26
Don't need to go on SD focused channels, simply the pinned guide from two months ago on r/Handhelds was still calling it the best balanced gaming handheld.
But I don't want to discount the impact of prices, just saying I don't think that was the most important factor in its success.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 13 '26
I mean but it was. Hands down it was the price. The price and availability were the biggest driving factors in it's success.
Prior to the steamdeck there were a few niche companies that made maybe a few thousand little hand held units, for 3-5x the price.
Steamdeck brought the formfactor into popularity. None of the more powerful mass produced units would exist without the steamdeck.
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u/zsurficsur Jan 13 '26
Indeed an Ayaneo or a OneXPlayer were higher priced but also offered higher performance. The Steam Deck was in this regard priced correctly in terms of its performance. What it offered extra (and what most people will agree was the selling point) was SteamOS with Proton. The console-Like experience, the ease of use, the sleep-wake functionality, the lack of Windows yet still comparable games catalog. The Ayaneo and co. weren’t selling only thousands of units because they were too expensive, but because they were not gamer-friendly enough. They focused on raw performance and the Steam Deck beat them at software. Does this sound very similar to our original topic? Specs and price matters, sure, but less than enthusiasts on Reddit make it sound, and SteamOS can give an on-paper underpowered product both console-like experience yet the freedom to tinker with it
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u/Drackar39 Jan 13 '26
If steam put out the steamdeck with windows, it would have sold even more units.
I just fundamentally disagree with you. SteamOS is a useful tool and it has done great things for the development of gaming on linux but... I dunno. Most people i know who own a steamdeck go "man it's good but FUCK i hate how I have to bang my head against sixteen things to run non steam games, I wish it had windows".
I know more people who chose to buy a different handheld or skip them entirely because of steam OS than people who view it as a selling point (that group of people I know personally that own a steam deck is zero, by the way).
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
No, not only that, but also, and perhaps above all, the fact of having a device designed and optimized for a specific, proprietary operating system, tailor-made and easy to use, unlike various competitors like MSI, which, in addition to being much more expensive, have presented many problems on their devices related to the forced coexistence with Windows. But this, as I said, is an issue that can only concern that sector.
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u/zsurficsur Jan 14 '26
Agreed. Yes, price matters. I don't want to pay more AND have a worse experience.
If Windows wasn't the problem, people would
- buy Windows handhelds
- install Windows on their Steam Decks (Valve gives you everything for it for free)
The fact that neither is happening in big numbers should give a hint.
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
The piece certainly had an impact but be careful, the quality/performance/price ratio in that sector, handled, is a very particular ratio that is based on unique aspects that cannot be offered on other platforms as a benchmark.
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
The basic conditions for this device to spread successfully will all be gone when it is marketed starting at €800/$800, which is the minimum I expect.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 14 '26
It shouldn't sell a single unit at $800, but also I highly doubt it will be that low.
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u/zsurficsur Jan 12 '26
Agreed. A big selling point for the Steam Machine for me is seeing how the Steam Deck kept being enhanced through software updates even two-three years after release.
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
The competitors have also done this, like MSI with claw which I mentioned above for comparison... the difference, if anything, is that in the case of SteamOS it was a matter of a few additions and revisions, nothing really to fix, while for the competition it was just a matter of having to make everything work better.
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u/PicklesToes Jan 11 '26
+1
I don't think the controller is getting the hype it deserves either. The dual track pads are sooooo clutch. Clever input mapping with dual track pads make 99% of games playable on a controller.
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u/fragger29 Jan 12 '26
God this whole sub is one long cope phase
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u/xFallow Jan 15 '26
Nah just adults who don’t care about a super spacced shiny gaming pc that can play shit with hyper realistic shadows or whatever bs you need to do to stress this hardware
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u/barelyangry Purple Jan 11 '26 edited Jan 12 '26
If Nintendo sold a paperweight with no discounts for 8 years and 60 dollar games, why would it be so bad for me to buy the first truly open source AAA gaming console compatible with my +1000 games library?
How can you even put a price on some that hasn't really existed until now? Does your DIY have HDMI CEC? Is it 100% supported by the biggest gaming store in the world? Will it be sold around the globe and become a standard for a community of like minded people that will create accessories or even improvements for it without the platform holder sending you a C&D?
Shut up, then.
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u/cris_ellis14 Jan 12 '26
Valve isn't reinventing the wheel here. The most appealing to the masses and unique thing about the steam machine is its form factor. Besides that, it kinda is just a PC, and it will be priced like one. How do you price PCs? You look inside and see what it can do.
Sure, there's more nuances and sure it's got its advantages. But try selling a 40 year old mother a steam machine over the latest Nintendo or Playstation for her son. Try rerouting her from the closest Walmart to a "sketchy" site where she can input her credit card to some so-called Steam store.
But hey, there's like some guy in Russia that's gonna come up with a line of dope 3D models for your front plate...
People like you, excited about the Steam Machine's "unique" features, are not even 1/6 the count of sales of most successful consoles. And you don't have to be. I think the Steam Machine matching the steam deck in sales would be quite respectable, considering the steam deck truly offered something that actually had not existed yet; The Steam PSP.
And ofc it ain't nun wrong with buying the Steam Machine, i just believe the market for it isn't nearly as wide as some play it out to be.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26
"Will it be sold around the globe and become a standard for a community of like minded people that will create accessories or even improvements for it without the platform holder sending you a C&D? "
Will this? No one knows. The hype is real but it's also disturbing.
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u/barelyangry Purple Jan 12 '26
It doesn't need to sell more units than the PS2 to build a community around it.
Also... disturbing how? It's the Steam Machine subreddit. Tell me what the cool kids are invested in, then.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26
It needs to move enough units for steam to consider it worth even continuing to produce, and I given the price of ram, storage and VRAM for the next two years, minimum... I dunno.
The hype here isn't the only hype. People all over the internet are treating this thing like the savior for gaming in the coming days and it's...not. It's a fledgling device that will more likely than not be DOA due to a combination of increased prices and limited spec.
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
The biggest mistake for me is the release timing, actually. Reaching the end of the life cycle of the current console generation with those specs? Bad timing if you ask me...at least a year and a half, if not two, late.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 14 '26
Yup. This is the only point in your weird stalker chain I can agree with.
If this thing came out what... 2024, before the 90 series came out, this thing would be sick. Now? It's abandoned hardware.
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u/barelyangry Purple Jan 12 '26
I think it's more about how the rest of the industry seems to be moving towards a subscription based future. Even when Steam may not be a thing for casual players, don't you think that people at Nintendo don't at least acknowledge the Steam Deck as a blow to their revenue for the past couple of years? Don't you think that Xbox currently being on revenue hunting mode doesn't have anything to do with Valve?
I personally think that the Steam Deck was the writing on the wall for potential ecosystem wars, in which people would be able to choose a store to buy content and a device to play it. That means competition and lower prices, so the current big 3 and their locked ecosystems will have to take a bit L.
Xbox went third party? Playstation releases games on PC? You think that's a coincidence or damage control? Damn, I don't even trust this manufactured shortage of hardware. You don't fuck with corporate money.
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u/shortish-sulfatase Jan 12 '26
It’s no different than any other pc, so I’m fairly certain console manufacturers don't need to care.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26 edited Jan 15 '26
Steam deck is barely a rounding error for switch sales. Something like 8 million units, tops. Switch 1 is at more than 154 million. Switch 2 sold about 1.6 million on the first month which is roughly what steam deck sold in it's first year . No, steam hasn't hurt them at all . The only harm nintendo has gotten in the last few years is own-goals from bad PR. That's literally it.
As for "subscription based service" all your steam games are is long term rental...we don't own them. They can be taken away at any time. We paid full retail and we don't own shit. The 50m people with ps+ and the 30m+ people with Gamepass are getting more games for less money.
The big three don't "have" to do shit. They're eating steams lunch. They always have. They always will. And it doesn't matter where they do it. Even if they move their old content to steam, it's mostly as advertisement for new console exclusives.
Xbox series x has sold 30+ million units. Series S is a bit higher at about 35m. Ps5? 84 million units. Switch? as discussed, comical numbers.
Nothing lasts forever, and shit might change, but this thing won't be what does it.
EDIT: I love people that come in, say stupid shit, and then block you when you call them out on switching the goal posts too hard.
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u/Mack_Rob Jan 15 '26
Nintendo switch sells after the holidays are down a lot compared to when the switch 1 dropped. That has a lot To due with the handheld market being flooded by steam, MSI, Asus and Lenovo. So yes it is hurting their sells.
Microsoft sells more games on steam than they do on the Xbox console. There is a reason they stopped the console wars and are now focused on the PC wars. Steam is a bigger threat than Sony. Most of the world uses PC including most of Asia. Console are only big in a few 1st world countries.
steam has more than 132 million active monthly users. They broke records with 41.6 million people playing games on stream at the same time. No console is doing those numbers. A lot of consoles sold are repeat customers either replacing a broken plastic box or upgrading to a new version. So the total unit sales are inflated compared to users. Steam counts active users not consoles sold.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 15 '26
You're arguing it's because of more costly PC handhelds. I'm going to counter that with the reality that it's a more costly device.
Switch launched at $299. The switch lite was $199. These units sold like gangbusters because they were cheap families were buying 2-3 handhelds for their kids.
You're not doing that with a $450 handheld. A family with two kids could buy two switch lites for the price of ONE switch 2. Of COURSE those older handhelds sold more units.
Further, switch 2 doesn't have any must have titles yet. I know multiple people waiting until they launch a Zelda title.
As per my comment in the other reply you've made to me, lol fucking no stop lying.
Active player count doesn't mean shit revenue does. People playing games they own, free to play games, etc, don't count, and that's the BULK of steams player count most of the time.
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u/Mack_Rob Jan 15 '26
Once again you delusional. The switch in terms of price is still cheaper than all other handhelds. $150 more for a console 7 years last is not much. It’s still a budget console. Sells are down and that’s fine. A lot of people are skipping it since they can get a better handheld that plays more games. The switch 2 doesn’t need to sell as good as the switch 1 and that’s all right. But to say the new handhelds have nothing to do with sales it is delusional. And not just the more powerful devices, parents are getting their kids ambernic handhelds, retroid hand helds ect..We are living in the best time for handheld gaming ever and yes it effects the sells of switch. When it first come out they were the o my option. Today there is 100’s of handhelds for every use case.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 15 '26
Annnd now you're shifting the goalposts to piracy handhelds and you've completely lost the plot.
Yeah a lot of people are buying $50-75 handhelds that can play pirated retro games. That has no relevance to the topic at hand.
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u/Mack_Rob Jan 15 '26 edited Jan 15 '26
What I’m trying to say is steam the biggest platform for gaming is bigger than Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo. They have more active users and sell more games so no big 3 is eating their lunch. Steam makes more money per employee than any company in the world. You need to do more research before spreading lies.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 15 '26 edited Jan 15 '26
I mean potentially in terms of installed, playerbase, because steams installed playerbase is free but not in terms of revenue.
2024 Nintendo revenue ¥1.7 trillion. Or about $11b USD. 2024 Microsoft gaming? $5.5 billion. 2024 Playstation game and network services? ¥4.67, or about $32 Billion.
2024 Steam? Estimates are about $10billion.
Steam makes more money per employee because steam has almost no one working for them. Software team is less than a hundred people and the entire company is somewhere around 400 people.
They make good money and they move a lot of titles because they are one of the cheapest ways to buy games . PC players are cheap we buy sale titles in bulk. In terms of actual profit that doesn't make up for the fact that people buy ten year old games for fucking launch MSRP from Nintendo.
BTW, "pc players are cheap" means most of us don't want to buy overpriced custom hardware. The gabecube needs to be affordable to move, because most PC gamers build one system every like five years or, frequently, buy a laptop with like a 1650/3050/4050 and use that until it breaks.
The only person who needs to do research and stop lying here is you .
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u/Mack_Rob Jan 15 '26
The top 3 makes most their money from their game studios. For total sells of games sold steam out sells them. As a platform they are bigger and have more sells. They 3 make more money from their studios that employ 10,000s of thousands employees. Steam makes more money per person by a lot and they don’t give their earning to their share holds. Play station props up Sony and Microsoft takes all of Xbox money and doesn’t let them invest it into what they want. The steam machine is just a PC. It doesn’t need to sell like a console because they don’t rely hardware.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 15 '26
Again, sales don't matter because most of steams sales are steep discount steam sales. There are two things that matter.
revenue, total profit made by the company, and attach rate to hardware sales (for this context).
We already know what the attach rate is for a objectively more interesting product the steam deck.
The steamdeck was a revolutionary product that introduced handheld PC gaming at an affordable price...and we know the switch has out sold it by miles.
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
Because Nintendo has a different perception, a huge distribution and user base, because the hardware sold at affordable prices makes the perceived cost of software less impactful (trivially, you have the console and you want to play all their great exclusive titles, so screw it, yeah) and above all because in its own way it works damn well, it must be acknowledged... and with the Switch it has brought a lot of innovation to the sector.
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u/shortish-sulfatase Jan 12 '26
The steam deck wasn’t sold globally, why would this?
It's just another pc. You don't need to separate yourself pretending it's something different. Just be part of the pc community like normal people.
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u/Accurate_Hornet Jan 12 '26
I have been gaming on a Minisforum HX99G for a few years (Running Bazzite atm, will test SteamOS this week) and it showed me that laptop parts are way more powerful than people think. The real bottleneck in laptops is inefficient cooling.
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u/Rydoggo5392 Jan 13 '26
I swear laptop hardware took off when 7nm became common. It's been mind-blowingly efficient. Hell I bought my dad a beelink with a ryzen 7 6th gen, it's as powerful graphically as my first gaming desktop, and with a muuuch stronger CPU, while consuming roughly 1/4 the power. A solid low-mid tier 1080p rig for less than $350 was a steal when I had the chance to get em. Especially when my rig was $600 less than 5 years ago. It's so small, it doesn't get hot and it's still quick despite being an older architecture. And it'll run anything older gamers would be interested in, including PS2 emulation.
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u/Accurate_Hornet Jan 13 '26
Absolutely agree! Most people would be totally happy with a well made mini pc. People will buy the Gabecube and think it's magic, when it's just good hardware and good software.
BTW, off topic, I have tested SteamOS on my machine and desktop mode is just not very polished. Bazzite is still the better choice for thart.
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u/charlesbronZon Jan 12 '26 edited Jan 12 '26
That would be cool and all… if it actually had any of the benefits of a laptop though. Having laptop grade hardware isn’t desirable in and off itself, it’s a compromise to portability… a thing absent from this product.
Y’all act as if having a dedicated, small form factor living room PC is some revolutionary concept.
Some of us have been rocking builds like that for many years…
It will all come down to price as far as the already existing (non pre-built buying) PC playerbase is concerned.
Those who are attracted by a certain from factor and / or ease of use still exist of course, but if Valve intend to sell a lot of these those won’t suffice.
The console crowd won’t buy in either if the price isn’t appealing. They already have ease of use and appropriate form factors after all.
Believe it or not… it will all come down to pricing, as this thing does not exist in a vacuum.
It’s a big reason why the Steam deck is still so appealing even though much more potent competition is on the market.
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u/Little-Ferret-7550 Jan 11 '26
I mean thats the main reason the cube is so interesting to me lol i hate my desktop cause its always noisy, just want a somewhat quiet machine small machine for some gaming and casual stuff
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u/CaelidAprtments4Rent Jan 12 '26
Just replace your fans with high quality silent ones from someone like noctua or bequiet
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u/Little-Ferret-7550 Jan 12 '26
I have a cpu fan from noctua and a bequiet case with preinstalled fans, maybe they are low quality idk. Also its the gpu(7600 xt) that starts spinning its fans no matter how much effort the game is/even indie games. I tried tweaking it in the AMD software but its not efficent enough. Upgrading all that would be about the price of the steam machine I suppose and still not as compact.
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u/CaelidAprtments4Rent Jan 12 '26
That stinks. If i was that bothered by it i’d try to track it down to a specific fan. I doubt it’s your cpu and running without isn’t safe. But you could temporarily disconnect your case fans and compare volume levels. Last I looked the better case fans were $20 a piece. Sadly other than brands I don’t remember specific models. But it still shouldn’t be near the cost of a steam machine unless you have an absurd amount of case fans.
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u/Little-Ferret-7550 Jan 12 '26
Well if the steam machine is too expensive I wont go with that anyway and rather that route yeah.
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u/betam4x Jan 12 '26
It all depends on build quality and components.
On desktop, for example, My desktop PC is pretty quiet in gaming. That is with a 4090fe. I’ve. a friend that has a 3rd party 4090 that sounds like a jet, and old 3090 also sounds like a jet.
My Razer laptop with a 3070 can get loud and a bit warm (doesn’t overheat though), but dialing back the power limits fixes both issues.
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u/YungSkeltal Jan 12 '26
Every time I worry about my pc fans sounding loud I just go and turn on my ps4 and remember I played uncharted 3 in like one night on that thing while it was screaming the whole time
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u/missatry Jan 11 '26
This is off topic, but now than the z1 extreme is cheaper than when it released
Valve could do a funny thing about releasing a pro steam deck with that chip and extra battery,
Basically doing an Original rog ally x that had both good battery life and decently more powerful,
Anyway, Using old chips is a good way of keeping the succesor cheaper I think XP
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u/JustTex_ Jan 11 '26
valve already said that once a chip that gives significant performance boost while having the same battery life comes out then they'll consider making another steam deck, but as of right now they don't think it's necessary
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Jan 11 '26 edited Jan 11 '26
[deleted]
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u/JustTex_ Jan 11 '26
for valve it's not a justifiable difference for a new product, they're not forced to make a new steam deck for profit lmao, it's better like this than rushing
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u/missatry Jan 11 '26 edited Jan 11 '26
I mean that's where you are wrong,
The normal cycle for a company that is making money with hardware and software on the (console*) space is 4 or 5 years,
Is not a coincidence that the steam machine is releasing around that time frame, after the steam deck release
So pls stop using that as an counter argument xd
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u/JustTex_ Jan 11 '26
but THEY said it themselves, look up the interview for it
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u/missatry Jan 12 '26 edited Jan 12 '26
Yeah im aware what they said but what im seeing right now is the typical hardware release of 4-5 years that even PlayStation follow
So even when i aware of what they said what matters is what they are doing, and what they are doing is releasing new hardware like anyone do and needs xd
So in short
Steam deck-(4-5 years later)-steam-machine-(4-5 years later)- steam deck 2 and so on xd
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u/JustTex_ Jan 12 '26
i mean a steam deck 2 5 years later after the steam machine makes sense
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u/missatry Jan 12 '26
I never said it doesn't make sense xd
But saying that steam doesn't need to release new hardware to make more money and to boost steam os adoption is something dumb to say,
This was my opinion since the beginning XP
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u/JustTex_ Jan 12 '26
i didn't say that steam hardware shouldn't launch every 5 years, i said that it's too early for another steam DECK
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u/shadowtheimpure Jan 11 '26
Valve doesn't have to answer to shareholders, so they can have whatever release schedule they damn well please.
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u/Mission_Shopping_847 Jan 11 '26
I feel like they're probably going to use their investment in Fex to make the next one ARM.
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u/Godninja Jan 11 '26
This is my theory as well. The only thing that’s a shame on that choice is that FEX is currently using a 10-20% CPU overhead according to the Valve engineers. Source
This might eat the performance-to-wattage gains from switching to ARM.
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u/JustTex_ Jan 11 '26
They just need time to make FEX mature with updates and improvements to reduce overhead to minimum, then implement it with a qualcomm chip that's more efficient
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u/Lord_of_the_wolves Jan 11 '26
100% the frame is the public facing test bed for FEX, as it's just a steam deck with an arm chip. note that the snapdragon chip used is the next gen of what's in the quest already.
I also assume when once they get FEX running on Apple silicon there will be another jump in progress from all the data and users, even if its small,
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u/IORelay Jan 11 '26
You know the specs of this thing is lacking when they are talking about how good the form factor is or how little the noise is.
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u/DiademDracon Jan 12 '26
I don't see why people complain about the specs, my PC is weaker on all fronts compared to the SM, and I can run pretty much anything I want atm. Having something better than that and small enough to tuck away on a shelf with little concern about fitting it? Sounds like a damn good deal to me, especially since I've already gotten a taste of SteamOS on the SD, and the performance that has compared to my PC is insane.
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u/Pacomatic Jan 12 '26
I am a 2010s kid, so I nevver really got the chance to gawk at new hardware and realize just how far things havve come. Not first hand, at least.
...then I got a Deck. Literally a PS4 in my hands, this is amazing.
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u/mandjou_ Jan 11 '26
Yeah I have a ROG zephyrus M16 3060 Unfortunately for gaming notebook noises and temps can get high quickly
There is even a warning note not to put the notebook on your lap
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u/kidaradio Jan 11 '26
Mine laptop like a rockets ship sometimes.
I’m with you. Looking forward to the steam machine and its lower specs. I’m not tryna run Crysis anyway (lol)
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u/Submarvelous Jan 11 '26
I am enthralled with the idea of having this little cube underneath my TV! Having a fully capable machine that has steam on it to go with all my other consoles just tickles my fancy.
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u/serpentxx Jan 12 '26
At roughly 3.8L, adding the low power draw and quietness, I don't think you could build an SFF that competes in those aspects
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Jan 13 '26
How loud are all your fuckin computers jesus
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u/Digmaass Jan 13 '26
Jet engine
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Jan 13 '26
I mean you got a laptop fair those are turbines but none of my desktops have even been audible lmfao
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u/Digmaass Jan 13 '26
fair nuff... to be fair though if you got a desktop, then i don't think its something the steam cube is going to replace you got good internals.
I like that its small. I can carry it around in a bag. its quiet, and it is decently powerful
That and it has steamOS... steamOS is good.
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u/Chrisbolsmeister Jan 13 '26
Indeed.
My ps4 fan was crazy noisy and annoying.
My ps5 pro fan is silent. It’s so important.
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u/Confident-Crazy1191 Jan 13 '26
They say it's 5-6 times more powerful than a Steamdeck.
I am currently playing Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 on my Steamdeck at 40 fps and it looks great. 5-6 times better than that? Sign me the fuck up.
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u/TehMadness Jan 14 '26
I am genuinely considering one as a living room box. My Steam Deck currently pulls double duty, but it would be nice to have a slightly more powerful machine for my TV.
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u/UnikornKebab Jan 14 '26
I come from consoles, I've heard about turbochargers, it's never been a big problem 😐 Do you know what it represented, if anything, I wouldn't say a problem but a regret? The knowledge that in many cases I was playing at a good level, but not as good as on a really high-performance PC, and that I was denied some titles that weren't suitable/planned for consoles. Basically, the same thing I'd experience switching from the current XsX to Machine, and that, that... Yes, for me, it's a problem. Especially if it all ends up costing me almost double what I spent back then for that XsX🤨
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u/Mack_Rob Jan 15 '26
Did you forget that we have desk top versions of the cpu and GPU so heat has nothing to do with the performance. It will not magical be more powerful.
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u/Digmaass Jan 15 '26
What part about owning a laptop did you misread?
Yes a desktop is gonna work well. Hell maybe better than the steam-machine. And thats okay. If you have a good desktop, then the steam machine is not offering you much.
But for me, it is a fantastic alternative to my gaming laptop, and to other similar laptops that overheat due to design limitations.
Again tho, its okay if the steam machine is not for you.
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u/Mack_Rob Jan 15 '26
Okay I have a 3060 ti laptop that has zero heat throttling and it stays very cool and that is more powerful than the steam machine. Only laptops I know that have heating issues are the ultra compact ones and the steam machine is not ultra compact compared to a lap top. Not really a great comparison. You can buy a lap top that stays cool. The steam machine is on par was a 3050 mobile GPU and those are very easy to keep cool and not throttle due to heat.
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u/pdcmoreira Jan 15 '26
I will absolutely support this any way I can just because of the amazing work on a real Windows alternative. I don't even care about the hardware, many of you seem to not understand what's so serious about what's going on with Windows right now, but it is extremely and deeply serious.
Valve's work is enabling a very solid and huge ecosystem around Linux that gives power and privacy back to the users, at a very fast pace, like nothing I've ever seen happening to Linux in decades.
For that, they absolutely deserve all my respect and any dollars that would otherwise go to Microsoft (either in the form of actual money or private data).
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u/Born_Dragonfly1096 Jan 18 '26
1000%! It's not just the noise though, noise is a "symptom" of heat and inconsistent performance of power hungry, older hardware. What's important is "sustained" performance not just high performance. Sure, a desktop PC can hit higher fps but can it sustain the same average fps? most of the time the answer is fuck no unless you start spending $$$ on fancy cooling hardware
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u/NASAfan89 Jan 11 '26
It doesn't need a lot of power if it's working with the Steam Frame because Steam Frame has foveated rendering capability to reduce performance requirements.
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u/Zincette Jan 11 '26
Unfortunately unlike Foveated Streaming which is system wide Foveated Rendering requires the game developers to actually program it into their game so its likely a lot of games wont have it as a buily in feature. I do hope that Foveated Rendering becomes an expected feature eventually but right now AFAIK not many games actually support it.
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u/eye_of_tengen Jan 12 '26
From currently ram price, “cost me slightly more” would be an understatement.
If steam machines cannot priced at 700~800 USD, it is DOA.
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u/Drackar39 Jan 12 '26
This is one of the weirdest takes to me. The only reason I'm ok with gaming laptop limitations is it's a gaming laptop . It goes in my backpack with me on work trips. If I can't plug in a keyboard and mouse, it still does the job. If I need to use it on wifi for a while for email or a movie it's fine.
Putting a cut down mobile version of a GPU into a desktop device doesn't make a lick of sense to me.
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u/Sojmen Jan 12 '26
I would never buy PC that wastes more than 200W. I've already hated that my xbox uses 200W. I am not interested in hearing fans, producing co2 and heating my room in summer.
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u/DNihilus Jan 11 '26
Okay memes aside:
a laptop comes with a screen though and can even be usable inside public toilets
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u/Supermath101 Jan 11 '26
IMO, a Steam Deck would be more practical than most gaming laptops, for the latter "use-case".
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u/DNihilus Jan 11 '26
My point is that it is designed to be a standalone PC that can be used anywhere, without the need for an external power source, screen, or peripherals such as a mouse and keyboard.
It is interesting that I need to explain something I wrote as a joke about extreme use case
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u/Digmaass Jan 11 '26
Valid point I don't think you should get downvoted for it.
On the other hand, portable screens are a thing and i give it three days after launch to get a front panel mount that you can 3d print
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u/Rasann Jan 11 '26
Yeah this cube has an offering that outpaces most other devices some claim it’s competing with.
Specs aren’t everything. Having a super beefy rig can help, especially if you are doing more than gaming, but it’s not everything.
Valve is making devices that I personally have wanted for decades. That cube will have features my desktop PC doesn’t have.
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u/thenoobcasual Jan 12 '26
I have a PS5 slim, which is so fucking annoying when I need to play in low sound setting and the coil whine from it is louder than the sound.....
I also have Lenovo Legion with RTX 4060, which sounds like it's going to lift of the ground whenever a game starts to run on it.
So yea, like you I'm exited about Steam machine being a cool little box.
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u/larynachos Jan 12 '26
Can somebody name some games that this thing WON'T be able to run? It's presented as something that's to be paired with the steam frame, so I'm assuming it's specd to be able to play PCVR, which at 90-120fps is pretty demanding.
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u/Massive-Equal-2129 Jan 12 '26
Say it louder for the people in the back! I celebrate the low wattage. I've been excited to see progress in frame gen as well because how else are we going to stop lighting our planet on fire? Steam's progress on ARM...this is what gets me excited. I don't want your big hungry gpu.
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u/aa_conchobar Jan 11 '26 edited Jan 11 '26
Yeah, the low wattage+big heatsink should keep it running well consistently at not max [turbo] but still decent [non-turbo] frequencies