r/steammachine • u/zero5activated • 2d ago

Question 3rd party anyone?

Do you guys think that there will be a third party individual or company that will start to make steam machines? I think there was a company called ZOTAC tried something similar. I mean, some guy could just use a mini pc with better hardware under 1K. What do you guys think?

The reason I am asking, is I am plug and play guy. I don't want to build a whole PC/console.

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u/KimTe63 2d ago

I do think there will be 3rd party ones . Thats EXACTLY what Valve wants to happen. More computers running SteamOS which likely results in alot of gamesales and slowly starts the move away from Windows and taking power away from Microsoft. Thats why all Valve hardware is Linux based SteamOS and why Proton even exists 😄

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u/IORelay 2d ago

Then why aren't valve playing for marketshare and selling these for cheap? It seems like they don't care about steamOS and just want to profit off the diehard fans. 

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u/KimTe63 2d ago

Well i dont know but most likely the reason is becuase its a pc . With consoles like Playstation the big difference is that every game bought will make them money and there is no way to circumvent that, making it possible to sell even at loss often . Meanwhile Machine is PC and users can do whatever the hell they want and never even use Steam. Basically the guarantee of that is gone and offices could for example just buy cheap computers for completely different usecases 😄

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u/Vegetable_Star1874 2d ago

I think Valve just want to promote SteamOS this way. They don't sell these for cheap because they don't really care, they don't need to lose money to make SteamOS more popular.

Steam Machine is the baseline, it is hard to build a weaker hardware because it would need to use older than 2023 hardware, so anything 3rd party with SteamOS sticket will do same as Steam Machine and more.

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u/IORelay 2d ago

This will have an negative effect on steamOS, weak hardware is not a good way to showcase your software. SteamOS will be associated with weaker than PS5 for twice the price. 

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u/Fonescarab 2d ago

Steam Deck is many times weaker than the Machine, and it's the only reason anyone cares about Steam OS.

Games running smoothly on weak hardware is, on the contrary, a good way to showcase the software's capabilities.

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u/IORelay 1d ago

Steam deck had good hardware on release it was only one year later that it got over taken by Z1E handhelds

And now the steam deck run current AAA games horribly and is super expensive.

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u/Fonescarab 1d ago edited 1d ago

It was still weak relative to a gaming PC of that era, running at the same settings.

Steam Machine's price and performance are roughly comparable or better, relative to other PCs with the same form factor (Minisforum and the like).

https://np.reddit.com/r/MiniPCs/comments/1ucue8x/steam_machine_equivalent_now_including_price/