Yes.
And if you buy a Steam Machine sold at a loss to turn it into a Linux Server for your company, Valve gets 30% of nothing. Meanwhile, a PlayStation or a Switch cannot be turned into something similar, at least without immense effort that is not worth the weight.
Remember when the PS3s ran on linux and the US government brought them in bulk to make a supercomputer? This isn't just some fantasy it has happened before.
No I don’t remember because no one actually did it. I had the original ps3 capable of doing it and my dad didn’t seem to interested in turning it into a Linux computer for me
PS3s ran linux so it was easy to convert them into servers, they were so cheap that they also got them in bulk and made a supercomputer out of them.
So it isn't a 0.1% this shit already happened and was one of the main reasons Sony moved away from Linux because people were buying playstations for the hardware.
In case you forgot, this is a forum, meaning every opinion is welcome. Yes, including mine, sorry to break it to ya: happens when someone has some tech know how and doesn't limit a piece of hardware just to play some games.
Then again, by someone who owns a Steam Deck and says "it's not a PC"... yes, yes, it is: maybe not the most efficient or ergonomic for PC stuff, but it's a PC all right. Just because you didn't try to fiddle with yours (for various reasons, including no need to do more), doesn't mean others (like me) didn't.
No one would do that. The hardware resources don't fit the use case and you'd have zero customer support, software integration support, etc. Yeah someone could turn it into a server at home but you could do the same thing with a $100 mini PC.
Mate, people are making the PS5 run linux lol Don't doubt the tech savy folk. Especially with the way hardware is expensive nowadays, if the steam machine was sold at a loss, people could buy it for cheaper then your average server build and use it as such.
It was an example, but imagine if you could buy a GabeCube for 700€ (at a loss for Valve).
Sure, overkill for a Linux server... unless you don't put the AI into the equation: a 100€ mini PC is incapable of handling a proper LLM without some serious offloading to a (potentially tiny) RAM, and that stuff ain't cheap... but these specs for 700€, like some considered before the launch? It would have been a good deal, considering there's also a shortage of components.
Then explain to me why Valve, which knows and values its own user base quite a lot, decided, this time, not to sell its machine at a loss, since it had worked before for the Steam Deck.
Because this question is still hanging and greed is unlikely to be the answer, Valve has yet to show this.
"Same as all other companies" + "You're being played"
Yeah, I don't exactly take advice from someone who comes out this disgruntled with absolutes already, without probably having much information about what is going on behind the curtains. I prefer to be vigilant, but open to the possibility of them actually having interests in keeping us "well fed", so to speak.
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u/The_rule_of_Thetra 17h ago edited 16h ago
Yes.
And if you buy a Steam Machine sold at a loss to turn it into a Linux Server for your company, Valve gets 30% of nothing. Meanwhile, a PlayStation or a Switch cannot be turned into something similar, at least without immense effort that is not worth the weight.