Steam Now Has Official Hardware Pages On Its Store (UPDATED)

It's a shame the CyberPowerPC downgraded its graphics card and upped its price (unless the info on Steam is out of date). Up until now, that was the best one by a mile.

The only one worth getting and which is anywhere near a reasonable price now is the Alienware one and even then, the base model should have 8GB RAM instead of 4GB... This is all a bit underwhelming really, the third-party manufacturers don't seem to know what they're doing or what their target market is.

Valve should just take matters into their own hands and release their own Steam machines priced at ~ $400, $500 and $650, either making a loss per unit sold (like consoles do) or just a very small profit margin. If we're being really crazy, they should throw in copies of Portal 2, Left 4 Dead 2 and CS:GO. That would really grab the attention of console gamers.

EDit: UGH just reading some of the specs on this is really annoying me! Like the Gigabyte Brix (grand prize in stupidness for this one), which is priced at $600, has an i7 but with Intel graphics... What's the point in that??? It's just throwing away money on a load of CPU power which won't ever get any use. Why not an i3 or AMD FX with a decent graphics card considering it's a gaming PC? Seriously, I think anyone with half a brain could pick better components than some of these have.

Those prices... I understand companies need to make money, but none of those are priced to actually make someone think twice before purchasing an XBone or PS4.

The best looking one IMO is the iBuyPower SBX. It happens to be the cheapest at $460. The Syber one @ option A seems to be the best bang for buck out of these @ $499 but it is still very underwhelming parts wise.

AMD FM2 mother board - $60
AMD Athlon x4 840 - $70-80?
AMD R7 250x - $80
4gb DDR3 - $35
500gb 2.5 hdd - $43
Case+PSU+misc - $70

So 350-380 in parts @ retail. So I guess the price isn't too bad considering it is pre-built and possibly a decent warranty. But, I have a hard time believing that 250x with only 1gb of vram is going to play any better than any of the current consoles (it may actually be worse) and then it costs more. This is a problem.

I think the big problem here compared to XBone and PS4 is that the people making these have to make a profit on them. MS and Sony can sell theirs as a loss leader. Segata is right. Valve needs to produce these themselves for either 0 profit or even at a bit of a loss.


EDIT* I didn't even take into account the horrible Linux driver situation for the AMD GPUs either. Not looking too good!

Added Steam Universe page link http://store.steampowered.com/universe/

This is the Steam page of games that are already on and will be coming to SteamOS:
http://store.steampowered.com/sale/steamos_sale/?snr=1_41_4__42.

The penguin logo has been replaced by the Steam logo ...BTW, The Witcher 3:Wild Hunt is included in the list.

Liam, this might be worth its own headline.

This is the Steam page of games that are already on and will be coming to SteamOS:
http://store.steampowered.com/sale/steamos_sale/?snr=1_41_4__42.

Liam, this might be worth its own headline.

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/articles/lots-of-big-games-confirmed-for-steamos-torchlight-ii-now-out-payday-2-mordor-and-more-coming-too.5047

Pretty sure you even commented on it :P

The best looking one IMO is the iBuyPower SBX.

[...]

EDIT* I didn't even take into account the horrible Linux driver situation for the AMD GPUs either. Not looking too good!

The only one which I would consider getting and which has the sort of specs I would expect from a Steam Machine is this one:

Syber Steam Machine I
Price: $599
CPU: Intel® Core™ i3 4150
GPU: NVIDIA® Geforce® GTX 750Ti 2GB
Memory: 8GB DDR3 1600MHz
Storage: 1TB 7200 RPM HDD

... except $150 cheaper (and probably without the 1TB HDD, seems like overkill).

With the AMD cards it's really, really silly of them to even have them on sale for a machine which runs Linux. Either Valve need to slap them on the wrist and tell them to do a U-turn, or they need to put some SERIOUS pressure on AMD to get the drivers up to at least the same level as Windows. Damage control needed there.

I can just see these going on sale in November and all these people buying them and obviously having no knowledge of Linux and then finding that they're getting piss-poor performance from their card and that lots of their games don't even work because their drivers are so broken. Those people would install Windows in a heartbeat and never come back to Linux again.

This is the Steam page of games that are already on and will be coming to SteamOS:
http://store.steampowered.com/sale/steamos_sale/?snr=1_41_4__42.

Liam, this might be worth its own headline.

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/articles/lots-of-big-games-confirmed-for-steamos-torchlight-ii-now-out-payday-2-mordor-and-more-coming-too.5047

Pretty sure you even commented on it :P

Indeed, Syber Steam Machine I seems to make the most sense

EDit: UGH just reading some of the specs on this is really annoying me! Like the Gigabyte Brix (grand prize in stupidness for this one), which is priced at $600, has an i7 but with Intel graphics... What's the point in that??? It's just throwing away money on a load of CPU power which won't ever get any use. Why not an i3 or AMD FX with a decent graphics card considering it's a gaming PC? Seriously, I think anyone with half a brain could pick better components than some of these have.

It's actually an Iris Pro iGPU with eDRAM so it's not as slow as a typical Intel iGPU, but of course it wont be enough for very demanding titles. That said i agree that all of them are overpriced like all OEM build PCs. Maybe some cheaper better priced stuff will appear closer to launch.

I was going to build my own Steam Machine but will probably go with a pre-built solution, mainly to support the effort and also because I'm probably too inert

Looks like Valve have been delaying in order to bring the whole package together... I definitely want the controller and the VR headset is interesting me greatly too... and possibly the Steam Link... hang on, that's the whole lot ;)

I agree with what Segata said previously about the pricing though, Valve should be putting out their own range, low, mid and high and sucking up the loss on hardware to get wider adoption and market penetration.

Very exciting times.

The ASUS one was SEXY.

Much more than fixing drivers, developers need to fix their code. The majority of the problems simply vanish then. When developers actually fix their code, it also makes it much easier for actual core driver issues to be detected and handled (as opposed to weird out-of-spec things the drivers have to detect and handle). That will come in time, as devs (be it game devs, or engine devs) get more experience with OpenGL (and Vulkan in future).

Sure, in time. But these need to be perfect by November. A bad launch will kill this almost instantly and all that working towards improving drivers and code will be for nothing.

The best blockbusters
We’ve been working with the makers of the best-selling games you know and love to bring their Steam titles to your living room. Big names like Dying Light, Evolve, Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, Total War: ATTILA and many more are headed to SteamOS and Steam Machines this year.

http://store.steampowered.com/universe/games/

Oh yes EVOLVE is coming to Linux! ^_^ <3 ^_^

I think the big problem here compared to XBone and PS4 is that the people making these have to make a profit on them. MS and Sony can sell theirs as a loss leader. Segata is right. Valve needs to produce these themselves for either 0 profit or even at a bit of a loss.

And then lock the software down so that you could only buy from Steam, sell games for twice the price and make you pay a monthly subscription to play online? Don't worry about the price... having multiple OEMs guarantees that free market will take care of it.

I believe Steam Machines shouldn't compete with consoles in price as if you just buy 2-3 AAA games at console prices and pay the subscription for just an year makes a console with inferior performance more expensive (or at least balances the prices) than a low-mid range Steam Machine.

Edit: So as it comes to price I just decided to calculate how much I've spent on Steam. It's a total of £92.28 for a total of 47 games I own. And I know that buying on sale is not supporting the developers but I'm poor and believe giving back less is better than nothing. And these games were equal to hundreds of hours of fun. So the point I'm trying to make is why would they lower the price of hardware therefore lowering the profits of the OEMs, lowering the chances of them making a second generation of Steam Machines and therefore lowering the general interest in the platform when consoles couldn't even get close in terms of game prices?

I'm curious....how many of you guys are actually gonna get a Steam Machine from one of these vendors? If so, why?

The experience/benefits are that of a console in your living room etc... but if you can purchase a Steam Link, why get a Steam Machine?

No bashing intended or expected....just interested. :)

Here's a marketing trick: Someone should offer a Steam Machine for, like, $100 . . . plus a $10/month fee for nothing in particular that goes for 4 years. That is, $580, but it looks cheap.

I think the big problem here compared to XBone and PS4 is that the people making these have to make a profit on them. MS and Sony can sell theirs as a loss leader. Segata is right. Valve needs to produce these themselves for either 0 profit or even at a bit of a loss.

And then lock the software down so that you could only buy from Steam, sell games for twice the price and make you pay a monthly subscription to play online? Don't worry about the price... having multiple OEMs guarantees that free market will take care of it.

I believe Steam Machines shouldn't compete with consoles in price as if you just buy 2-3 AAA games at console prices and pay the subscription for just an year makes a console with inferior performance more expensive (or at least balances the prices) than a low-mid range Steam Machine.

Edit: So as it comes to price I just decided to calculate how much I've spent on Steam. It's a total of £92.28 for a total of 47 games I own. And I know that buying on sale is not supporting the developers but I'm poor and believe giving back less is better than nothing. And these games were equal to hundreds of hours of fun. So the point I'm trying to make is why would they lower the price of hardware therefore lowering the profits of the OEMs, lowering the chances of them making a second generation of Steam Machines and therefore lowering the general interest in the platform when consoles couldn't even get close in terms of game prices?

Because that would be shooting themselves(valve) in the foot. The cost if these are not going to get console gamers to buy one. That is who steam machines are aimed at. I didn't say NOT to allow other companies to make them, I just said valve needs to get the cost of them down. The easiest way I can think to do that would be to also make them themselves. Another route could be that they subsidize the cost of the more modest ones to OriginPC, Alienware, etc.

I know exactly what you're saying about saving money on games and subscriptions, but people who are not already apart of PC gaming are not going to see it that way. What they are going to see is a $600-700 game console that will produce graphics only marginally better (if at all) than an XBone or PS4. At best they can hope for better frame rates.

The best blockbusters
We’ve been working with the makers of the best-selling games you know and love to bring their Steam titles to your living room. Big names like Dying Light, Evolve, Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, Total War: ATTILA and many more are headed to SteamOS and Steam Machines this year.

http://store.steampowered.com/universe/games/

Oh yes EVOLVE is coming to Linux! ^_^ &lt;3 ^_^

I post here to celebrate that and that .... I ditched windows!

LIAM!!!!! EVOLVE..... LOOK LOOK....


Am not excited honest

I think the big problem here compared to XBone and PS4 is that the people making these have to make a profit on them. MS and Sony can sell theirs as a loss leader. Segata is right. Valve needs to produce these themselves for either 0 profit or even at a bit of a loss.

And then lock the software down so that you could only buy from Steam, sell games for twice the price and make you pay a monthly subscription to play online? Don't worry about the price... having multiple OEMs guarantees that free market will take care of it.

I believe Steam Machines shouldn't compete with consoles in price as if you just buy 2-3 AAA games at console prices and pay the subscription for just an year makes a console with inferior performance more expensive (or at least balances the prices) than a low-mid range Steam Machine.

Edit: So as it comes to price I just decided to calculate how much I've spent on Steam. It's a total of £92.28 for a total of 47 games I own. And I know that buying on sale is not supporting the developers but I'm poor and believe giving back less is better than nothing. And these games were equal to hundreds of hours of fun. So the point I'm trying to make is why would they lower the price of hardware therefore lowering the profits of the OEMs, lowering the chances of them making a second generation of Steam Machines and therefore lowering the general interest in the platform when consoles couldn't even get close in terms of game prices?

Because that would be shooting themselves(valve) in the foot. The cost if these are not going to get console gamers to buy one. That is who steam machines are aimed at. I didn't say NOT to allow other companies to make them, I just said valve needs to get the cost of them down. The easiest way I can think to do that would be to also make them themselves. Another route could be that they subsidize the cost of the more modest ones to OriginPC, Alienware, etc.

I know exactly what you're saying about saving money on games and subscriptions, but people who are not already apart of PC gaming are not going to see it that way. What they are going to see is a $600-700 game console that will produce graphics only marginally better (if at all) than an XBone or PS4. At best they can hope for better frame rates.

There is definitely some truth in what you say, but at the end of the day isn't it easier and a little bit more honest to just "educate" said users of the benefits of an open platform instead of using Microsoft tactics? Anyway I guess at this point all I could do is wish them best of luck, buy games and be thankful for all they've done for Linux gaming and Linux in general.