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@chr , why make it more complicated than it has to though? ;)
Have it simple and then offer the option to built fancy stuff on top of it for those that want to invest more time.

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Calling the PC "Steam Machine" again, is this stupidity or some severe balls?!?

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Me this morning to family:

Yes, I'm going to get VR!

Then, misreading:

Oh no, it's just a streaming device!

Finally, reading further:

Yes, I'm going to get VR!

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So what you're saying is that 2026 is going to be super-expensive for me then?

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@GustyGhost if the price is competitive i might buy one for my partner who is more into casual gaming and wants to move away from the isolating 'big box PC stuck in a small room experience' to play in the living room. And also it should be great for streaming to from a much more powerful big box PC.

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This is incredibly exciting news! I sincerely hope Valve plans to upstream their contributions, particularly the work done on FEX and the extensive ARM optimizations. Integrating these back into the mainline projects would offer huge benefits to the entire Linux community, not just SteamOS.

A key technical question I have is whether SteamOS 3.0 for the new Steam Frame remains based on Arch Linux. If it is, Valve's work on the ARM platform could significantly impact upstream Arch Linux and its derivatives, such as CachyOS. Regardless of the base distribution, I'm curious to know how these performance enhancements will be shared or integrated into other major non-Arch Linux distributions as well.

It's a huge opportunity for cross-distribution collaboration and advancing Linux gaming on ARM (and hopefully RISC-V in the future too)!

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One of the few factors in the first Steam machine's failures was on the part of fence sitters (people like myself) not moving on the opportunity to buy one.

This is our second chance. Or my second chance, anyway. I will certainly be buying one or several Steam Machines.

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On current-gen consoles (PS5, Xbox Series X/S), true native 4K (3840*2160) rendering is not common in most AAA games. It's like 5-10% of AAA titles on Series X, even less on PS5, and non-existent on Series S. Dynamic resolution scaling, upscaling, and reconstruction techniques are the norm. 4K is just marketing and extremely rare. Most players can't tell the difference in blind tests anyway (Digital Foundry has proven this repeatedly).

interesting. Not to get too into the weeds here but the thing im wondering here is how a 'real' console operates vs a PC with SteamOS. On those '4k' console games that use native resolution but checkerboarding, DSR the TV is still taking a native 4k signal so no upscaling internally meaning the video DAC is not adding too much latency. However PC games don't really work like that in that you as a user tend to have to manually switch to 4k and then fiddle around for ages trying to get things to work and a lot of games not designed with a specific hardware target in mind (like a console) won't have upscaling options, or DSR built into the game. The likelyhood imo is that people will either run games at 1080p or maybe 1440p and let the TV scale to native 4k.

also we don't know the memory bandwidth yet, my 12GB 6700XT is a 192bit bandwidth cannot realistically do 4k because of that limitation in most cases, the best it can manage without really chugging, even on older titles is 2880 x 1600 , sure in *some* case you can run those games but mostly your getting dips into the 40fps region.

So i do think there will be some latency for folks running on a 4k TV in general where games are not catering for the user like a 4k optimized console game.

However i don't think it is trying to compete with the PS5 or is it .. im confused now.

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If we forget about the VRAM issue, it's a beautifuly made Linux hardware and I'll consider buying it, even if I don't need it (and if I can pay for it), just to support the cause.

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I didn't see a single word about AI.

Valve.

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Half Life 3 Confirmed!!!

Look ->
We have 3 new products...
Announced Wednesday...
3rd day of the week...
3rd week of the month...

From the Devices We have the words --> Machine Control Frame

1. Black Mesa control machinery (Half-Life 1)
2. Combine control interfaces (Half-Life 2)

3.So in Half Life 3 we will have:

Machine Control Frame (MCF) — In automation or industrial networking, an MCF is a data frame or communication packet that coordinates or synchronizes machine actions, such as movement control, safety interlocks, or sensor feedback between controllers (PLCs, robots, etc.).

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Ok, so I'm going broke in 2026...

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I already have this on Steam, but I don't usually play fighting games online. So this doesn't really make a difference to me. I voted with my wallet to support Virtua Fighter and don't regret my decision.

I'll probably double dip and get it on the Switch 2 if I ever get one. I already have vanilla Virtua Fighter 5 and Final Tuned on PS3, then the PS4 release, plus this Steam release. lol

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Probably still 1080p.

Going to largely come down to the game. But I assume it at least has PROPER access to FSR4? lets hope so.

Ultimately I think it will come down to price. People will be comparing this to PS5/XBSX prices and if its double or triple those consoles it may not sell well. Same with the VR headset, if its over 1000usd I think it won't sell as well as VR is already NICHE.

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Day 1 buy.

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What's the resolution on most living room TVs?

Probably still 1080p.

My question is are we looking at a barely disguised Dev Kit for a next-generation handheld that is still a few years away.

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outside of outliner concerns like the PC system memory upgradability and lower then expected fov on the VR headset, oh and how is pitch black? The biggest question is always price.

When Steam Machines flopped back then, it was because Proton wasn't ready.

Actually it was also because the cost kept going up(or varied); if people remember the steam machine was being made by MANY companies and cost a LOT and also didn't even come with SteamOS most the time, as it was Windows.

Basically it just became a prebuilt PC bundle of rando companies ABC. Certainly didn't help that SteamOS was FAR FAR from ready and Windows was just bad for a gaming machine.

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WE ARE SO BACK!!!!!

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As to Steam Machine performance, I guess my question is: What's the resolution on most living room TVs?

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I moved to a new place last month and have been considering getting a TV (for the first time), a dock for my Steam Deck, and a couple of controllers to play things like PlateUp! and Ultimate Chicken Horse with friends. As someone who has never owned a stand-alone controller I wasn't really looking forward to doing research on which ones to get, but I think the decision just got made for me.

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I liked the replaceable batteries of SC1 more. Also I preferred the circular trackpads instead of thumbstick and d-pad. But I get it that I am definitely the minority in the latter and possibly also in the former 😅

I wish I had a job so I could consider Steam Frame as well 😭. I wanted to sell my Index before any announcement drops, but now the cat is out of the bag 😅

A small part of me doesn't like the inconsistency of their previous VR device starting with Valve (Index) and this one being Steam (Frame). But autistic marketing preferences aside - looks very very appealing.

I wonder if SF technically also support foveated rendering (i.e. in addition to foveated streaming)? I.e. can this create a PC VR market where games implements this feature?

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@tpau

I still hope for a way to split an ultrawide screen in two virtual monitors so i can have a game in 16:9 on the left side and chat on the right side.
Right now having custom regions and boxes with shortcuts and scripts that resize and move them feels too complex.

Whatever scripts you have - you can map to some keyboard hotkeys. Or if remembering arbitrary combinations isn't you jam, I recommend using [Kando](https://github.com/kando-menu/kando) or [fusuma](https://github.com/iberianpig/fusuma) 😊

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SteamGameCube looks sooo cute. But I only want the VR piece at this time. Exciting!

[edit] or shall we say... GabeCube?

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But isn't that game going to have state of the art graphics ? Looking at the footage graphically at least it looks pretty amazing.

GTA 6 will be available for current-gen consoles. If Steam Machine will have performance-parity (seems like it will, but I'm not a HW guy) then it will be capable to run the game with similar graphics and similar performance. Heavy console-exclusive optimisations are long gone, they're pretty much PC games without all the graphics options.

it's not a 4k machine but it will be connected to 4k TV's.

On current-gen consoles (PS5, Xbox Series X/S), true native 4K (3840*2160) rendering is not common in most AAA games. It's like 5-10% of AAA titles on Series X, even less on PS5, and non-existent on Series S. Dynamic resolution scaling, upscaling, and reconstruction techniques are the norm. 4K is just marketing and extremely rare. Most players can't tell the difference in blind tests anyway (Digital Foundry has proven this repeatedly).

i might be wrong here but i thought there was a latency penalty with TV's when running non native resolution as the image needs to be upscaled ( on top of the game upscaling of course ) ehh..

That's correct. The aforementioned "shenanigans" are explicitly designed to avoid this. Game renders low-res -> GPU reconstructs to full 4K framebuffer -> TV gets pixel-perfect 4K.

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I'm hoping to get one of the controllers. Hopefully it'll be affordable for me, because I know for sure the headset and steam console won't be.

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Dang. I was pondering about the VR situation on Linux *very* recently. I'm gonna get my hands on that headset, unless it's like $2k. My only concern would be the inside out tracking, but according to some (very early) reviews, it's good.

Time to sell what used to be a bit more than a thousand dollar of equipment and just devaluated very quickly :D

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Yazan Aldehayyat: If you're trying to make a PC that has similar features and similar performance, I think the Steam Machine is going to be a really competitive price to that and provide really good value to it.

This! It could mean that they are going the Steam Deck way, price wise. I like that.

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Many people are planning to buy a new gaming device just because of GTA 6

But isn't that game going to have state of the art graphics ? Looking at the footage graphically at least it looks pretty amazing. Is a GPU only 4 - 10% faster than an RX570 from 2017 with 8gb of RAM even going to play it without aggressive 'performance' FSR ( i.e 720p upscaled) and frame generation at any kind of decent settings.

And as a side note, many people are rocking 4k TV's right ? i might be wrong here but i thought there was a latency penalty with TV's when running non native resolution as the image needs to be upscaled ( on top of the game upscaling of course ) ehh.. maybe im out of touch with how it is now with TV input latency technology.

it's not a 4k machine but it will be connected to 4k TV's.

still this is probably just the blueprint / baseline for other vendors to produce SteamOS steam machines with higher specs.

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"Magnetic thumbsticks (TMR) "
i hope this is a rebranding for hall effect sensor, if that is the case, its perfect!

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With the Steam Machine, I think their goal is performance-parity with PS5 and Xbox Series X, just as Steam Deck was a Switch competitor, and didn't try to be the beefiest PC handheld that was possible at that time. PS5, Xbox Series X are still receiving the brand-new high-budget games with fixed graphical presets, and (correct me if I'm wrong) it seems like the Steam Machine is in the same ballpark, and that's the point in my opinion, not to be a high-end gaming PC. It will probably have aggressive pricing, just like the Deck. Also, if they drop it soon enough with competitive pricing then GTA 6 alone could attract massive sales. Many people are planning to buy a new gaming device just because of GTA 6, and the Steam Machine with almost full access (except most kernel-level anti-cheat games) to the Steam library, free online services, and massive, frequent sales, sounds like a better deal than a new console with zero games and subscriptions.

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