Steam Hardware
A place to discuss and support all Steam Hardware, including Steam Deck, Steam Machine, Steam Frame, and SteamOS in general.
As Lemmy doesn't have flairs yet, you can use these prefixes to indicate what type of post you have made, eg:
[Flair] My post title
The following is a list of suggested flairs:
[Deck] - Steam Deck related.
[Machine] - Steam Machine related.
[Frame] - Steam Frame related.
[Discussion] - General discussion.
[Help] - A request for help or support.
[News] - News about the deck.
[PSA] - Sharing important information.
[Game] - News / info about a game on the deck.
[Update] - An update to a previous post.
[Meta] - Discussion about this community.
If your post is only relevant to one hardware device (Deck/Machine/Frame/etc) please specify which one as part of the title or by using a device flair.
These are not enforced, but they are encouraged.
Rules:
- Follow the rules of Sopuli
- Posts must be related to Steam Hardware or Steam OS in an obvious way.
- No piracy, there are other communities for that.
- Discussion of emulators are allowed, but no discussion on how to illegally acquire ROMs.
- This is a place of civil discussion, no trolling.
- Have fun.
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Why are people so excited about what looks like custom proprietary hardware designed to have a limited lifespawn and that will end up in a landfill in less than a decade?
I wish it had a more defined upgrade path, I really do. I was actually going to get a Framework 16 until their controversy came to light. For those of us who care for that sort of thing, the only game in town left the building.
So my answer is that this device checks all my boxes except for that. It's built with Linux in mind, it's small, it's not a laptop, it has quality assurance and I don't have to build it myself, and it can run all my favorite games. And it is still repairable, just not upgradable. But I'm going to get as much life as I can get out of it, and I'm not going to just throw it out or sell it when the next Steam Machine comes around. I'll make do with what I have until it breaks or becomes unusable.
what sort of thing? a SFF pc? you can build one quite easily of pay someone to build it for you, it's cheaper and more reliable
I didn't want to get too specific, but by "that sort of thing" I meant not supporting companies who financially contribute to certain political organizations and individuals. That's a personal decision and I didn't want to ruffle any feathers on an unrelated thread.
I'll also say that not everyone wants to build their own PC and would prefer the assurance that everything will just work out of the box, yet still don't want a locked-down experience that you'd get with consoles. And that's okay.
Steam Deck was one-of-a-kind for having a console-like pricing model, while having a high ifixit repairability score, and because it's not a custom build, there's a tutorial out there for most repairs or other problems you'll encounter. So that's pretty reliable in my book.
some people don't want to cook their launch and get mcdonald
This is a custom small form factor PC with many of its components being user replaceable. The GPU and CPU are soldered, which is unfortunate, but it is still significantly more upgradable and repairable than any other console that has existed. So what the hell are you on about?
And Valve already has a partnership with iFixit to offer replacement parts for their handheld gaming device, the Steam Deck, and they intended to continue that partnership with their new hardware products.
I think you're just dumb and don't know what you're talking about.
Well there seems to be exactly one component that's upgradable that you don't have on the other consoles, which is the RAM. And at first sight I think you'll have to remove the heatsink to get to it.
If you want any 'usable' upgradability it's better to compare to modern minipc's where you can easily replace the RAM and WiFi, have multiple SSD slots and even have the option to connect an external GPU.
Consoles are garbage, bringing a PC close to these is rowing in the wrong direction. Their presentation doesn't say much about components being replaceable and hint at fix storage. GPU is one of the most important pieces in a machine that is supposed to be dedicated to videogames
You are on lemmy, a decentralized and open source platform that doesn't share peanuts with steam or for profit companies like valve, i may be dump but i encourage you to learn more about open source software/hardware and decentralized platforms.
I've used fedora for the past 5 years and run GrapheneOS. I'm familiar with open software dude
I'm not a hardware guy, how is this different from the Steam Deck? Is the hardware here used of crappy quality by comparison? I thought most people liked the Deck (and everyone in here, I thought this is general Linux for a second), I sure do and will likely use it for a decade.
Hardware in the cube is said to be roughly 6x more powerful.
Well I know that, but isn't that good in the context of waste (OP's problem)? Since PS6 hasn't been released yet, it's seems the PS5-like specs here will last a decade and be future proof enough. PS4 is almost 13 years old and still has games coming out. The Switch 2 is PS4 level and it seems to be successful for now, and Steam Deck was aiming for that benchmark too.
(You can tell I'm a tech idiot by how I measure power in Playstations)
The difference is in the form factor. The Steam Deck is a purpose-built device for handheld gaming, with the expectation that it won't be useful for AAA games that push current PC hardware. It's found that niche and serves very, very well there. For that reason, it will likely outlive its tech specs - it will continue to work for many lower-spec indie games, because expectations will be reasonable.
The Steam Machine, on the other hand, is positioned as something that can play all current games (that aren't kernel-level DRMed to hell and back, at least). These become outdated the moment new games start coming out that run poorly on it. Since it's not upgradeable, the whole device becomes outdated and will need to be replaced if you want to play the next new hotness at a good FPS.
The thing is that since Steam Deck's release, a lot of competitors made handhelds, and it's mostly keeping up because of SteamOS. It sounds to me like Valve just needs the Steam Machine to once again offer software, convenience etc. above everyone else in the couch gaming market this is aiming for.
Then the only upgrade most users would want is from Valve themselves, but the same goes for Steam Deck - they said they might make a new one with a big enough generational leap, and then the old SD's become outdated too. We had emulation machines before Steam Deck - being able to play last gen games on it was still a big appeal.
Also, is constantly upgrading PCs better, when instead of selling off/scrapping the PUs and other parts every 5-10 years, you sell off/scrap PUs annually? I don't think people doing that are the target audience here anyway. I think some patient gamers would buy a used GabeCube 15 years from now for a low price.
SteamOS, the trackpads that drastically increase the breadth of games that are reasonable to play on it, AND the price-to-performance ratio that blows nearly everything else out of the water.
You're not wrong; it's possible that the SM will see a longer lifespan than its specs suggest. I do think it's more likely to get bumped in less time than the SD though.
The steam deck is a portable device, soldering components and custom parts in devices that need to be small it's more justifiable because it can save space. This box on the other hand is a SFF pc that has to be small only for marketing reasons.
Some people don't want the same beige tower as you.
With this machine you are stuck to a specific case. With a modular setup you can chose the case you want between thousand.
Fractal design terra has a similar design and can fit a big GPU
It's a console for PC gaming. Consoles have always been like that. The original Steam Machines were small modular PCs built by system integrators and they sold barely any of them.
the original steam machines had linux in a protonless time so they didn't have much appeal in the first place
consoles are PCs running proprietary software