This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Becsuse they said the Frame was gonna be less than a Index complete kit ($1200) I kinda wondered if the GabeCube would be $1200.
Which, since I haven't built a PC since just before COVID lockdowns but keep hesring about soaring costs, I'm not sure if that is actually a decent price, a low price, or a high price.
Low
I can’t guess at what the price will be or what makes sense for Valve, but I’m not interested at $1000. I can do a Linux box on my own for much less, or for about the same amount, a Windows box that can run all games without tinkering.
I'm ready, but Amd is not. I want 4k 120hz on my TV via Amd videocard. But this stupid hdmi forum is blocking this.
There are two red flags on the new Steam Machine — the fact that it still includes USB-A ports and the 8GB of VRAM. Anything under 12GB is a major problem in 2025. While there are adapters for USB, I hope they offer a version that includes 12GB or 16GB VRAM.
I was pricing out an entry level gaming PC for one of the grandkids for Christmas and the price of parts has gone mad. It’s even worse if you want to make a smaller ITX build. How does less material and complexity translate to higher costs? And storage and memory are ridiculous. With a few small upgrades, even at $1,000 these would be a steal. It’s a shame they won’t ship before the holidays.
So right now, we’re discussing Steam Decks with some third party docks and accessories so they can be used like a PC. I can’t find anything better.
$1000 is still less expensive than my next PC I would need to buy after Windows 10 ends.
If it can run the Epic Games Launcher, too, I would use the Steam Machine for gaming, some cheap laptop with Windows 11 for my tax software and everything else that forces you to use Windows, and a Mac for work.
My biggest complaint about the Steam Deck is that it's too underpowered, so yes, I would in fact love a $1000 Steam Machine. Can we have a $3000 one too, please? I want a luggable PC that can handle games with RT in 4K 120Hz.
If this post is intended as discussion material; No, not as long that I have my stationary computer that fills my gaming needs.
I guess if you have a stationary computer that fills your gaming needs you really aren't the target group regardless of the price.
Personally, I would be interested in a different type of Steam Machine: A shrouded motherboard as a sort of LEGO base, into which you place modular blocks or cartridges that contain the PSU, CPU, USB, RAM, Wi-Fi, audio, drives, and graphics. Each block can have rails, to provide connections for power and signals, so that users don't need to futz around with wires. Just plonk a brick down onto the rails below it, and you are good for that part.
Would it actually work from an engineering perspective? No idea. All I know is that I would replace parts of my PC more often, if I didn't have to worry about screwing up in some fashion.
Look at the price of Xbox series X SSD expansion vs PS5 and see if that’s what you really want. $150 for 1TB with Xbox or 2TB for the same price or less for PS5? 1TB NVMe is well under $100 right now.
This. Components would be overpriced and proprietary. Nobody wants that.
Building and upgrading a computer really isn't that difficult. All the parts only fit in one spot. Getting compatible parts can be tricky if you don't know what you're looking for...but this problem could strike this idea, too, because there would certainly need to be different generation mainboards whenever CPU sockets or chipsets or memory speed or really anything else on the mainboard comes around.
So such a solution would likely lead to less choice and more proprietary vendor-locked garbage. Just now solely on the hardware side.
But wait...what games are compatible with this system? What games will run well?
This is something Valve has done really well...they built a benchmark system. This is the problem that's been plagueing PC, imo. AAA games get built for bleeding edge tech, necessitating upgrades...while the steamdeck sets a bar that developers have to be playable on in order to tap that entire market. Could the game run better on better systems? Sure, probably. But it needs to be at least playable on steamdeck.
What I’m trying to say is we should all just standardize on PlayStation. Cheers.
Monopolies are good for innovation /s
(Bell Labs being probably the only notable exception)
I will only consider buying it if it's half that price. Also I'm in a specific intersect of necessary mobility & content with what I have.
Even if it won't be that high, it's definitely gonna cost more than Steam Deck.
Whatever the price, I most likely will buy it.
From everything we have heard... I would be shocked if it wasn't pretty damned close.
Gamers Nexus touched on the pricing info they were given. Go watch the video to confirm but off the top of my head:
So what that translates to is
Which... sounds about right. The Steam Frame is going to use a comparatively cheap Snapdragon processor but it still needs all the HMD tech. The Facebook Quest 3 is around 500 USD and considering economy of scale... that is probably the price floor for the Steam Frame.
And the Steam Machine? That is rocking a proper Zen 4 with 16 gigs of DDR5 and 8 gigs of DDR6. Considering how expensive RAM already is and how that probably ain't going down until late 2026 at the earliest... And it is worth noting that people lost their shit over the ROG XBOX ALLY X S 45 WHATEVER being 1k but... spec wise that lines up with similar laptops. The display is a decent chunk of that, which the Steam Machine won't have, but.. yeah.
Computers is expensive. Especially in a Post Liberation Day world. It will be a miracle if the base console price (because you can bet the PS6 is gonna do the same stupid bullshit MS did with the Series S...) is below 900 USD with the "real" price being well over 1k. And the Steam Machine is going to be priced along those lines because Valve (presumably) doesn't have a bunch of warehouses full of parts from five years ago.
The good news is that if you already have a gaming PC, and don't need the Valve branding, you can get a pretty solid AMD NUC for 300-600 USD that will run Bazzite perfectly and play a lot of your games locally with the rest streaming over Moonlight or Steam Link. GMKtec pretty much have this market on lock and I personally love my K11 (overkill but also really nice to not have to walk upstairs to wake my desktop for every single game).
You'll have the same nonsense with HDMI 2.1 as the Steam Machine will (so VRR) and AMD but there are workarounds for that (basically you flash a displayport dongle to be REAL sketchy). And you'll be able to take advantage of most of the software improvements Valve are pushing for SteamVR, SteamOS, and Steam Link that are going to be coming rapidly for the launch. MUCH less oomph but... people who are expecting proper 4k experiences out of a Steam Machine are lying to themselves.
