Steam Machine's weak specs may actually benefit PC gaming by forcing better optimizations.

SScorpio said:
You must have missed the ability to be woken by a controller and having functional HDMI-CEC so your TV and audio turn on with it automatically and are on the right input. And that's out of the box without special configuration. It should also not have HDMI audio drop out issues that even the high end NVIDIA cards suffer from.

Functionally it will have a lot of the console quality of life features you can't get in a PC.
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more or less those are nothing burgers and at least possible on pc. nothing changes. you don't even know those 2 features work as good as a console either btw. ;)

if someone wants convenience they go console.

besides a few little improvements are canceled out ten fold by not being able to play many popular titles on the device and by having to dink around with getting Windows games to work on SteamOS etc.

Even if I would rather game on STeam OS than Windows, which I would actually,...STeamOS is not ready to take over everything else Windows does. And that seems like a big obstacle when a lot of gaming pcs do double duty for their owners functioning as both gaming device and a pc for everything else.

Last you can load SteamOS on many a pc afaik right?
 
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SScorpio said:
Using solid state storage was standard in PC long before the PS5 came out. And the Steam Machine has NVME which is direct PCIe connected storage, exactly how the PS5 works with it's dedicated PCIe lanes for storage to the Zen CPU. The secret sauce of the PS5 is a custom module that's dedicated to hardware decompression. The extreme bandwidth of NVME is lost in most games. There's a lot of overhead involved with parsing through the games files to load levels. Sony has been optimizing this which is why there's the instant loading. The way the PS5 can access storage memory exists on PCs as well. It's just not a commonly used feature.
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Standard my ass - you are living in the bubble.
Just recently about half of PC had HDD as main storage even for games, and it clearly shows where SSD (not NVME) is usually only "recommended" in settings. And you have to go to nvme to get a proper speeds for fast IO stack.
Whatever Steambox will have is irrelevant, with it's low million sales, vast majority of games will not be tailored for it and just be general PC build. And those will be build around common denominator, that is still HDD on PC

SScorpio said:
The Steam Machine is RDNA 3 which has raytracing hardware. But it doesn't handle pathtracing well. But the base PS5 doesn't even have raytracing support that performs at the level of the Steam Machine will. So again cross gen which will be most of the PS6's life span will let games play just fine. Tech Illiterate console users who think they know everything don't understand just how flexible gaming can be. Hardware generations are dead, the Steam Machine isn't targetting being a top end system, I'd be very surprised is anything released during the PS6's life cycle wasn't playable on the Steam Machine, it won't look as pretty, but it will run. It will be in about a decade when the PS7 comes out that the Steam Machine would need to be upgraded.
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RDNA3 is a joke. And again - you are f*cking delusional if you think that a lot of games will be hard tailored to Steam machine specs. Some extra optimization - maybe, but separate branch just for Steam Machine and it's capabilities - your dreams are very expansive.
And yes, they most probably will run, like Witcher run on Switch or Wukong on 1060. It's just not that much pleasurable experience.
 
tr1p1ex said:
more or less those are nothing burgers and at least possible on pc. nothing changes. you don't even know those 2 things if works as good as a console either btw. ;)

if someone wants convenience they go console.

besides a few little improvemetns are canceled out ten fold by not being able to play many popular titles on the device and by having to dink around with getting Windows games to work on SteamOS etc.

Even if I would rather game on STeam OS than Windows which I would actually...STeamOS is not ready to take over everything else Windows does. And that seems like a big obstacle when a lot of gaming pcs do double duty for their owners functioning as both gaming device and a pc for everything else.

Last you can load SteamOS on many a pc afaik right?
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I own all the consoles and prefer playing on PC. Every time I want to play a game is a battle. Show me how to improve my TV experience now. It's somewhat usable with PlayNite or Steam Big Picture mode, but then Windows fucks something up and I'm pulling out the keyboard and mouse.

Steam OS only works with AMD GPUs, and you are still missing the features I listed. I have a PC running it. The interface for on a TV is great. But it's missing those quality of life features makes it feel incomplete. Their are 3rd party Linux distros that are similar. But they aren't official and all have their own issues.

And the unsupported games don't really bother me. I have zero interest in any of them. The majority of players are on tablets anyways.
 
Felessan said:
Standard my ass - you are living in the bubble.
Just recently about half of PC had HDD as main storage even for games, and it clearly shows where SSD (not NVME) is usually only "recommended" in settings. And you have to go to nvme to get a proper speeds for fast IO stack.
Whatever Steambox will have is irrelevant, with it's low million sales, vast majority of games will not be tailored for it and just be general PC build. And those will be build around common denominator, that is still HDD on PC


RDNA3 is a joke. And again - you are f*cking delusional if you think that a lot of games will be hard tailored to Steam machine specs. Some extra optimization - maybe, but separate branch just for Steam Machine and it's capabilities - your dreams are very expansive.
And yes, they most probably will run, like Witcher run on Switch or Wukong on 1060. It's just not that much pleasurable experience.
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That really sounds like a you problem. m.2 NVME has been an option in PCs for a decade (first appeared in 2015), with SATA SSDs for years before that. I've been flash only on all my PCs since probably 2007. PC games have been releasing that say they require SSDs for the last few years. Are some people still running HDDs even today? Sure, but there's nothing stopping that from happening. But look at any PC prebuilt from the last few years, it's either m.2 NVME or m.2 SATA SSDs. Even the cheapest budget laptops use eMMC instead of hdds.

If RDNA3 is a joke, what does that make the PS5, PS5 Pro, and XSX that are RDNA2?
 
SScorpio said:
I own all the consoles and prefer playing on PC. Every time I want to play a game is a battle. Show me how to improve my TV experience now. It's somewhat usable with PlayNite or Steam Big Picture mode, but then Windows fucks something up and I'm pulling out the keyboard and mouse.

Steam OS only works with AMD GPUs, and you are still missing the features I listed. I have a PC running it. The interface for on a TV is great. But it's missing those quality of life features makes it feel incomplete. Their are 3rd party Linux distros that are similar. But they aren't official and all have their own issues.

And the unsupported games don't really bother me. I have zero interest in any of them. The majority of players are on tablets anyways.
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You're changing the argument to what you would like and what is good for you.

I'm still saying it's a nothing burger for the gaming market. IT's just a mini-pc at the end of the day.
 
SScorpio said:
That really sounds like a you problem. m.2 NVME has been an option in PCs for a decade (first appeared in 2015), with SATA SSDs for years before that. I've been flash only on all my PCs since probably 2007. PC games have been releasing that say they require SSDs for the last few years. Are some people still running HDDs even today? Sure, but there's nothing stopping that from happening. But look at any PC prebuilt from the last few years, it's either m.2 NVME or m.2 SATA SSDs. Even the cheapest budget laptops use eMMC instead of hdds.

If RDNA3 is a joke, what does that make the PS5, PS5 Pro, and XSX that are RDNA2?
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Option means nothing
We are talking about target specs and those are what ~majority~ of PCs have, including some outdated, cheap and casual stuff. Not your 5090 ultra fancy rig that 0.1% people have . Because those majority spec will be target of optimization, and frustrated hardcore enthusiasts will be left with "your problems, don't care"
And majority in no way have m2 ssd, games are not done for these specs.
You can google recent games and practically none (aside from Doom) not even require SSD - they go under "recommended" aka nice to have but not obligatory line.
WuKong on minimum is "HDD supported, SSD prefered" - means stack does support HDD, throwing out of the window on-the-fly streaming. And it's how most games on PC - targeting 10yo hardware just because legacy, mass market blablabla
 
tr1p1ex said:
You're changing the argument to what you would like and what is good for you.

I'm still saying it's a nothing burger for the gaming market. IT's just a mini-pc at the end of the day.
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It's a PC that works like a console that will play the thousands of games available on Steam.

If someone doesn't need the console features, they can just get a PC. This is being marketed as an improved way to play PC games on a TV. Did you watch any of the coverage on it? It's all about PC gaming on a TV from a couch.

It's unlikely to have the sales of a Sony or Nintendo console. But if the price is right, it will meet the use case for several millions people. It's not like it has to be a success to have games released for it, games will continue to be released on Steam. And they'll be playable.


Felessan said:
Option means nothing
We are talking about target specs and those are what ~majority~ of PCs have, including some outdated, cheap and casual stuff. Not your 5090 ultra fancy rig that 0.1% people have . Because those majority spec will be target of optimization, and frustrated hardcore enthusiasts will be left with "your problems, don't care"
And majority in no way have m2 ssd, games are not done for these specs.
You can google recent games and practically none (aside from Doom) not even require SSD - they go under "recommended" aka nice to have but not obligatory line.
WuKong on minimum is "HDD supported, SSD prefered" - means stack does support HDD, throwing out of the window on-the-fly streaming. And it's how most games on PC - targeting 10yo hardware just because legacy, mass market blablabla
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Sorry your comment is still taking a while to make it over here. Must be that HDD you have taking a long time to send it.

Mad Hip Hop GIF by Universal Music India


Even the cheapest notebook has eMMC now instead of HDDs. Do games need to require SSDs? No, but as you have an example for, some are. But games are also supporting the fast loading from NVME drives just like the PS5 https://steamdb.info/tech/SDK/DirectStorage/
 
I wouldn't count on the optimization part. It may give options for "optimized settings" for this specific device - but core optimization of the game itself, I think will be just as the same...
 
rodrigolfp said:
It's a PC that works like a PC. The first thing you will have to do is to type your login and password on Steam.
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No, it's entering the WiFi information or selecting the option to say you are using Ethernet. Then you log into Steam. I did with a QR code.

Not sure how that's any different from a PS5 though.
 
SScorpio said:
Even the cheapest notebook has eMMC now instead of HDDs. Do games need to require SSDs? No, but as you have an example for, some are. But games are also supporting the fast loading from NVME drives just like the PS5 https://steamdb.info/tech/SDK/DirectStorage/
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69 (!!) titles (with quite some doubles) and many of them consoles exclusives ports :messenger_grinning_sweat: You really want to bring this to discussion?
This only reinforce that only ones who care about fast IO stack on PC is those who build games around it and port them for money - i.e. xbox/playstation
 
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SScorpio said:
No, it's entering the WiFi information or selecting the option to say you are using Ethernet. Then you log into Steam. I did with a QR code.

Not sure how that's any different from a PS5 though.
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All that stuff are more PC like stuff. PS5 is that act more like a PC, not the other way.
 
Lol, I swear the same thing was said about the Series S, but nevertheless, its interesting to see people defending a low spec prebuilt PC when the PS6 and next Xbox are 1-2 years away. I doubt this thing sell as much as the Steamdeck.
 
SScorpio said:
It's a PC that works like a console that will play the thousands of games available on Steam.

If someone doesn't need the console features, they can just get a PC. This is being marketed as an improved way to play PC games on a TV. Did you watch any of the coverage on it? It's all about PC gaming on a TV from a couch.

It's unlikely to have the sales of a Sony or Nintendo console. But if the price is right, it will meet the use case for several millions people. It's not like it has to be a success to have games released for it, games will continue to be released on Steam. And they'll be playable.
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i'm sure a few million could buy it like with any other pc.

That's why nothing changes.
 
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No it really wont just as the steam decks low specs didn't benefit pc gaming. It doesn't have the userbase to command such a change. Furthermore, there are millions of 3060s, 4060s, 5060s in the wild and I don't know that they have done anything to force developer optimizations. Why would the steam machine be any different?
 

Seems like the newest iteration of the Steam Machine will be pretty capable to me. The build above is pretty similar in specs and performs quite nicely with an outdated chip and graphics card, so the Steam Machine can only be better by comparison. I must say, PC is truly the master gaming platform, but man, a huge percentage of its so called "master race" are just straight up elitist snobs. Reminds me of roid rage, except it's for nerds. lol
 
I'm not sure, the portable PCs didn't do it, a low specs gabecube will not do it either.

It will get the same treatment as a low market share console.

This is not like it's not a capable machine, you just have to keep your expectations in check, play in 1080p or 1440p, and don't expect Ultra graphics in the most demanding titles. Games still don't look significantly better than they did during the PS4 era, they mostly run better (if they don't try to force feed raytracing, and other unnecessary tech, to gamers).
 
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IMO, the fact that Valve vertically controls the hardware and software that runs the Steam Machine would let them rapidly iterate and optimize their drivers and OS to help improve performance that way. It worked well for the Steam Deck.
 
nkarafo said:

Steam Machine's weak specs may actually benefit PC gaming by forcing better optimizations.

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I think Valve's target with the specs was to achieve results similar to a base PS5 but optimizing less, because many devs use PS5 as their main hardwre reference target. So when porting their game to PC, if their game is optimized to PS5, they wouldn't need to optimize it for the Steam Machine.

They know most next gen games will be PS5+PS6 crossgen during the whole next generation, so most games in PC will make sure 8 years from now that the game runs decently on base PS5 hardware or somewhat similar PC hardware, as could be this one.

nkarafo said:
But what if the STEAM machine actually becomes a huge success?
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It won't, see Steamdeck and previous Steam Machine sales as reference
 
PixelatedBeast said:
Lol, I swear the same thing was said about the Series S, but nevertheless, its interesting to see people defending a low spec prebuilt PC when the PS6 and next Xbox are 1-2 years away. I doubt this thing sell as much as the Steamdeck.
Click to expand...

It's even funnier because PC gamers are all about the Master (Power) Race

Now they are happy about a revolutionary PC with worse specs than a 5-year old console

Lmao Lol GIF
 
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pudel said:
But arent these features just related to the OS? This should be all possible with every other pc as well if you use SteamOS on it?
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SteamOS should enable suspend/resume but the other two are hardware based.

You can definitely get CEC to work but it requires adapters as far as I'm aware. Wake from controller is possible but with caveats. Waking from controller wouldn't work with bluetooth which I'd be willing to bet most people use for controllers and requires a dongle like the official Xbox adapter and requires the device to only be in sleep and not turned off. You could use something like a smart plug to turn a PC on remotely from power off but that's more hassle then just walking up and pressing the power button IMO.

Valve talked about making sure that stuff like CEC worked properly in one of the many videos on the device and it's just one of the many things that make a device like this more convenient
 
the 8gb vram could backfired though.

before : games build with console as lowest denominator

next: games build with Steam Machines PC as lowest denominator


as long they dont took this approach and keep making games like before it is fine. the most they can do is the 'Steam Machines verified' optimization stuff later on which is still fine.


but this kind of device could play role to push A.I Upscalling tech to be more vital in future.
 
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Valve will definitely leverage the store to push Gabecube friendly games, just like they did with the steam deck.
Like using the "verified for steam deck" label and the "Great on steam deck" page.

Some developers released patches just to get the verification like with Doom: DA and BG3.
 
Knightime_X said:
1080p Medium will be your optimized setting.
4k is out of the question.

4k
modern game
performance
low price

pick 3
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The GPU is about an equal step down from the PS5 as the PS5's GPU is step down from the XSX. In terms of teraflops, 8.8 -> 10.3 -> 12 is what I read somewhere. I think in terms of native rendering, you are right on, but what impact do you think upscaling will have?
 
Kacho said:
How does the CPU compare to PS5/Series
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a good chunk better.
but I feel like in any modern game that won't really do much given the GPU will bottleneck you most of the time.

it could have a small advantage in some games when using hardware raytracing. RDNA3 is a bit better with RT, and a better CPU also potentially helps a bit... but I think that will be a rare occasion
 
This thing either has fsr4 or it don't. We know it works on rdna3. It has got to be coming. That will make a huge difference in the performance.

Still fucking crazy to me it has 8gb vram, though. They're going seriously cheap with this.

As far as forcing optimization? The steam machine will be a tiny, sliver-like subset of the steam hardware survey. It may become just a bit of reference device, but not so much that it can swing hardware targets in the long run. Most games will have to run on 3060's for a long time, still. And PS5, of course.

I played ninja gaiden 2 on pc and it was pretty heavy. A 6800 was able to get it looking and running nicely, but that's a much bigger chip than what's in a ps5 and I saw it was pretty raggedy there. The game doesn't look so good that a ps5 should be choking on it.

Wanted:Dead again the 6800 was fine, but I played it on ps5 later and it was using enough upscaling to look a bit shit. Graphics are basic, which ironically makes the artifacts easy to overlook. You're just there for the gameplay.

FF7 Rebirth on ps5 had a no-go 60fps mode. Looked and played beautiful at 30fps, if you ask me. And it's a great looking game.

I don't know if that counts as bad optimization or if those are just heavy games.
 
tr1p1ex said:
STeamOS is not ready to take over everything else Windows does.
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I wonder what that is. Linux has come a long way since the 90s. Today, you'll find professional software on Linux for almost any of the most widespread use cases. Video editing, image manipulation, game development, software engineering, editing, emulation, virtualization it's all there. The desktop has become much more usable over the years to the point where even someone that doesn't want to learn anything new can at least use web and email out of the box without issues.
 
Would the Steam Machine be considered 9 gen or 10th gen since PS6 and Xbox Hybrid will release a year after.

Switch 2 and Steam Machine pretty much eliminating generations. Unless the NEXT generation in the 2030's is:
Switch 3 in 2032
Steam Machine 2 in 2033
PlayStation 6 in 2034
 
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