I thought it was expensive, but always thought the expense was the right choice compared to a razor-blade model that would have created an evil incentive to close their platform.
Now that we’re looking forward to years of bearing the full effects of Trump’s tariffs and unregulated AI hyperscalers cornering the semiconductor industry, however, it’s starting to look downright cheap.
I just wish they’d gone a little more aggressive for their performance goals.
Same. They have their CPU and GPU power limited to keep the temps (subsequent fan noise) down. If they put in a more powerful PSU in and let the fans ramp up it’d do significantly better in benchmarks
I have a worse desktop (overclocked R5 2600 and RX 7600) and it generally performs fine. Some CPU-heavy settings have to be turned down in some games, but it manages medium-high at native 1080p for everything I’ve tried. White room benchmarks aren’t everything.
Turns out… it is actually pretty hard to build an SFF PC with comparable gaming power, for comparable or cheaper… if you’re not a giganto megacorp that can muscle in for priority on components.
Not even they can even get bulk discounts now, not really… thats why all the console makers had to jump up their prices too.
For me, the price of a base steam machine is $1,509 CAD plus tax.
Even then, they’re constantly changing their wording (“delivers 4k60fps” to “up to 4k60fps”), and real world testing it doesn’t make sense for me to consider this.
The Switch 2 is more than half the price ($629 CAD without the bundle) and has subjectively better price to performance plus it can be docked: it’s basically a steam deck and steam machine in one console.
Am I the only one who thinks the steam machine’s price is very reasonable relative to the current PC component prices?
I thought it was expensive, but always thought the expense was the right choice compared to a razor-blade model that would have created an evil incentive to close their platform.
Now that we’re looking forward to years of bearing the full effects of Trump’s tariffs and unregulated AI hyperscalers cornering the semiconductor industry, however, it’s starting to look downright cheap.
I think it’s pretty reasonable. I just wish they’d gone a little more aggressive for their performance goals.
Everything else, from the clean design, open specs, etc. is great.
Same. They have their CPU and GPU power limited to keep the temps (subsequent fan noise) down. If they put in a more powerful PSU in and let the fans ramp up it’d do significantly better in benchmarks
I have a worse desktop (overclocked R5 2600 and RX 7600) and it generally performs fine. Some CPU-heavy settings have to be turned down in some games, but it manages medium-high at native 1080p for everything I’ve tried. White room benchmarks aren’t everything.
No you’re not.
Turns out… it is actually pretty hard to build an SFF PC with comparable gaming power, for comparable or cheaper… if you’re not a giganto megacorp that can muscle in for priority on components.
Not even they can even get bulk discounts now, not really… thats why all the console makers had to jump up their prices too.
It’s all relative.
For me, the price of a base steam machine is $1,509 CAD plus tax.
Even then, they’re constantly changing their wording (“delivers 4k60fps” to “up to 4k60fps”), and real world testing it doesn’t make sense for me to consider this.
The Switch 2 is more than half the price ($629 CAD without the bundle) and has subjectively better price to performance plus it can be docked: it’s basically a steam deck and steam machine in one console.