It’s been a while since I’ve purchased a new gaming console, and I was thinking about going with PS5 when I do, but now, I think I’m going with Steam Machine by Valve. 2026 will be the year of Linux on the gaming console!
Discussion
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Discussion
@ramsey Gaming on Linux has gotten pretty solid as if late. Much of that is due to the work Valve has been doing. I think if they can be competitive with other consoles on price they could have a banger product.
I've been really happy with my Steam Deck, so I'm sure the Steam Machine will also be really good.
I've had very few compatibility issues with a bunch of games.
And games from Epic and GOG also work really well, plus any native Linux games available as a Flatpak. And of course, any ROM you can throw at RetroArch, or ScummVM.
The controller mapping is especially good.
Everyone who has been making fun of the form factor because it’s like the GameCube can STFD.
The form factor is like a mini desktop workstation. That’s it. That’s what they built. It’s the case I’d get if I were building the same.
@ramsey Question is what it'll be priced at. 'cuz if I'm going to buy another desktop I want it to be more powerful than the machines I currently have, and this one is hit or miss in that regard. Whereas a Strix Halo box _would_ be more powerful for at least some things (albeit a lot more expensive than they're pricing this out as of course).
@ian @ramsey From what I've seen, this thing probably isn't aimed at you (or me, for that matter). It isn't aimed at people already having a (beefy) gaming pc. This is aimed at people who wanna play some games on a TV and are eyeing a console.
The specs are sorta out there. It's previous gen hardware with relatively handicapped performance. This isn't gonna run AAA titles at 4K and 120fps.
@ian Fair enough. I could probably get much more mileage building my own machine.
@ramsey @ian https://dbrand.com/shop/limited-edition/companion-cube the skins for the gabencube are already off the hook
@ramsey I want a GabeCube
I bet they release HL3 alongside
@ramsey I would like to do the same, but the price is what is going to do or break the Steam Machine.
Until then, the PS5 for $550 is still the best deal in gaming, behind the Steam Deck.
For a device that hardly plays online games (because it needs Windows), $499 would be perfect, but all outlets point out $800 realistically.
@darkghosthunter Oooh! I haven’t seen the price on the Steam Machine. I’ll have to check that.
Regardless, it’ll probably be cheaper than what I was planning, which was to do a Linux build that dual-boots to Windows, for playing games from Steam.
@darkghosthunter I’ve been waiting for games to port to macOS, but even $800 is cheaper than what I was planning to build on my own, which would have been closer to $2k, probably.
@ramsey The problem of Steam Machine is that for $800~ you can get a better machine (with an Intel B580 12GB) with Windows 11.
They have to beat that.
https://pcpartpicker.com/guide/6JQzK8/entry-level-intel-gaming-build
That's why I feel that beyond $500 is DOA.
@darkghosthunter I would prefer not to have Windows.
@ramsey From what I have gathered, the best way to dualboot is to have different drives, and the Steam Machien only supports a single NVMe.
I've already tried dual booting in a single drive, and Windows 11 decided to fuck himself up.
@darkghosthunter I’ve dual-booted many times with one drive. You just have to make sure you’ve partitioned things correctly.
@ramsey I just gave up the moment Windows 11 started to bootloop into blue-screens after an update.
The main reason why I couldn't test BF6 open beta.
@darkghosthunter The trick is to install Linux first and configure the partitions and boot loader. Then, you install Windows on one of those partitions.
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