Steam Machines and Steam Controller Shipping Friday

H

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
Valve announced today that it will notify the 300 selected beta testers at 2pm PT today that they will receive Steam hardware and SteamOS for testing. For everyone else, here's an image of lots of Steam boxes being built in Santa Newell's workshop.

The 300 selected beta testers are being notified today (at about 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time) that they’ll soon receive Steam hardware and SteamOS for testing. Each selected user is also being awarded a special badge on their Steam Community profile, indicating that they’re a beta participant. In addition, a number of games that run natively on SteamOS are being added to each selected user’s library.
Click to expand...
 
I might buy one of their controllers if it turns out to be sliced bread 4.0
 
I'm still more interested in the OS. But I guess they have to start here. One step at a time.
 
It's amazing. As soon as I upgraded my PC, all my interest in a Steam Machine, PS4 or Xbox One basically faded away.
 
Advil said:
I'm still more interested in the OS. But I guess they have to start here. One step at a time.
Click to expand...
You will be able to get the OS also.

From the article:
SteamOS will be made available when the prototype hardware ships. It will be downloadable by individual users and commercial OEMs. (But unless you’re an intrepid Linux hacker already, we’re going to recommend that you wait until later in 2014 to try it out.) We’ll post info soon about that. Oh, and stay tuned for the in-home streaming beta to begin soon, too!
Click to expand...
 
The hardware in those machines = beastly by almost any standard. I hope I make the cut.
 
So I wonder how many of those testers are gonna say fuck it and put Windows on it so they can play all their games?
 
ballistic90 said:
It's amazing. As soon as I upgraded my PC, all my interest in a Steam Machine, PS4 or Xbox One basically faded away.
Click to expand...

The hard community will have little to no use for a steambox, its not suppose to be for you. The controller on the other hand and maybe the OS is a big deal. You should be able to just throw this on your HTPC. This is the KEY thing the HTPC has been missing since the start.
 
03grandam said:
So I wonder how many of those testers are gonna say fuck it and put Windows on it so they can play all their games?
Click to expand...

I was a little curious about that, too. It's essentially modular just like a PC, right? I believe they come bundled with Titan video cards. Can you yank the Titan and put it in a different machine? Could you put an 290x in it? I'm sure that voids all sorts of things, but I'm wondering how everything will work.
 
crossing my fingers that they send me one :D

either way, I'm excited to see it'll be available for the mainstream soon. Really interested in SteamOS and the controllers.
 
My interest lies in the OS & controller but if I get chosen to test the box out, I won't complain.
 
US Only. So the correct line on my steam profile should say "You are now NOT one out of 421,843 eligible beta candidates."
 
Domingo said:
I was a little curious about that, too. It's essentially modular just like a PC, right? I believe they come bundled with Titan video cards. Can you yank the Titan and put it in a different machine? Could you put an 290x in it? I'm sure that voids all sorts of things, but I'm wondering how everything will work.
Click to expand...

what do you mean like a pc? It is a PC. There is no standard for video cards, or hardware really just a min that it has to be, kind of like any other computer. Can't have dell building 400mhz, 128MB computer trying to sell them with Windows 8. Same here, there is a requirement for the computers for Steam OS.

These beta machines are going to be different and range from i3s to i7s and different NVidia video cards. So some people will get i3s some i5s, some i7s. As for video cards some will get GTX660, some a GTX760, some a GTX780, and some a Titan. So some will basically get a i3 with a GTX660 and a few might get i7s with a Titan. if you think it sucks too badly (if you get the low end one) then you can just upgrade the hardware.
 
I would think people who are active in the forums, perhaps who have put in bug reports or feature requests, maybe anybody who already has a linux box that uses steam....?
 
Exavior said:
These beta machines are going to be different and range from i3s to i7s and different NVidia video cards. So some people will get i3s some i5s, some i7s. As for video cards some will get GTX660, some a GTX760, some a GTX780, and some a Titan. So some will basically get a i3 with a GTX660 and a few might get i7s with a Titan. if you think it sucks too badly (if you get the low end one) then you can just upgrade the hardware.
Click to expand...

That is the one thing that consoles have in their favor. All the games are running on the same hardware. Valve should have just made the mid to high end machine and been done with it. None of this tier based PC crap. At this point why wouldn't you just build or buy a PC (unless the price is right)?
 
WinSomeLoseNone said:
How awesome would it be to get one with an i7 & 780/Titan!
Click to expand...

If I am not mistaken, they are going to let the beta testers keep these machines, no? If they do, and I received one I would rip that 780/Titan out and put it into one of my own rigs. And give the steambox a dumbed down card for living room casual gaming.
 
eth3ton said:
That is the one thing that consoles have in their favor. All the games are running on the same hardware. Valve should have just made the mid to high end machine and been done with it. None of this tier based PC crap. At this point why wouldn't you just build or buy a PC (unless the price is right)?
Click to expand...

There are no standards at all. This is no different than a gaming PC for Windows.

http://www.maximumpc.com/valve_steam_machines_won’t_be_exclusive_nvidia_2013

"Steam Machines commercially available with graphics hardware made by AMD, Nvidia, and Intel. "

So even Intel integrated graphics will be supported.

Rather than being a like the best of PC/Console it is more like a marriage of most of the weaknesses of PC/Console combined with no market share/mind share.

This really seems like some kind of Hail Mary play done from desperation, more than any kind of sound plan.
 
Snowdog said:
There are no standards at all. This is no different than a gaming PC for Windows.

http://www.maximumpc.com/valve_steam_machines_won’t_be_exclusive_nvidia_2013

"Steam Machines commercially available with graphics hardware made by AMD, Nvidia, and Intel. "

So even Intel integrated graphics will be supported.

Rather than being a like the best of PC/Console it is more like a marriage of most of the weaknesses of PC/Console combined with no market share/mind share.

This really seems like some kind of Hail Mary play done from desperation, more than any kind of sound plan.
Click to expand...

One of the features of SteamOS is going to be streaming gameplay from another machine. So say I have steam running on my desktop, but I want to play in the living room on the TV. Instead of physically connecting the desktop to the TV, which may not always be practical, I can use something small and low power like an Intel NUC running SteamOS and stream gameplay from my desktop. I would think that's the role they have in mind for the lower power variants.
 
Chime said:
One of the features of SteamOS is going to be streaming gameplay from another machine. So say I have steam running on my desktop, but I want to play in the living room on the TV. Instead of physically connecting the desktop to the TV, which may not always be practical, I can use something small and low power like an Intel NUC running SteamOS and stream gameplay from my desktop. I would think that's the role they have in mind for the lower power variants.
Click to expand...

You can use something even smaller and cheaper to stream games.

A NVidia shield. People made a lot of noise about how exciting streaming was with that, but once it was a a real product it seems like no-one cares anymore.

I didn't buy streaming as the killer app with shield and I don't buy it with SteamBox.
 
I would consider buying a controller for sidescrollers on the pc.
 
eth3ton said:
That is the one thing that consoles have in their favor. All the games are running on the same hardware. Valve should have just made the mid to high end machine and been done with it. None of this tier based PC crap. At this point why wouldn't you just build or buy a PC (unless the price is right)?
Click to expand...

I haven't seen a lot of prices that seem right so far. The piston is $999, not that the specs are horrible just not what I would call cheap.

This isn't meant really to be something for those that know what they are doing. It is basically meant to be a dumbed down PC that you can't do anything to that plugs into your tv easily for the average person. For anyone else there really isn't any value.

The system is not going to have exclusive games, it play steam games that you play now. Which means it has to be a flexible system as those games are different in their requirements
 
Ocean said:
I would consider buying a controller for sidescrollers on the pc.
Click to expand...

I just purchased the xbox wireless receiver for like $17 and use my xbox 360 controller on my PC. Of course that is only a cheap option if you already have a 360.
 
Snowdog said:
There are no standards at all. This is no different than a gaming PC for Windows.

http://www.maximumpc.com/valve_steam_machines_won’t_be_exclusive_nvidia_2013

"Steam Machines commercially available with graphics hardware made by AMD, Nvidia, and Intel. "

So even Intel integrated graphics will be supported.

Rather than being a like the best of PC/Console it is more like a marriage of most of the weaknesses of PC/Console combined with no market share/mind share.

This really seems like some kind of Hail Mary play done from desperation, more than any kind of sound plan.
Click to expand...

Everyone seems to get all out of whack about what they think the advantages of a console are. Steam box is going to be able to close the gap on a couple of issues that have made it hard / impossible to make HTPCs work well.

1 Controller, goto the HTPC section and see how hard it is for people to find a good input device for a HTPC. IMO as an HTPC user this is one of the biggest. I would pay lots of money for a good wireless controller but I literally cannot because nothing exists. Steam can help here. Currently using 4x xbox 360 controllers which only work in games, and some games.

2 Along the same lines almost all controller systems in windows do not work well, many don't move the mouse pointer around so you cannot get rid of the mouse, many times people need to hack them with programs like joy2key to get them working decent. Steam can bring standardizations and this functionality back to the HTPC like it was in vista but go furter.

3 multiplayer split screen. Tons of games are a couple config files away from having this, but knowing the HTPC crowd is small they just don't bother. If steam can increase market share we can see more games simply unlock an existing feature and others add it. Down the road we might even see games that are traditionally reserved for consoles start coming to the PC or increased interest in games that are already capable.

4 Push, lets be honest their was windows media center edition and that was it. No company ever has had a large vested interest in getting an open PC into the living room. That is a huge reason why it did not happen. We aren't talking bad marketing we are talking no freaking marketing at all. Valve will be the first company that has a large vested interest in preserving their way of life because their way of life is NOT compatible with a future that is console driven or one where OS makers lock other content distributors out. This is probably the most important reason why I think the HTPC finally has its first real chance at making progress.

5 Guess what, the desktop is losing ground and a bunch of companies out there have not done a good job transitioning to mobile. Many like Dell and HP have fallen flat on their faces and just have gone nowhere with phone offerings. And their tablet offerings are not much better. Once again for the first time in history massive corporations with huge amounts of capital could find that the steam box may be the device they need to evolve into servicing as a legitmate replacement for their shrinking home computer sales. If valve plays this right it may be the best time in history to go for it.

Obviously costs will be an issue as they will not be able to subsidize these but hopefully with a turn key solution more people will see the value in cheaper games and accessories of PC gaming and be more willing to make the investment.
 
Exavior said:
I haven't seen a lot of prices that seem right so far. The piston is $999, not that the specs are horrible just not what I would call cheap.

This isn't meant really to be something for those that know what they are doing. It is basically meant to be a dumbed down PC that you can't do anything to that plugs into your tv easily for the average person. For anyone else there really isn't any value.

The system is not going to have exclusive games, it play steam games that you play now. Which means it has to be a flexible system as those games are different in their requirements
Click to expand...

The "Piston" has zero to do with Valve and the Steambox. Nothing. Just some opportunistic asshat trying to source miniPC's from alibaba (chinese b2b) and got some buzz and made some press rounds earlier in the year because he spammed the tech blogs masquerading as "The Steambox" which created a lot of confusion and a lot of "hurr durr the Steambox is so expensive OMG". Its a long story but Valve has nothing to do with the guy and wants nothing to do with his POS miniPC.
 
rudy said:
Everyone seems to get all out of whack about what they think the advantages of a console are. Steam box is going to be able to close the gap on a couple of issues that have made it hard / impossible to make HTPCs work well.

1 Controller, goto the HTPC section and see how hard it is for people to find a good input device for a HTPC. IMO as an HTPC user this is one of the biggest. I would pay lots of money for a good wireless controller but I literally cannot because nothing exists. Steam can help here. Currently using 4x xbox 360 controllers which only work in games, and some games.

2 Along the same lines almost all controller systems in windows do not work well, many don't move the mouse pointer around so you cannot get rid of the mouse, many times people need to hack them with programs like joy2key to get them working decent. Steam can bring standardizations and this functionality back to the HTPC like it was in vista but go furter.

3 multiplayer split screen. Tons of games are a couple config files away from having this, but knowing the HTPC crowd is small they just don't bother. If steam can increase market share we can see more games simply unlock an existing feature and others add it. Down the road we might even see games that are traditionally reserved for consoles start coming to the PC or increased interest in games that are already capable.
Click to expand...

Yeah, trying to control an HTPC with just a controller/remote is a nightmare. I spent a lot of time to get XBMC set up as my UI on windows, but it required lots of joy2key and autoit scripts to incorporate things like netflix and older PC games. It'd be great to have an official netflix/HBO go/Amazon app on SteamOS, because the experience on windows is subpar.

Splitscreen would be nice, and I wouldn't be surprised to see Valve add it to some of their source engine games. AFAIK you can already play the Left 4 Dead games and Portal 2 in splitscreen pretty easily.
 
The streaming games part of the Steam OS is about the only thing that interests me. I have zero interest in playing them using a controller. As long as I can use my kb/mouse then it's all good.
 
And keep in mind, its not just streaming games from your desktop. Shield users are Beta testing GRID from nvidia. Put in some darksiders (i think that was it) the other day. May be able to stream games from the web as a service. What better way to stick it to Sony and Microsoft than to get games from your stream service, rather that just networking and communication features, Netfilx for games? :cool:
 
I am eagerly expecting their controller. I wonder how good it is for racing and my sunday MAME/Gens gaming. If it turns out to be better than my wireless Xbox 360 pad, then cool. Won't pay for than €50-60 got it, though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top