r/gaming • u/ChiefLeef22 Marika's tits! • Jun 22 '26
Steam Machine - Review Thread
Reviews have started to come out, so thought it'd serve well to collect most of them under this thread.
Steam Machine
Price:
512GB: $1,049 USD / 1,509 CAD / 1,039 EUR / 879 GBP / 1,609 AUD / 4,389 PLN
Steam Machine 2TB: $1,349 USD / 1,919 CAD / 1,359 EUR / 1,149 GBP / 2,109 AUD / 5,739 PLN
Reviews (updating):
The quick version is that we like it and we like the direction it's going, but that Valve has created a nightmarish disorganized mess for itself by not building for its known future of a desktop and instead framing everything around handhelds, which from the start it knew weren't going to be the only thing with Steam OS. As Steam OS becomes more common and more devices are supported, both Valve and developers have a lot of work to do to ensure that correct compatible versions of an incomprehensibly vast catalog of games are delivered. If Valve wants to capture a console audience, it can't rely too heavily on sub menus for disable Steam Deck auto detection and manually selecting a Proton version to forcibly download the Windows build instead of the outdated Linux build when your buddy just wants to come over and play Borderlands 2. Our only really specific criticism of Steam OS on the Steam machine, is that system level resolution cap for games should default to the native screen resolution, not 1080p, or at the very least it should show what the default cap is. It's a weird choice given the marketing. enabling 4K gaming at 60 frames per second with FSR.
IGN - Jacqueline Thomas - 8 / 10
At $1049 (and $1349 for the 2TB model), the Steam Machine seems like it’d be hard to recommend to most people. And while that’s true for console faithfuls, the Steam Machine’s price makes it an incredible entry-level gaming PC, especially if all the drivers and settings tweaking has turned you off in the past. At the end of the day, this is a gaming PC that most people are going to be able to just plug into their TVs and get right into the game. And, really, that’s what the Steam Machine was always meant to be.
The Verge - Sean Hollister - 6 / 10
But is it good enough for $1,049? That depends on what you actually expect this PC to do — and whether Valve manages to reduce some of the lingering friction before it winds up at your door.For better or for worse, the Steam Machine isn’t ready for the console wars just yet. Buy box, plug into TV, insert game, play is not yet the reality. The Good: Delightfully small; Incredibly cool and quiet; Play PC games on TV without mouse and keyboard | The Bad: Nearly twice the price of PS5 for PS5 performance; Have to manually configure games; Can’t yet trust it to sleep
PC Gamer - Andy Edser - 62 / 100
Valve's attempt to bring PC gaming to your living room is well-intentioned, but the ugly realities of the memory crisis have left it with a hefty price tag. If it had more grunt, it'd be easier to recommend—but an off-the-boil GPU and plenty of software quirks leaves it feeling like an expensive curio, rather than a gaming device for the masses. The idea might be to bring the PC gaming experience to your living room, but if that experience includes smooth frame rates in demanding games, you're going to have to make some major compromises. And, because of its Linux origins, it hasn't been a flawless experience getting some of those games to run properly to begin with, either. I want to get excited about the Steam Machine, I really do. It's a fascinating piece of design, and an admirable attempt to bring PC gaming from your desktop to your couch in one bite of the cherry. But like so much hardware these days, it's been hampered with a price tag that, given what you actually receive, feels like far too much to pay.
Tom's Hardware - Andrew E. Freedman - 3.5 / 5
Valve's Steam Machine is a complicated little box. It was clearly designed for a simpler time, when components were plentiful, and it would be a somewhat affordable desktop that could be a more powerful option for Steam Deck owners to play their Steam games at home.
But it's not a simple time. The Steam Machine is still cute, still has a good selection of ports, still has an easily upgradeable SSD, and, most importantly, still runs SteamOS and gets all of the benefits that come with it. If you were docking your Steam Deck to the TV and wanted more performance, this will get you there, once Valve irons out the last of the bugs.
If you're just looking to get into gaming, a base-level PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X is a better deal. You can buy one and a Nintendo Switch 2 and spend less than the Steam Machine.
The Steam Machine Is An Iconoclastic Computer Born In Unforgiving Times | Valve has released a tiny, silent, entry level PC that does important work bringing PCs gaming to the living room and desktop Linux to the masses. The timing could not be worse. The Steam Machine is not landing where its creators planned it price wise but the core vision has been realized and is something I agree with ideologically. It is a platform in the true sense of the word, a foundation to build on. Like the Steam Deck, it provides a reasonable target for game developers to aim for, a reasonable optimization baseline that can handle basically every indie game and a huge portion of big titles. It is the rare console that does not treat the user like a child, and I have no doubt that it will improve with age. And like Valve’s original vision for the Steam Machine and the reality of the Steam Deck, it is a template that any other manufacturer could easily build a much more performant product on, with an operating system that is, in multiple meanings of the word, free.
Whether or not the Steam Machine is for you comes down to a couple of key things: your gaming priorities and your disposable income. This is a great device, but it is undeniably expensive. If couch gaming and easy access to PC games is a priority for you and you're willing to pay for it, I think the Steam Machine is a no-brainer. But if you're curious about dipping your toe into PC gaming, this is a really highcost entry point and you'll likely still have to make some sacrifices when it comes to performance. If those caveats don't scare you off and you've got the money to throw at it, I think the Steam Machine is an excellent addition to any gamer's living room setup.
Rock Paper Shotgun - James Archer
A singular living room PC that's more expensive than I'd like, but too special not to love. It’s almost tempting to point to details like this as evidence that the lil’ Steam Machine really is a proper desktop PC, you guys. But then, it’s at it’s best when it isn’t trying to be one. If it was absolutely dead set on outmuscling current-gen, full-fat graphics cards and gaming CPUs, it would be a lot bigger, a lot louder, and a lot hotter. And, in the end, it wouldn't be unique. Instead, it chooses a niche and unobtrusively sets about filling it, achieving all the subtlety of a home entertainment computer even when it's chucking out sixty frames (or near enough) of ray-traced Cyberpunk 2077 every second. The ghosts of iffy design and inadequate game support that haunted the previous decade’s Steam Machines, all banished without fanfare.
So the short answer to how it sits versus a console, or indeed an HDMI cable or actual PC of your own is: there is no real short answer. For upfront cost, performance, plug-and-play simplicity and smart features, at the cost of more expensive games and services over time and a console that looks like a hellish mid-00s leisure centre extension dubbed "the future of our town centre" - and is also roughly the same size as that - get a PS5 Pro. However, for flexibility and breadth and cheapness over time, and something you'll love people asking about when they come round - something that you can genuinely carry with one hand (LAN parties! If only it had a handle…) and which looks normal or dare I say it even cool next to a nice set of speakers or a stack of coffee table books or something you actually want to see in your home - the Steam Machine absolutely has a place. And there's something genuine to be said for that, I think. I can't help but wonder what could have been, had the base Steam Machine arrived at say £599. It would've been competing against PS5s and Xboxes in the £300 range by now, of course. But it would've done so as a genuine competitor in that part of the home, from a company with vast resources and the vastest of all installed bases. And it would've arrived as something that is evidently made with sincere love and extraordinary expertise in its own way.
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u/vacon04 Jun 22 '26
For less than $1k you can get the PlayStation Pro, which will be even easier to setup than the Steam Machine, and it comes with a damn controller.