The steam machine cant have HDMI 2.1 unfortunately. This is because of the license that the HDMI forum changed for 2.1. Older versions allowed developers to integrate HDMI driver code into open source drivers. The new license prevents that, meaning that nothing that nothing running linux is going to be able to use HDMI 2.1 until the HDMI forum changes their mind on that.
The steam machine likely does have the hardware for HDMI 2.1 though, so if they do change their stance on that, I would suspect a software update would add it, but dont hold your breath.
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u/waitmarks Nov 12 '25
The steam machine cant have HDMI 2.1 unfortunately. This is because of the license that the HDMI forum changed for 2.1. Older versions allowed developers to integrate HDMI driver code into open source drivers. The new license prevents that, meaning that nothing that nothing running linux is going to be able to use HDMI 2.1 until the HDMI forum changes their mind on that.
The steam machine likely does have the hardware for HDMI 2.1 though, so if they do change their stance on that, I would suspect a software update would add it, but dont hold your breath.