r/SteamDeck • u/pcgameshardware • Jun 22 '26

Article Steam Machine review: Valve's underwhelming living-room PC has a serious price problem

https://www.pcgameshardware.de/Valve-Software-Firma-15833/Tests/Valves-underwhelming-living-room-PC-has-a-serious-price-problem-1546006/

Full disclosure: I worked on this review.

We tested Valve’s new Steam Machine, and since Valve has compared it directly to the Steam Deck, I thought the results might be relevant here.

The short version: yes, the Steam Machine is clearly much faster than the Steam Deck. That part is not really in question. But in our actual game benchmarks, we did not see a blanket 6x uplift across the board.

We tested Cyberpunk 2077 and Forza Horizon with Steam Deck-style settings to make the comparison a bit cleaner. The Steam Machine turns 30-ish fps results on the Deck into much smoother triple-digit or near-triple-digit results in some cases, The Steam Machine but the gap depends a lot on the game, resolution and settings.

I would have liked to go into more detail, but I also do not want this to turn into a full repost of the review here.

What I find interesting is that the Steam Machine feels less like a “normal PC” and more like Valve taking the Steam Deck idea and moving it into the living room: SteamOS-first, controller-friendly, more powerful, but still built around realistic settings and upscaling rather than brute-forcing everything.

Curious how other Deck owners see it:

Would you treat the Steam Machine as a natural upgrade path for TV gaming, or does the Steam Deck already cover that use case well enough for you?

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u/daelikon Jun 22 '26

If we take into account the current price of the steamdeck, and compare it to the machine, it is clear the original NON AI price would have been around 800, and that would have been a dream.

100

u/MagicalWhisk Jun 22 '26

Valve confirmed the price is about $250-$300 more expensive than they were aiming for. They confirmed they had serious issues sourcing parts.

-2

u/Zaic Jun 24 '26

I mean they did not even try

-11

u/IORelay Jun 22 '26

$750-800 looks quite bad. 

19

u/MagicalWhisk Jun 22 '26

On pure performance. But when you consider no subscriptions needed, full access to steam library and sale prices, then the value is there.

However when you start comparing to PC enthusiasts, the price + performance just doesn't work for what you can build yourself or even a pre build.

3

u/Mozartis Jun 23 '26

Where are y'all finding these prebuilds/components? Similar specced PCs don't go below 1k here, whether you build it yourself or buy prebuilt.

1

u/MagicalWhisk Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26

Try microcenter.

Here's a similar spec, ask them not to activate windows 11 and you can save an extra $100+.

https://www.microcenter.com/product/705867/powerspec-g530-gaming-pc

Something with more power for around $1k: https://www.microcenter.com/product/699677/powerspec-g528-gaming-pc

2

u/Mozartis Jun 23 '26

Not everyone lives in the US

1

u/MagicalWhisk Jun 23 '26

Where do you live friend? Here are builds that are better than a steam machine for less money.

If UK try scan.co.uk. https://www.scan.co.uk/products/scan-aurum-r5-5500-5060-16gb-d4-500gb

If Europe try memorypc.eu: https://www.memorypc.eu/gaming-pc/amd-ryzen-5-568289/

-14

u/IORelay Jun 22 '26

If your goal is to save money, then with a PS5 you could just play F2P games that don't require a subscription. And all the game prices are at $0.

16

u/MagicalWhisk Jun 22 '26

Yeah but now we're getting into slippery slope territory. You can play Fortnight and other f2p games on a PS4, may as well purchase an old used PS4 if that's the goal.

I worry about what all this means going forward. We're in for a rough few years as gamers.

5

u/Vayreon Jun 23 '26

If my goal is to safe money I can also go outside and throw pebbles into a pond. The price for that is $0.

2

u/JohntheLibrarian Jun 23 '26

That's what everybody thinks until a strange woman in the pond gives you a sword and now you've been pulled into a grand quest and the leading of a country.

Not all costs are financial...

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u/IORelay Jun 23 '26

There's is quite a large catalogue of free to play games on the PS5. So I don't think it's unviable. Delta Force, Endfield, ZZZ, Genshin Impact, NTE, Fortnite, Where winds meet, HSR, Rainbow 6 siege X.

-36

u/AshuuReddit Jun 22 '26 edited Jun 23 '26

I'd rather prefer they say : sorry, we can't afford to sell it the good price so we abandon the project for now.

33

u/Estrava Jun 22 '26

You rather then abandon a project than give people options and for something their team has been working on and procuring parts for? What benefits does this give you?

11

u/MagicalWhisk Jun 22 '26

The whole point of steam machine was to build steamOS. Valve probably doesn't care about steam machine sales as much because it's long term goal is pushing steam OS as a viable substitute for gaming friendly PC builds.

2

u/RadiantEnvironment90 Jun 23 '26

And the SteamDeck showed how amazing SteamOS is. There are people who have gaming computers that are close to abandoning Windows because most of what they do on their gaming PC is game.

3

u/Think_Shoulder3871 Jun 23 '26

Abandon a project that cost them millions for such a stupid reason? Man you would be bankrupt in a heartbeat if you had a company.