Steam Machine Hands-On: First Impressions of Valve’s New Console-Like Gaming PC

Steam Machines are backmost for the archetypal clip since Valve teamed up with manufacturers similar Alienware and Lenovo backmost successful the 2010s. But portion those archetypal console-PC hybrids failed due to the fact that of a deficiency of crippled compatibility with the nascent SteamOS, 2022’s Steam Deck has paved the mode for the Steam Machine’s return.

This clip around, alternatively of partnering with extracurricular manufacturers, Valve is gathering and releasing a singular Steam Machine with the extremity of being capable to tally each existent games astatine 4K with upscaling. The concealed down this is an AMD RDNA 3 GPU with powerfulness astir equivalent to an RTX 4060 oregon RX 7600 mobile graphics card. That mightiness beryllium disappointing to anyone looking to max retired everything astatine a precocious resolution, but it should person plentifulness of powerfulness portion inactive being comparatively affordable (we assume) – Valve hasn’t announced a terms for the happening yet.

I spent a time astatine Valve playing astir with this caller mini gaming PC, and portion I haven’t had the accidental to tally my accustomed gamut of gaming benchmarks, it looks similar the caller Steam Machine mightiness beryllium a superior contender for your surviving country space.

What’s Changed?

On the surface, the caller Steam Machine seems a batch similar the aged Steam Machine. They’re some gaming PCs with a humble spec, and meant to tally games connected Valve’s ain Linux-based SteamOS. But portion the archetypal machines had occupation selling, mostly owed to precocious prices and a deficiency of Linux compatibility astatine the time, SteamOS has changed a batch implicit the past decade.

The biggest portion of that is Proton, Valve’s compatibility furniture that fundamentally translates Windows games to Linux, allowing you to play astir of Steam’s immense catalog of games connected SteamOS, adjacent if they don’t officially enactment Linux. Anyone that’s utilized a Steam Deck implicit the past fewer years volition cognize that astir games tally highly good connected SteamOS, sometimes adjacent with show that exceeds equivalent Windows 11 machines, arsenic was the lawsuit with the SteamOS mentation of the Lenovo Legion Go S. There are a fewer exceptions – notably immoderate online multiplayer games with anti-cheat bundle that doesn’t play bully with SteamOS, similar Battlefield 6 and Destiny 2 – but for the astir part, if it’s connected Steam, it’ll tally connected SteamOS.

While I was astatine Valve playing games connected the Steam Machine, the institution had a wide assortment of games installed to amusement it off. The PC ran everything from Cyberpunk 2077 to Silent Hill F without immoderate large issues – though the second did person immoderate show trouble. Obviously, erstwhile I get the Steam Machine successful the lab, I’ll beryllium capable to tally a wider assortment of games to spot conscionable however flexible it is, but for the clip being, it seems similar astir games volition run.

Luckily, Valve is besides taking the Steam Deck Verified programme from the Steam Deck and duplicating it for the Steam Machine. Soon determination volition beryllium 3 antithetic verification badges: 1 each for the Steam Deck, Steam Machine and the Steam Frame, the company’s caller VR headset. Because the hardware isn’t really retired yet, I’m not definite however wide this volition be, but Valve has been precise palmy with the Steam Deck Verified program, to the constituent wherever I usage it to gauge whether games volition tally good connected different PC handhelds.

Design

The Steam Machine mightiness beryllium a gaming PC, but it doesn’t truly look similar one. It’s a tiny achromatic container with a slim RGB lightbar crossed the front, mostly meant to bespeak that it’s on. And erstwhile I accidental it’s tiny, I mean it: the PC is simply a cube that measures astir 6-7 inches connected each side, and appears little than fractional the size of the Xbox Series X. It’s person successful size to a GameCube.

The beforehand sheet is magnetic, too, and tin beryllium swapped retired to customize the mode the console looks. For instance, erstwhile I was astatine Valve, I saw a Steam Machine with a wood panel, which contrasted beautifully with the remainder of the all-black chassis. Valve hasn’t confirmed whether oregon not it volition beryllium selling alternate beforehand panels, but the institution volition merchandise 3D Printing files truthful you tin marque your own, and third-party accessory companies volition undoubtedly merchantability plentifulness of customized options for you to take from.

Because this is ostensibly a desktop PC, there’s a wealthiness of ports connected offer, with 2 USB-A ports and a MicroSD larboard connected the front. In the backmost you’ll find a DisplayPort, HDMI, 2 USB-A ports and a USB-C port, on with the powerfulness connector. What’s impressive, considering the Machine’s size, is that the existent powerfulness proviso is internal, which means you don’t person to interest astir fitting a elephantine powerfulness ceramic successful your amusement center.

Valve did unfastened up the Steam Machine truthful I could get a little look inside, and what I saw was impressive. A bulk of the abstraction is taken up by a elephantine heatsink, which has an exhaust instrumentality astatine the backmost that sucks aerial done the beforehand and bottommost of the instrumentality and expels it done the rear to support the instrumentality operating cool. It’s a bold design, particularly considering that the Steam Machine’s GPU is operating with a TDP (thermal plan power) of 110-130W. I’ll person to hold and spot however its thermals equilibrium retired erstwhile I get the strategy successful for reappraisal aboriginal adjacent year.

The bottommost of the instrumentality houses the SSD, which volition either beryllium a 512GB oregon a 2TB drive, depending connected which mentation you buy. This thrust is easy replaceable by the user. Just similar the Steam Deck, the Steam Machine volition vessel with an NVMe 2230 drive. However, dissimilar Valve’s handheld, the SSD slot has abstraction for a full-sized NVMe 2280 drive, which are some much affordable and easier to find connected store shelves. Don’t get excessively hopeful astir upgrading the instrumentality beyond the storage, though – the remainder of the components are soldered connected and volition not beryllium upgradeable.

That’s a small disappointing, particularly fixed Valve’s past of letting its users bash what they privation with the hardware. However, if the remainder of the internals were user-swappable, it wouldn’t beryllium capable to beryllium arsenic tiny arsenic it is. Whether oregon not that tradeoff is worthy it is up to you, but fixed the Steam Machine’s console-like qualities, it volition apt entreaty astir to radical who conscionable privation a plug-and-play gaming device. For them, I fishy the deficiency of upgradeability volition beryllium a non-issue – astatine slightest until it starts showing its property successful a fewer years.

The Steam Machine volition besides beryllium disposable with the caller Steam Controller – oregon without one. No substance whether oregon not you get the Steam Machine bundled with the controller oregon not, though, the PC volition person the controller’s wireless dongle built-in, truthful you don’t person to interest astir ever having 1 of your USB ports occupied by a small antenna. What’s better, though, is that the Steam Controller that’s bundled with the strategy volition also travel with a wireless dongle, which you tin usage with different system, oregon conscionable person it connected the array adjacent to you to wirelessly complaint the controller erstwhile you’re not utilizing it.

Tying things up is an RGB airy barroom that stretches crossed the bottommost of the Steam Machine, conscionable beneath the removable beforehand panel. Valve tells maine that this is chiefly meant to beryllium a presumption indicator, but it is inactive user-addressable, with 13 lighting zones. I don’t cognize what benignant of bundle Valve is cooking up for lighting control, though. (One of the symptom points with SteamOS close present – astatine slightest with the Legion Go S – is that it’s not that casual to customize the RGB astir the thumbsticks.) We’ll conscionable person to hold and spot what the last bundle looks similar present earlier rendering judgment.

Specs and Performance

The Steam Machine is powered by a customized spot made by AMD and Valve, with a RDNA 3 GPU with 28 compute units and a TDP betwixt 110-130W, which would spot it astir astir a mobile RX 7600 – not precisely the champion graphics spot retired there. This is paired with a 6-core Zen 4 CPU with a TDP astir 30W.

But contempt the humble specs, the Steam Machine seems to beryllium a susceptible gaming PC. I played Cyberpunk 2077 astatine 4K with the Ultra preset and FSR acceptable to Performance, and the enactment stayed bully and smooth. I adjacent went into the settings paper and turned connected ray tracing, and show seemed to enactment coagulated – though I didn’t person a framework antagonistic up telling maine precisely what benignant of framework complaint I was getting.

Things were somewhat antithetic with Silent Hill F, though. After a lengthy process of installing the shaders – thing each crippled seems to request to bash these days – it defaulted to Ultra settings astatine 4K with TSR (temporal ace resolution) alternatively of AMD’s FSR. At these settings, Silent Hill struggled, chugging on astatine what seemed similar 15-20 fps – not precisely what I’d telephone playable. After adjusting the settings down to mean astatine 1440p with FSR enabled, things felt overmuch better, but this conscionable highlights that the Steam Machine is inactive a gaming PC astatine the extremity of the day, for amended oregon worse. Tweaking settings to optimize show is simply a time-honored contented among PC gamers, but again, mightiness beryllium little appealing to radical who conscionable privation a plug-and-play gaming experience.

Valve says it intends for the Steam Machine to beryllium capable to play each existent games astatine 4K with FSR upscaling, but determination are going to beryllium plentifulness of games – particularly ones moving connected Unreal Engine 5 – wherever you’ll person to little settings to get it moving astatine a creaseless framework rate. Ultimately, I’ll person to get it successful the laboratory to benchmark it to spot precisely what it’ll beryllium susceptible of, but I person small uncertainty this PC volition beryllium running astir things – it’s conscionable that the prime settings are decidedly going to vary.

It’s apt that implicit clip developers volition beryllium capable to consciousness the Steam Machine hardware and automatically acceptable prime settings that are appropriate. After all, galore games bash that with the Steam Deck now, but lone clip volition archer if the Steam Machine volition person the aforesaid treatment. If it does, though, this happening could beryllium a superior contender successful the adjacent procreation of consoles, particularly arsenic the adjacent Xbox looks progressively PC-like.

Who Is This For?

According to Valve, astir 20% of its Steam Deck users utilized its authoritative dock to link their handheld to their TV. That mightiness not look similar a lot, but fixed that Valve has shipped millions of Steam Decks – a first-generation product, caput you – that 20% is not an insignificant magnitude of people. However, determination are limitations to moving a Steam Deck connected a TV – main among them is performance.

While the Steam Deck is plentifulness almighty for moving PC games connected its 800p display, it can’t truly grip higher resolutions precise well, particularly erstwhile you link it to a 4K TV. The Steam Machine, then, is the answer. This is simply a surviving country gaming PC that should beryllium capable to play astir games astatine 4K, assuming you’re good with upscaling from 1080p. But of course, astir gaming PCs should beryllium capable to bash that these days.

And portion the Steam Machine volition person to contend with likewise spec’d gaming PCs that tin beryllium upgraded, I don’t deliberation this is for the accepted DIY hardware enthusiast. Rather, this feels much similar a PC for console gamers – radical who didn’t play games connected PC until the Steam Deck deed the marketplace successful 2022. It runs the aforesaid operating strategy and has the aforesaid library, lone it’ll beryllium capable to play games astatine overmuch higher settings. After all, Valve claims the Steam Machine is up to six times much almighty than the Steam Deck, truthful it should debar situations similar Baldur’s Gate 3, wherever the 2nd you load into Act 3 connected the handheld, your framerate slows to a crawl.

So, if the Steam Deck made you flirt with the thought of PC gaming, the Steam Machine looks similar it’ll beryllium a large adjacent step, particularly arsenic games get progressively much demanding arsenic we caput into the adjacent procreation of consoles. For everyone other that already has a gaming PC, astatine slightest the hardware enactment for SteamOS is starting to broaden a bit.

Just How Expensive Will This Thing Be?

It’s intolerable to speech astir PC hardware successful 2025 without bringing up the price. Devices from the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X successful October to the RTX 5080 backmost successful January person each launched with importantly higher prices compared to what they would person been successful erstwhile years. Console pricing hasn’t fared overmuch better, arsenic the Switch 2 deed store shelves astatine $150 much than its predecessor, portion the PS5 and Xbox Series X person some faced terms hikes wrong the past year. Valve hasn’t shared pricing for the Steam Machine yet. The lone guidance the institution has shared with maine was that it volition beryllium priced competitively with likewise spec’d gaming PCs.

Keeping successful caput that this is moving a last-generation GPU and processor, it could mean that pricing mightiness extremity up being comparatively tenable – but we conscionable won’t cognize until Valve decides to stock more. I’ll update this preview arsenic soon arsenic I find out, but my anticipation is that Valve keeps the Steam Machine nether $1,000. If it wants to vie for Xbox’s and PlayStation’s abstraction successful the surviving room, it’ll person to.

For much sum of Valve's caller hardware, cheque retired our hands-on previews of the Steam Controller and Steam Frame, arsenic good arsenic our investigation of what this could mean for the aboriginal of the console and PC landscape.

Jackie Thomas is the Hardware and Buying Guides Editor astatine IGN and the PC components queen. You tin travel her @Jackiecobra