Steam Machines pre-orders up

[mizzou]

I don't know if this is a repost, but


http://www.gamestop.com/steammachine

http://www.gamestop.com/pc/consoles/alienware-steam-machine-i7-1tb/121863

http://www.alienware.com/Landings/steammachine/

Some things to note:

WILL THE ALIENWARE STEAM MACHINE BE ABLE TO RUN WINDOWS?
The Alienware Steam Machine is pre-loaded with Valve’s SteamOS. It will support a Windows operating system but customers would be at their own risk to install it over what comes factory shipped.


ALIENWARE ALPHA AND THE ALIENWARE STEAM MACHINE LOOK AESTHETICALLY THE SAME. ARE THERE ANY DIFFERENCES?
Aesthetically, everything will be the same except the corner, which will have a Steam logo. Additionally, we have upgraded the Alienware Steam Machine hard drive, which will be available for hardware shipping in November 2015.

WHAT WILL THE ALIENWARE STEAM MACHINE BE BUNDLED WITH?
It will come bundled with a Steam Controller and bonus game content to be announced later. We want everyone to be able to start gaming right out of the box.

WILL IT BE UPGRADEABLE?
Yes, the CPU, memory, hard drive and wireless cards are upgradable.



--------------
So basically you are buying a Alienware Alpha PC with SteamOS loaded instead of Windows. No one should be shocked here. I'm unimpressed with the hardware on the alpha platform...although it's size appears to be something nice and this should honestly be something more to compete in the mobile market then desktop.


I'm curious though...wouldn't you rather have something with a windows 8.1 license than something with only a free SteamOS installation? I see that this might be beneficial to those who are a novice at installing/uninstalling operating systems and drivers. Grandma buys little Johnny a SteamBox and they can literally fire it up, create an account, and start playing Steam Big Picture games on the TV.

I feel like it is a gimped PC though without the ability to load Windows.... :\

I'm excited to see potential FPS benefits by moving away from DirectX...THAT is what will sell me on installing a SteamOS.

 

[Artorias]

I cant view the specs for some reason.

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

I'm sure it's the same hardware as the Alpha. The base model of that with Windows has been <$350 at least a couple of times. That was a pretty good deal, this at msrp w/o Windows isn't.

Edit: Yeah, specs are buried on alienware's page:

WHAT KIND OF HARDWARE IS GOING TO BE IN THE ALIENWARE STEAM MACHINE?

Our base configuration offers Intel® Core&#8482; processors, NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX GPU 2GB GDDR5, 4GB of memory and a 500 GB HDD. Upgrades include more memory, larger hard drives, faster CPU, including Intel ® Core&#8482; i5 and i7 and better wireless options.

Edit 2: Here are the Syber machines:
http://www.sybergaming.com/products/steam-machine.aspx
Ooh, and from the pics here it looks like there's a full height two-slot video card in there.

 

[mizzou]

I cant view the specs for some reason.

They aren't on there. You may as well just look at the specs on the ALpha since it's more or less a rebadged ALpha.

http://www.dell.com/us/p/alienware-alpha/pd?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&fl=p&~ck=mn&ndlvid=1658-318799

They all use this GPU right now.

Alpha chassis with NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 860M+ GPU 2GB GDDR5

They also use these CPUs

Intel® Core™ i3-4130T Dual-Core processor (3M Cache, 2.9GHz)
Intel® Core™ i5-4590T Quad-Core processor (6M Cache, up to 3.0GH
Intel® Core™ i7-4765T Quad-Core processor (8M Cache, up to 3.0 GHz)

4GB Dual Channel DDR3L 1600MHz
8GB Dual Channel DDR3L 1600MHz

1TB SATA 6Gb/s


Chassis Dimensions & Weight
Height: 2.7” (55mm)
Depth: 7.87” (200mm)
Width: 7.87” (200mm)
Starting at Weight: 4lbs (1.81 Kg.)

External Chassis Connections
2x USB 2.0 (Front)
2x USB 3.0 (Back)
1x RJ45 GbE
1x HDMI-Out 1.4a
1x HDMI-In
1x optical audio out (Toslink)
1x DC in

Internal Chassis Connections
1x USB 2.0 – Tool-less access via bottom door
--------------------------

I imagine they will UP the specs a bit on release...there is no reason to expect these will remain the same on an October release schedule.

 

[Artorias]

Kind of weak imo. If you're starting to go over the $650 range you might as well save some more money up and get yourself a top of the line desktop.

 

[Elcs]

Well that's no good... I was expecting a steampunk focused TBS a la KB/HoMM

 

[mizzou]

Kind of weak imo. If you're starting to go over the $650 range you might as well save some more money up and get yourself a top of the line desktop.

I wonder if they will get a mobile version of Skylake and a Pascal nvidia mobile GPU?

The 860M is woefully inadequate. The Intel CPU's are already a little long in the tooth...although capable.

If the hardware remains the same...I foresee many games running at sub 30fps.


I thought Steam Machines would fare better with some sort of standardized hardware, but that doesn't seem to be the case. People with no experience on PC's are going to be mystified and angry when their friends Steambox runs at 60fps and theirs runs at 12fps.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I wonder if they will get a mobile version of Skylake and a Pascal nvidia mobile GPU?

The 860M is woefully inadequate. The Intel CPU's are already a little long in the tooth...although capable.

If the hardware remains the same...I foresee many games running at sub 30fps.


I thought Steam Machines would fare better with some sort of standardized hardware, but that doesn't seem to be the case. People with no experience on PC's are going to be mystified and angry when their friends Steambox runs at 60fps and theirs runs at 12fps.

If they don't know the answer to that then they don't know their FPS.
I do agree the steam boxes don't seem to be thought out too well.

 

[TeknoBug]

The i3 4130T version is of some interest, but I can probably build something similar to it for almost $200 less (i3 4130T + 8GB ram + GTX750Ti + Silverstone RAVEN case).

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

There are a lot of customization options for the Syber machines and prices aren't too bad for something that's just unbox and go. Here's an i5, 8GB, & 970 for $866:
http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/saved/1H2K4T

 

[CPA]

So, no upgrading of the video card then?

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Not in the Alienware. IMO those are DOA for anything but the i3 model. Those Syber machines on the other hand... You'll pay for it, but you can have a slick system there.

 

[Subyman]

Thought about picking up the steam link and controller, but may as well wait for them to come out and see the reviews.

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

I just saw the Steam Link only has a 10/100 ethernet port. Steam recommends gigabit for streaming.

 

[thilanliyan]

There are a lot of customization options for the Syber machines and prices aren't too bad for something that's just unbox and go. Here's an i5, 8GB, & 970 for $866:
http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/saved/1H2K4T

How come you can't pick an AMD card? Does Cyber not sell AMD cards?

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Looks like they'll be added:
* To get the Free AMD Dirt Rally Game Coupon, you must purchase Radeon R9 Series graphics OR AMD FX6000 Processors or above.

 

[rivethead]

Thought about picking up the steam link and controller, but may as well wait for them to come out and see the reviews.

Same here. And I agree....wait and see.

 

[mizzou]

Well this definitely has me excited for what is to come several years down the road. With better OpenGL/DirectX API's, more refined multi-core technology, and VR...things are going to be very very interesting

 

[cmdrdredd]

I wonder if they will get a mobile version of Skylake and a Pascal nvidia mobile GPU?

The 860M is woefully inadequate. The Intel CPU's are already a little long in the tooth...although capable.

If the hardware remains the same...I foresee many games running at sub 30fps.


I thought Steam Machines would fare better with some sort of standardized hardware, but that doesn't seem to be the case. People with no experience on PC's are going to be mystified and angry when their friends Steambox runs at 60fps and theirs runs at 12fps.

That's the problem. There's no target base spec that every box has. This can't happen if it's playing what amounts to PC games and ports. People will have to adjust settings and all that too and I don't think the market these are for will know what to do with the settings and may wonder why their friend plays the same game as you said, at 60fps while their game is running slow and looks worse.

 

[cmdrdredd]

I just saw the Steam Link only has a 10/100 ethernet port. Steam recommends gigabit for streaming.

That's ridiculous... gigabit should be the standard for everything these days.

 

[PieIsAwesome]

Regular desktop + Steam Link => Steam Machine pointless?

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

That's ridiculous... gigabit should be the standard for everything these days.

Yeah, I was specifically looking forward to the Link but I'm not going to bother now with this Liva dropping down to $100 on occasion. It may even go lower before Nov or something better could drop before then.

 

[Lonyo]

Regular desktop + Steam Link => Steam Machine pointless?

If you already own a high end gaming PC, then buying a lower spec gaming PC would be rather pointless unless you really wanted two gaming PCs.

Regular desktop => Steam machine pointless unless you want 2 gaming PCs.

Desktop + laptop = Steam machine pointless.
etc etc

 

[RampantAndroid]

If you already own a high end gaming PC, then buying a lower spec gaming PC would be rather pointless unless you really wanted two gaming PCs.

Regular desktop => Steam machine pointless unless you want 2 gaming PCs.

Desktop + laptop = Steam machine pointless.
etc etc

Well, Desktop + laptop IF your desktop monitor aspect ratio matches your Laptop. My monitor is 1080p; my laptop is a Retina screen at 16:10...so black bars. I just gave up and sat in front of my gaming PC to...game.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Has steam game streaming been reviewed anywhere? I wonder how it compares to Nvidia's streaming. About the same or worse?

My big problem would be input lag, even on a gigabit network.