Steamroller becomes first prebuilt gaming PC to ship with SteamOS — Ryzen 9600X, Radeon RX 7600, 16GB DDR5 RAM system available for preorder at $1,299

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Controller not included.

The Steamroller prebuilt gaming PC running on SteamOS
(Image credit: Meta PCs)

Meta PCs has announced preorders for Steamroller, the first prebuilt gaming PC running on SteamOS. The system features standard PC components that are broadly similar to those offered by Valve in the base variant of the Steam Machine. Priced at $1,299, the Steamroller is available for preorder now, with shipping set to begin on July 3, 2026. Buyers can also opt for an extended warranty, with two-year and three-year plans available for $180 and $240, respectively.

The Steamroller uses the Jonsbo D32, a well-ventilated m-ATX chassis with an AMD Ryzen 9600X, which is a 6-core, 12-thread CPU capable of boosting up to 5.4 GHz. Meta PCs mentions that the B650M/B650M Wi-Fi m-ATX motherboard will vary in brand and styling, meaning not all Steamroller PCs are alike, though they shouldn’t vary in terms of performance. For graphics, the system comes with AMD’s last-gen Radeon RX 7600 based on the RDNA 3 architecture with 8GB of GDDR6 memory. The system also includes 16GB of DDR5 RAM at 5600 MT/s, a 1TB NVMe M.2 SSD, a 240mm AIO liquid cooler, and a 650W Gold power supply unit.

In terms of hardware, the Steamroller seems competitive with Valve's new Steam Machine. Since it includes standard PC components, one also gains the ability to upgrade almost any component in the future, unlike the Steam Machine, which only allows you to swap the RAM and storage. That said, the Steam Machine is more compact, measuring at 152 × 162 × 156 mm (6.0 × 6.4 × 6.1 inches), justifying its console/living room PC purpose.

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Another aspect to consider is practicality. The Steam Machine supports HDMI CEC, a protocol that allows it to communicate and control compatible devices such as your TV and soundbar. This allows you to power on the Steam Machine and your TV simultaneously, and even switch to the correct input, without leaving your couch or reaching for a remote. Unfortunately, HDMI CEC is not supported on most PCs, including the Steamroller. The Steam Machine also features standby and quick resume functionality, which allows you to put the system to sleep and jump back into your game almost instantly.

The Steamroller is essentially aimed at potential customers who want a gaming PC running on SteamOS with the flexibility of standard PC hardware. While it may lack some of the living room-focused features available on the Steam Machine, it makes up for them by offering a system that is easier to upgrade and repair, while also offering a way to experience SteamOS without assembling an entire system.

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Kunal Khullar
Kunal Khullar
News Contributor

Kunal Khullar is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware.  He is a long time technology journalist and reviewer specializing in PC components and peripherals, and welcomes any and every question around building a PC.

22 Comments Comment from the forums
  • usertests
    HDMI CEC ought to be standard everywhere. It's on Raspberry Pi but not your battlestation #sad
    Reply
  • John Kiser
    You can basicslly build this exact system for about 150 less than this thing costs. It does show the steam machine really isn't that overpriced either. The fact of the matter is if you price out equivalent systems it wouldn't make much profit per unit even taking bulk ordering into account. It is a bad time to do these cuz of costs right now
    Reply
  • ezst036
    I mean, it makes sense that a gaming PC should come with a gaming OS instead of a business OS that isn't a gaming OS but it has gaming extras bolted onto it.

    Yeah it really does help tremendously that the business OS has been the default for basically ever, however at the end of the day its a business OS, not a gaming OS.

    Actually, Microsoft has stated publicly that they want it to be an agentic OS at that. Again. Not a gaming OS and gaming is not the primary future direction either.

    SteamOS's future is not agentic. SteamOS's future is gaming.
    Reply
  • TerryLaze
    ezst036 said:
    I mean, it makes sense that a gaming PC should come with a gaming OS instead of a business OS that isn't a gaming OS but it has gaming extras bolted onto it.

    Yeah it really does help tremendously that the business OS has been the default for basically ever, however at the end of the day its a business OS, not a gaming OS.

    Actually, Microsoft has stated publicly that they want it to be an agentic OS at that. Again. Not a gaming OS.
    And how exactly is arch OS a gaming OS??????????
    It's a generic linux with gaming stuff bolted onto it, the only difference is that it has fewer things to interfere.

    Xbox has been using a stripped down version of normal windows for decades now, that is more gaming legitness than arch has.
    Reply
  • ezst036
    TerryLaze said:
    And how exactly is arch OS a gaming OS??????????
    If you want to overwrite SteamOS and install Arch on your computer I guess that's your choice, but you should not expect Arch to be a gaming OS like SteamOS is.
    Reply
  • JamesJones44
    TerryLaze said:
    And how exactly is arch OS a gaming OS??????????
    It's a generic linux with gaming stuff bolted onto it, the only difference is that it has fewer things to interfere.

    Xbox has been using a stripped down version of normal windows for decades now, that is more gaming legitness than arch has.
    Neither are really "gaming" OSs. They're both just repurposed "business" or "consumer" OSs with gaming API add-ons. That was the whole point of DirectX (beyond the fact that MS hoped it would kill OpenGL and other non-proprietary add ons).
    Reply
  • ezst036
    In comparing the upcoming Steamroller to the upcoming Phantom V4 (the closest spec it seems MetaPC offers), the price difference is quite large.

    $1,299 vs $1,849.

    The biggest variance appears to be an Nvidia GPU compared to an AMD one for the Steamroller but I really do not think that a RTX 5060 is 500 dollars different - is it??? I suppose there could be other things affecting the price which are unseen. Motherboard type, mATX case cost, and other things.

    But otherwise, by not having Windows this Steamroller appears to be saving people money right out of the gate. This is a good thing in these days of RAMpocalypse and which also SteamOS is going to have more of that 16GB of memory at the ready for the user than Windows will.

    https://www.metapcs.com/products/phantom-v4
    People keep saying gaming is dead, its a luxury nobody can afford anymore due to RAMpocalypse, well, no, SteamOS is keeping the dream alive.

    Thanks Valve!
    Reply
  • TerryLaze
    ezst036 said:
    If you want to overwrite SteamOS and install Arch on your computer I guess that's your choice, but you should not expect Arch to be a gaming OS like SteamOS is.
    SteamOS is based on arch, it's arch with gaming stuff bolted on...
    Reply
  • dva852
    John Kiser said:
    You can basicslly build this exact system for about 150 less than this thing costs. It does show the steam machine really isn't that overpriced either.
    It's not really comparable. No matter how small a qty buy, Valve can obviously get parts cheaper than one-off retail. OTOH, it has to incur substantial manufacturing costs. Much of these are fixed upfront costs: Engineering (design/develop/test), compliance (FCC, CE, RoHS), tooling for chassis/case/etc.

    For variable costs, I expect Valve to have bought most parts in large qty to get good tiering discounts--CPU/GPU/VRAM/HS/etc. Items with volatile pricing like RAM/SSD are on-demand per production run.

    The over-$1K mark is most likely deliberate, going over the psychological $999 threshold. It leaves room for further price increases w/o buyers throwing (more) hissy fits, which is likely given higher price forecasts for RAM.

    I ran SM's guesstimated cost breakdown through a chatbot. For small (1000 unit) production runs, $650-850/unit, incl unamortized tooling costs. For large (100,000) runs, $220-300/unit. The specific amounts are most likely wrong, but what's relevant is the large difference in costs per economy of scale.

    Re: HDMI-CEC - You can work around it with zero cost.

    . Wake PC with game controller: Most controllers using wireless (2.4GHz) dongle can do this. BT-connected controllers can't. Config PC to maintain power to USB port on standby.

    . Turn off PC: via SteamOS menu, or map a button combo on controller to 'systemctl poweroff'.

    . Wake TV with PC: Consoles explicitly use HDMI-CEC signal to control TV, but PC can wake TV with just active video signal from PC. TV monitors all input ports for active signal, and you don't need to switch TV input beforehand.

    Exception: TV doesn't monitor ports while in deep sleep. Workaround: linux wakeonlan (via wifi) at power-up.

    . Turn off TV: When PC is off, TV goes into idle, then to standby after inactivity timeout. For immediate TV off, use ddcutil at power-down. Note: If equipped with USB-CEC adapter, use CEC commands with cec-ctl.

    . Soundbar use (connected to TV via HDMI eARC port): On TV, enable HDMI-CEC and set audio output to eARC/receiver.

    Some of above is suggested by chatbot, all verified against online docs for feasibility.

    Re: Steamroller build - It's a crappy build with mismatched parts. 9600X doesn't need AIO. Air cooler would be cheaper and obviate maintenance issue. AIO is likely from cheap combo deals. $1300 only to have RX 7600 beyond dumb. PSU is probably generic. For cost control, B550 w/ DDR4 would be better.

    Speaking of parts, RX 9070 XT is, er, was, $549, at Walmart for a short while. It's back to regular price now. Deal was posted on Videocardz, which was a surprise that it still lasted for a while.
    Reply
  • ezst036
    TerryLaze said:
    SteamOS is based on arch, it's arch with gaming stuff bolted on...
    While its Arch based, there is a lot of rebuilding that Valve does.

    An example of how deep Valve goes is the recent patch sets that Valve developed regarding VRAM.

    https://www.tomshardware.com/software/linux/valve-vram-hack-may-improve-gaming-on-4gb-gpus-testing-showed-mixed-results-in-select-titles-with-fps-almost-tripling-in-certain-games
    Another example is they have ACO - their own shader compiler. They are constantly creating driver patches to increase performance and reliability, and they do other things also. These are not bolt ons. They're fundamental shifts in the OS foundations itself. SteamOS is practically its own OS even though the base still does derive from Arch.(of note, much of what Valve does gets back ported back into mainstream distros and initiatives)

    You're trying to repurpose my comment about "bolt on", but no. They are not the same. Not even close.
    Reply