iBuyPower Steam Machine Video Interview

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We chat with iBuyPower on the console-competitive Steam Machine.

We attended Valve's Steam Machine launch event and got a chance to speak with iBuyPower about its offering. We learned that its $499 price point was a part of the company's intention to appeal to the mainstream buyer who might be considering an Xbox One or PS4. Details are still light, but it'll pack a quad core AMD or Intel processor, Radeon GCN graphics, 8GB RAM and a 500GB HDD.


 

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Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
9 Comments Comment from the forums
  • noid4u
    i feel bad for valve, i dont see steamboxs taking off too well but i still wish them the best
    Reply
  • killerclick
    Please Valve, cancel this nonsense. Steam Machines will never ever take off. They don't have the hardware commonality for games to be optimized like consoles, they don't have enough Linux compatible games out of the box, and very few people will be paying $500 to stream a game from their Windows gaming PC.This is DOA. I was right about Windows 8 and Surface, I'm right about this.
    Reply
  • chimera201
    lol. These Steam Machines aren't meant for us techies, it is meant for those people who don't know how to build a PC. And they are a lot of people. We forum members at Tom's will generally be against this concept but it wasn't meant for us in the first place. Only thing that will interest us is the free SteamOS and the Steam Controller. And Valve wouldn't have planned this without upcoming Linux support.
    Reply
  • doomtomb
    This just seems wrong. I honestly like the approach ibuypower is taking because instead of going all out guns blazing it seems to fit in well with the console crowd but how are you doing to convince a console enthusiast to get this? I don't see it happening. The only people that seem to be paying attention to Steam boxes is the crowd that already builds it themselves. And Linux isn't exactly user-friendly.
    Reply
  • Teeroy32
    Was going to get Xbox One, but now I like this, with my 680 GTX I'll be able to stream what ever isn't compatible from my main rig. I have always liked Linux and since I got into Ubuntu with 10.04 I have found it easier (apart from gaming) then windows, which now thanks to Valve is getting a whole lot easier.
    Reply
  • jessterman21
    That is a seriously hot piece of kit.
    Reply
  • poetic
    doomtomb: but how are you doing to convince a console enthusiast to get this?ehm, a console enthusiast thinks like this: does the box look nice in my room? does it have games I want to play? If both answers are YES, it's an attractive proposition. And even now Steam has a LOT more games for Linux then the current lineup for XB1 and PS4. Once they expand Linux support, their game library will sell the Steam hardware that don't scare the console user away. And this one doesn't.
    Reply
  • Deus Gladiorum
    It's not meant to be upgradeable beyond storage. I think that sort of kills it (I'm ready for the down votes I'm about to get) because for the console gamer, it lacks the game he's looking for. Unless he has a techie friend or is himself willing to install Windows, he's not going to be content with the games supported by Linux and will miss out on games he's used to like BF4 or the like. But then it's also not upgradeable, putting it into a dead zone in which it cannot be expanded (without a techie friend, that is) so then my question is who does this appeal to? Some people are arguing that it's meant for those who aren't builders and who don't know anything about PCs, but then how does it appeal to a console gamer when it doesn't offer much in the way of the triple As he's looking for and the one advantage that MIGHT convince him (i.e. being able to upgrade it in future) is a questionable feature at best? Go ahead, down vote me, but unless you can respond and tell me why this doesn't seem like a dead end, I don't think what I'm saying is crazy.
    Reply
  • GrouchyAlpaca
    The steam box has potential, but it has many flaws, one of them unforgivable. Instead of expanding the linux library and then releasing a machine specifically for it, it has done the exact opposite, it created a new type of console so that it will eventually have support comparable to consoles/windows.
    Reply