Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
The first thing I noticed after unboxing the Steam Machine at home was: Wow, this is small. I’ve already seen this thing In person last November, but its size still impresses me.
The Steam Machine is smaller than a PlayStation 5. It’s smaller than an Xbox. It’s a cube that you can easily place next to the TV, or carry in a box while on vacation with friends, which is what I did. It’s shockingly portable. But dense. You still need a power outlet and a TV or monitor to connect to it.
This is not a Steam surface. Steam Machine is Valve’s return to trying to create a PC gaming console – and unfortunately, it arrives at a difficult time. Electronics prices for computer components like RAM and SSD storage are skyrocketing, and gaming consoles including PlayStation and Xbox are seeing prices rise, even on 6-year-old machines. The Steam Machine’s starting price of $1,049 is already out of reach for many people.
Size-wise, this is exactly the kind of controller I want.
Additionally, while it’s fun to see Valve making its own PC gaming hardware, there are actually plenty of ways to run Steam on Windows PCs of all shapes, sizes, and prices. The Steam Deck is unique because it is handheld and Relatively small (and originally very affordable). The steam machine has just one of those things in its favor.
But as a testament to how accessible and console-like PC gaming is, I’m liking the effort so far. Even if the effort is rough and patchy and not as high performing as you might expect for the price.
The steam machine has a large fan ventilation system that runs from front to back. It runs quietly, but the air coming out can get very warm.
I’ll have a full review of the Steam Machine eventually, but for now I wanted to share some thoughts after a week with someone at home and on the road.
The review unit I received from Valve is the high-end model: Package $1428 It has 2TB of storage, two interchangeable magnetic plates and a Steam controller (which, by the way, I love). The configuration that starts at $1,049 has no controller and 512GB of storage. All models have the same AMD Zen 4 CPU, custom AMD RDNA3 GPU, 16GB DDR5 RAM, and 8GB GDDR6 RAM. There’s a microSD card slot for expandable storage as well.
@cnetdotcom Valve’s PC gaming console, the Steam Machine, is coming but it won’t be cheap, thanks to an ongoing memory shortage referred to as RAMageddon. The console purchase window will start today and will be open for three days. Whoever does not complete the purchase process will lose his reservation and go to someone else. Unbox the $1,428 2TB model with a Steam controller. #Conquest #Steam machine #valve #pcgaming #Steam controller @scotstein89 ♬ Domino Trap from Creed – Creed
Small and exquisite design of the steam machine
I can’t say enough about the compact size of the Steam Frame because I really love it. I’ve been averse to home PC gaming consoles in part because of the amount of space they take up. But the Steam Machine feels smaller than a PlayStation or Xbox, and is easy to place on a shelf or lid.
There’s also no big adapter brick: a simple power cord just plugs into the back. This makes setting up your TV much easier.
Steam device (left) next to Xbox Series It is half the size.
It also makes me want to set it up in the living room to show it off. But, as I do now, it sits conveniently next to my laptop and my gaming TV in my office, too.
The entire box is a ventilation system, with an intake in the front and a large exhaust fan covering the back. The front face plate is magnetically interchangeable, and the two included plates (red fabric and plastic wood grain) are fun and easy to install to change up its look. I’m also interested in the lower power button and the LED status bar below the cube, which glows in different system status patterns. The LED bar fills up to show download progress when the TV is turned off and you just want to know if your game is ready or not.
It’s easy to get started with the Steam Machine, but not all games will be smooth.
Things just work (sometimes)
The steam machine does not have an instruction manual. Just plug it in, go through the logging in, download the software update, and it’s up and running. It felt like an extension of the Steam Deck when I logged in and found everything ready for me, except for the game downloads.
Steam controllers work without their own controllers by pairing directly with the steamer, saving one step. But some firmware updates were needed, although they were relatively painless.
The default support for games in Steam Machine is 1,920×1,080, and while you can increase the resolution, Valve’s settings warn that games verified by Steam Machine are tested for 1,920×1,080. Walking outside of that area may not be great.
Baby Steps is one of the few games I’ve tried on the Steam Machine so far at the default 1080p resolution.
Steam Machine performance seems… OK
Honestly, 1080p is fine for me on my 42-inch desk monitor, but for a gaming console that starts at $1,000, it can seem pretty disappointing. (We’ll talk about how 4K gaming feels soon.) This confirms the overall feeling I got from the Steam Machine, which is that, in terms of gaming performance, it’s… good. Not amazing. Not bad (although sometimes it feels like a step down from the PS5 and Xbox Series
But I encountered some strange problems in the game. Star Wars Squadrons wouldn’t let me log in – it probably needed a keyboard and mouse, but the Steam controller wasn’t recognized. Some games showed weird, pixelated pop-up graphics driver error messages that I couldn’t get out of easily either. After several restarts of some of these games, the errors disappeared. Other times, not so much.
The front panel pops up magnetically, which is an airflow system to cool the internals. You can take a peek at the right.
Overall, though, the games play well among the ones I’ve been checking out casually: Death Stranding 2, Spider-Man 2, UFO 50 (a few weird frame rate issues), Stray, Subnautica, Team Fortress 2, Elden Ring, Hot Wheels Unleashed 2, and Baby Steps.
Valve has made a lot of iterative improvements to the game’s performance on Steam Deck over time. With a steam machine, it’s likely the same. But as early reviews and Reddit forums have already reported, your early mileage on this device will certainly vary.
The steam surface next to the steam machine shows how small the steam machine is. The Steam Deck is completely portable, too.
Machine vs. surface vs. frame
The overall presentation of the Steam Machine isn’t as exciting as a portable Steam Deck that has its own screen, and while Valve is clearly future-proofing where PC gaming consoles can be as good as (or even replace) consoles like PlayStation and Xbox, it’s hard to ignore the price equation and similarity to other PC gaming options. My son’s friend was busy playing Steam games on his laptop while I was playing on the Steam Machine, and this is particularly the case: There are many ways to play Steam games.
But ARM based Steam frame A virtual reality headset, also expected this summer, will push Steam gaming to smaller segments. The machine expands the deck design into larger shapes. Clearly there is a spectral valve to explore. I’m curious how all the pieces will play out. In the meantime, I’ll be finishing this review. But even when I do, I still want to try out the framework and review it against the grain to understand the comparative value of the machine for someone who wants and can afford a new Steam Thing in 2026.
