Valve has now confirmed our worst fears: all the Steam {hardware}—Steam Machine, Steam Body VR headset, and Steam Controller—it introduced in November is delayed by a number of months due to the creeping affect of the continued reminiscence scarcity.
In a post on the official Steam Hardware Blog, Valve mentioned it must “revisit” pricing for all three units, particularly the Steam Machine hybrid PC/console and Steam Body VR headset. Alas, “the restricted availability and rising costs of those crucial parts,” specifically RAM and SSD storage, have quickly elevated from only some months in the past. The corporate nonetheless guarantees to ship within the first half of the 12 months. AMD CEO Lisa Su additionally confirmed the Steam Machine would arrive early this 12 months.
This information shouldn’t come as a shock when you’ve been following the fast worth fluctuations of virtually all PC parts that use reminiscence. Fashionable high-end DRAM (dynamic random entry reminiscence) now prices 500% greater than it did a number of months in the past, in some instances. SSDs, aka solid-state drives, have seen costs improve usually for the reason that begin of the 12 months. The reminiscence difficulty has additionally impacted the discrete GPU market, particularly Nvidia’s newest 50-series graphics playing cards.
“Our aim of transport all three merchandise within the first half of the 12 months has not modified,” the corporate wrote in its weblog submit. “However we now have work to do to land on concrete pricing and launch dates that we will confidently announce, being aware of how rapidly the circumstances round each of these issues can change.”
There’s nonetheless no particular worth or transport date
Valve has solely hinted at a attainable worth, telling some shops it might place the Steam Machine near the “entry-level PC house.” That may have indicated a worth of round $700 and even $800, at the very least. As for efficiency, Valve reiterated in its weblog submit that the Steam Machine ought to be capable to deal with “the vast majority of Steam titles” at 4K and 60 fps whereas counting on AMD’s FSR (FidelityFX Tremendous Decision) upscaling know-how. This wouldn’t be the fabled FSR Redstone, sadly, for the reason that “semi-custom” AMD chip on the Steam Machine relies on the RDNA 3.5 GPU microarchitecture, relatively than the more moderen RDNA 4. Some video games could run higher when you push FSR to render video games at a 1080p decision earlier than bringing it to 4K.
In the meantime, a 5-year-old Sony PlayStation 5 console now prices $500 with out the disc drive. In its newest quarterly earnings report, Sony indicated it could possibly wait out the primary 12 months of the RAM scarcity. Sony’s chief monetary officer, Lin Tao, mentioned the corporate was “already ready” to safe the mandatory RAM wanted to final by the 2026 vacation season. Tao added that “we intend to attenuate the affect of the elevated reminiscence value on this phase going ahead.”
The good thing about a Steam Machine over a standard console is the customizability. It is possible for you to to switch the RAM and SSD, although the massive enchancment shall be entry to a large SteamOS growth neighborhood permitting gamers to put in non-Steam video games, mods, and emulators with out a lot fuss. The good thing about having devoted {hardware} means Valve can work to extend efficiency throughout all methods. In its FAQ, Valve mentioned, “We’re engaged on HDMI VRR, investigating improved upscaling, and optimizing ray tracing efficiency within the driver.”
So long as Valve can promise a minimal acceptable efficiency for many fashionable video games, the Steam Machine should make extra sense to potential gaming PC patrons as a less expensive different to purchasing over-inflated PC parts. Realizing the skyrocketing worth of RAM, the on a regular basis console purchaser could discover Valve’s 6 x 6-inch gaming machine continues to be out of attain.
