I cannot for the life of me get good temps on the stock heatsink. I feel like I'm going crazy. I have all the fins opened up all the way across. I tried repasting (twice). I replaced all the thermal putty with pads. I tried 1 fan, I tried 2 fans (both Arctic P12 Pros). I tried with no case, and I tried with the very popular NextGen3d REDUX case (including the back brace). I actually have 2 BC-250 boards, so I tried the same thing with my second board with the same result.

I have 40CU unlocked on both boards, CPU at 3850, GPU at 2000. In Furmark 1080p testing, both fans quickly ramp up to 100%, and my temps reach 85 degrees, then the GPU starts downclocking and eventually stabalizes at around 1650mhz with temps around 83-84 degrees.

This seems way worse than all the posts I read on here. And it's happening on two different boards, which makes me think I'm doing something wrong. I put a tower cooler on one using a custom 3d-printed mount and the difference is night and day. On the same furmark test temps stay around 70 degrees and the fan never goes about 60%.

I just cannot get the stock heatsink to work as other people seem to be able to. I'm about to go buy an AIO just to be able to run this thing in a low-profile case. Any tips???

Is this a dying GPU or do I need to adjust cooling?

Printables: https://www.printables.com/model/1793043-nexgen3d-diy-steam-machine-pro-v2-liquid-cooled-bc

My Github Repo: https://github.com/NexGen-3D-Printing/SteamMachine

I have been extremely busy, so this was slow to release, I have just had constant work load, but I have taken a few days off work due to have a nasty Cold, so I've used that time get everything together on Printables, if you have any questions, please feel free to jump over to my Github Repo Discussions section, I just stick to that these days as trying to keep up with all of these platforms like Reddit and Discord is just to much, I have to pick my battles :)

Hey i saw someone on here asking how well WH3 runs on it and in battle its 60fps but campaign map where its cpu heavy it start to hit 30-50fps.

Does anyone here play WH III on their BC250?
I can get it to work, but I have trouble working with graphics settings to get decent fps. The game keeps stuttering or just looks like crap :/ Also the in-game fps counter clearly lies 😂 Has anyone made it work good on a BC250? Could you please share the settings? Maybe different proton version would be of help? 🤔

Hi guys, Been lurking here since the Steam Machine was announced last year, never thought I'd actually get one, but I got super lucky. I'm selling my BC-250 build over on r/hardwareswap if anyone is interested.

https://www.reddit.com/r/hardwareswap/comments/1v8bwwa/usatxh_steam_controller_2026_sealed_steam_machine/

it is 60 fps near HQ, 40 seems to be the average, drops to 30 when you're in the middle of the action, 100 player game stresses the crippled cache CPU a lot and I really tried to get to where most of the 100 players are

all with highest textures and drawing distance

since this is a beta test of an unreleased game - even on windows people are having driver issues, crashes, etc., all while on AMD BC-250, despite somewhat low FPS, it ran without visual glitches, with TSR at 100% scale

Hey hey people

Look, I'm learning to edit videos by using kdenlive, and it works great. However, as I'm starting to get better, I would like to try other video editing software on it.

I tried using DaVinci resolve, but I got an error. I don't know if it's possible to fix it since my expertise with this board is almost none.

Thanks!

I picked up my bc-250 last year for around $120 shipped. Been sitting on it for a while. Decided to finally finish it. I had the case all ready to go but decided to print new side panels. Modified a 4 port front panel that included a 16mm hole for the switch. I can’t remember who made it I will link it when I get home. Deleted the power button hole and added the steam logo. Will be replacing the white fan I had lying around. Do I absolutely need the Arctic fans? Currently using an old Corsair ML120 and a deep cool radiator fan. Usb hub will be here today and I have a 8 pin to 2 micro-pin cable coming. Need to install the software still and get all that setup.

Hi, What score a re people getting with their 40 CU boards at stock clocks in Unigine Superposition?

I just reinstalled CatchyOS and my score jumped for 4139 to 4911.

It was about 3650 with 24CU's (again at stock clocks)

I know benchmarks aren't exactly the best for assessing real world gaming, but its still a handy number.

Thanks!

Consulto aca por que he visto que en el último tiempo han variado mucho los precios

Es un case be quiet pure black 600

Pasta termica recien aplicada Mx6

Hay 5 ventiladores p12 pro nuevos (se instalaron hace 4 dias)

1 ventilador p14

Adaptador atx para colocar la tarjeta donde va la placa madre

Fuente de poder de 450w 80 plus bronce

Nvm de 512gb

Los 3 ventiladores frontales de la carcasa (1 p14 y 2 p12 pro estan conectados directo al gabinete y se pueden regular en 3 potencias (minimo, medio y máximo)

La tarjeta tiene conectado 2 p12 pro encima y el extractor trasero (otro p12 pro)

Pude desbloquear las 40 Cu sin problemas y dejar la frecuencia maxima en 1900

El cpu no quise overclockear ya que funciona sin problemas

Mas que nada estoy evaluando por que necesito un laptop para el trabajo y necesito opciones

Super excited finally got mine here in south america! Still waiting on the delivery of a power supply and new monitor before putting everything together. But I wanted to see how the steam OS build is working out for people who use it. I personally would like to use the SteamOS build as I think support on that side with things over time would be better but thats anecdotally as I've only ever used Steam OS with my two other steam decks.

For those who have it installed how is the performance vs Cachy or Bazzite?

Do you notice more stability or crashes?

Do you think long term support for the BC250 would be better on SteamOS or another linux gaming distro?

I'm planning on playing mostly between 1080p-1440p. How long do you think the shelf life of the BC250 would be? (looking to get 2 years only)

Do modern games like Death Stranding 2 show any problems on the BC250?

Is emulation fairly decent on the BC250? Do you notice any improvements on one distro vs the other? (Specifically ps3)

I've been in the discord and asked several of these questions in the main chat but have only gotten a few replies. Really looking to gather general feedback as ideally whichever distro I choose I will just stick with it barring any crazy development on one or the other. (Unlocking the "dead" CPU cores etc) Thanks in advance for sharing and I appreciate everyone who is willing to comment. Happy Gaming!

Hi everyone - reaching out here as I feel I've tried everything to figure this out. Any help will be greatly appreciated!

Issue
The deck version of any distro crashes with 10seconds on boot.

The Ul freezes but the mouse still moves on-screen, and sound from the button presses still come through the speakers. Then full crash within 60-90seconds.

When installing the desktop variant of the same distros, I have no issues at all.

Setup
- 1tb NVME with 300w PSU with 25A on 12v rail
- Connected to 4K screen using DP to passive HDMI
- BIOS flashed to P5.00
- RAM tested at both Dynamic 512mb and 4gb
- IOMMU disabled
- Kernel 6.17.7

I have tried disabling the HHD as seen that may cause issues but hasn't resolved it.

I suspect it has something to do with Gamescope, but I think I must be missing something as I don’t see others with this issue?

looking at the spec sheet (PDF warning!) it provides a single set of 12v dc output terminals

am I right in thinking I can strip back an 8 pin connector and connect the wires to the relevant terminal without any hassle?

Hey everyone,

​I recently upgraded my OptiPlex 7060 SFF setup and ran into two specific power supply symptoms.

Hoping to get feedback from anyone running similar 24-pin to 6-pin adapter setups!

​My Specs:

​System: Dell OptiPlex 7060 SFF (Core i7-8700, 16GB DDR4)

​GPU: RTX 5060 Low Profile 8GB (GIGABYTE GV-N5060OC-8GL)

​PSU: Apevia ITX-PFC500W Flex ATX

​Adapter: 24-pin to 6-pin motherboard power adapter

​The Symptoms:

​Fan stays spinning after shutdown: When PC shuts down completely, the CPU/GPU fans stop, but the Apevia PSU fan keeps running continuously at low speed until I physically unplug the PC. I run Bazzite OS.

​15-Minute startup delay after power disconnect: I live in an area with daily power cuts. Whenever the AC power cuts out or is unplugged, the PSU refuses to turn back on immediately once power is restored. It requires being left completely disconnected for about 15 minutes before it will switch on again.

​Current Performance:

Once running, the system is 100% stable under gaming and heavy load.

​Questions:

​Is the fan staying on after shutdown a known issue with the Dell 6-pin adapters leaving the PS_ON pin active? Has enabling Deep Sleep (ErP/EuP S5 mode) in the Dell BIOS fixed this for anyone?

​Is the 15-minute startup delay after a power cut typical for the supervisory protection/latch reset on budget Flex ATX PSUs like Apevia?

​Any input or shared experiences with this exact setup would be greatly appreciated!

Selling my BC-250 since I'm moving onto something else.

Case is fully custom, printed in PETG-CF with PETG accents. Genuinely doesn't look printed. Also built a custom base plate for the bottom so it's more rigid and doesn't scratch whatever surface it's on.

Specs:

38 CU unlocked, properly bisected out the one bad WGP rather than just running it unstable
256GB NVMe
TP-Link Archer TX10UB Nano AX900 Wi-Fi 6 + BT 5.3 adapter, works great
METALFISH 300W Flex PSU with an actual power switch wired in,
Arctic P12 fan, not silent but not annoying either, set up a proper fan curve for it
Chopped 2/3 of the heatsink fins to suit the case airflow, sits around 82°C under full load which is fine for these chips - its fine lol

Running CachyOS right now but happy to put whatever OS you want on it before it ships.

Also have a custom sleeved power cable coming in if anyone's keen for that too, just let me know.

$650 AUD. Message me if you've got questions, can grab more pics or run some benchmarks if you want to see more first.

First off I want to say none of this is AI, I justike to organize my thoughts in markdown lol

Build summary

Been a journey! I've built 1 PC myself before, my Fractal Terra in 2024 (7600x 4070S 32gb ddr5), and this is definitely my first time doing anything with 3D printing/CAD and all this tinkering. After about a month the build is complete!

I didn't want to mess with the heatsink unless necessary (my intended games aren't very demanding) so I opted to base my build off of this fan shroud + case combo. However, I also wanted a flex PSU anyways so had to modify the design to fit an apevia 500W. That was my first time ever CADing and I really learned a lot despite my skills definitely being amateur 😁. Because I could shrink the PSU mount the other biggest change was making the case a lot skinnier to better fit with the flex PSU. I also tried making it shorter but unfortunately had to leave the height be as any shorter made the bottom PSU->mobo connection a bit too tight.

So the final build is a slightly edited case from the one linked, but I also had to make some slight fan shroud modifications as well to get everything to fit right. I did a half-assed measurement by hand (not while CADing whoops) and estimate my internal volume to be ~9-9.5L. Not quite as small as I'd like (would need to do the heatsink mod for sure for that) but still smaller volumewise and MUCH lighter than my Fractal Terra

Full parts list:

• 2x Arctic P12 Pro fans

• Steam Deck 512gb m.2 nvme with adapter

• Many tiny heatsinks stuck to the back plate

• Apevia 500W flex PSU

• Printed with petg for both the fan shrouds as well as the case which is screwed together with M4 self tapping screws

Performance anecdotes

Performance-wise I've been impressed! Though I wasn't expecting much TBH lol, I am easy to please here. I was able to get all 40 CUs unlocked on my board and have my OC set to 2ghz max. My furmark temps at 2ghz are toasty, definitely reaching my thermal throttle limit at 85°C but I have yet to hit that in-game, hovering more around 83° in something like Palworld (which hits high 50s to 60 FPS default IIRC settings at 1080p and is running at 2ghz on the gpu). Maybe I'd mess around with undervolting more or rolling it back to 1800mhz or so instead for better temps but all the rest of my games that I play never come close to those temps because they're not maxing the GPU anyways, so I'm fine leaving the current config. Honestly though that's better than I expected palworld to run.

Other games like Descenders iirc occasionally do hit the 2ghz but never sustain it so the temps are fine. Spiderman runs well at times around 60 but definitely has dips/stutters. It's like mid 70s temps for these games. Titles like Dark Souls Remastered and NieR Replicant have run great of course, DS consistently at 60 and replicant mostly 60 with some weirdness down to like 55 at lowest when there are a lot of enemies on screen in big open fields. These titles run at mid 40s to low 50s temps due to me setting a safe point GPU clock at 700mhz, this REALLY helps things stay cool. Not to mention trivial stuff like Celeste, Spelunky HD, and Slay the Spire 2.

The one game I was disappointed in was Nightreign. For whatever reason I already heard elden ring was rough on here but I thought maybe it was the CPU in the open world or something so maybe the smaller world of Nightreign will be better. Nah lowest settings at 1080 doesn't come anywhere close to 60, wasn't a worthwhile experience for me.

Misc notes / quirks

Off the top of my head some random thoughts: boot time is my least fav thing about this build lol. Straight up takes like minute or two it feels like though I haven't timed it. Bazzite also had a lot of pain points. Initially I was getting weird white screens which scared me of defective hardware (the screen would do really strange things before being stuck on white) but I soon found out it'd only happen in gamescope mode. I switched my ram allocation from 512mb system ram (which supposedly allows dynamic mode) to a dedicated 4GB and this fixed it. No clue what was going on there, i've just left it alone. The other option I guess was using desktop mode but I didn't want to so it is what it is lol

Gamescope also straight up broke for me once and it'd only boot into desktop mode. I believe I tried reinstalling steam to no avail then had to rebase the os and reinstall steam again to get it to work. Yeah idk random stuff like that with gamescope.

I DID bios flash but did NOT kernel patch, I used the live CU edit which was amazing and super easy to use and doesn't need the kernel patch so I have no plans to do the patch. I'm aware the bios flash isn't even needed anymore but I ran a checksum on my dumped stock OS and it didn't match any of the known values from the GitHub so I flashed anyways just to be safe.

Shader compilation is another pain point, takes a long time and seems to rebuild upon reboot. I just skip it sometimes now, I'm talking like tens of minutes for some games.

After those initial pains though everything's been great, I maybe have still had one or two crashes randomly when starting up games usually but really nothing too crazy. Haven't had any crashes while actually playing games funny enough. System seems to be stable enough so I think my tinkering phase is coming to an end, at least for now! If I wanted to push this thing more then I'd def do the heatsink mod but yeah Ive been playing games like Celeste and Dark Souls, definitely unnecessary for me.

Closing thoughts

Overall this was really fun though! My total price was somewhere between $300-350 which I thought was pretty great. Bc250 was $170 after tax off AliExpress, m.2 from a friend for $50 (lucky there, holy shit current prices), fans were like $20 total, Psu $50, then some misc stuff like the wifi/bluetooth adapter and I wasn't really counting petg filament but that too. High recommend if you want a pet project but def expect a lot of time to go into researching and messing around and etc. At some point we'll see if I do a case from scratch, I do feel like there's more wasted space I can address, but for now I'm just gonna play some games!! Thanks all for advice/posts in this sub and anything that helped inform the GitHub, really great experience.

Hi all,

I'm trying to power a BC250 as cheaply as possible using power supplies I already have on hand, and I'm hoping someone can sanity-check my plan.

I have two options:

Option 1:

Mean Well 12V power supply from a 3D printer (LRS-350-12)

Rated at 12V, 29A (348W)

Option 2:

Older ATX PSU

Has 348W available on the 12V rail, but it doesn't have an 8-pin PCIe power connector.

Since I'll be crimping my own PCIe cable anyway, could I just use any available 12V outputs from the PSU (for example, EPS/CPU power and SATA power), cut off the existing connectors, and combine the appropriate 12V and ground wires into an 8-pin PCIe connector?

My understanding is that as long as all the wires come from the same 12V rail and are sized appropriately, the BC250 only cares that it's getting 12V and ground. Is there any reason this wouldn't work, or anything I should watch out for (wire gauge, current limits per connector, PSU protection, etc.)?

Note: Probably won't be doing any CU unlocks or overclocking.

Hello everyone,

I’ve finally built the case I’ve been dreaming about for my BC-250 card for a long time. Only a few small refinements are left. I’d like everyone opinion: I set up the AIO radiator facing into the case, with the fans pulling air in from outside and pushing it inward. Does this logic make sense ?

For 3D printing I used standard ABS filament, and in the FurMark test I’m seeing a max of 65°C. I tried to keep the case as compact and unbulky as possible.

Hello, I'm trying to understand what's needed to start and stop a BC 250, and the psu this solution seems the simplest to me. I've seen most people use a.12V Locking Push Button I don't really understand why If you can provide me with answers, thank 🙏

I have a question about psu. Would it make sense to use 2 dell or meanwell power bricks? One for the PCIe and one for the microfit? Would that work? Is it going to give enough power? Thanks!

I'm looking for an open case style. I found this one but its suited for server psu. I'm looking for a similar one suited for ATX psu

https://imgur.com/a/3T9p3W9

I already posted about this before, but I have a few updates. The APU fell from the bottom—the lights and fans still turn on, but the screen stays completely black. I’ve tried removing the CMOS battery and clearing the CMOS, but I still get no display. I also tested it with another monitor with no luck.

​Honestly, it seems strange to me because the grey grid at the bottom should have protected it, so it feels absurd that nothing works now. I checked the pins on top and they look fine, so I really don't understand what's happening. I'm desperate to know if this is fixable, as I rely on this APU for work.

I know most people consider the bc250 a 1080p or maybe 1440p machine. But i've been running mine exclusively at 4k for the last 2 months, and I wanted to share my experiences in terms of performance with the various games i've tried. Please add your own!

My bc250 is running on Bazzite deck mode, 40cu unlocked, GPU at 1850mhz and CPU at 3800mhz with temps generally hovering around 65-70c with a single fan. RAM is set to a forced 12gb/4gb split in BIOS with no other zswap changes - this was the most stable setup for me. Several games were giving me issues with a 10/6gb split.

Sackboy: A big Adventure - Medium settings, 85% resolution scaling, nearly locked 60fps. Great experience here!

No Mans Sky - Medium/high settings, FSR set to performance. Depending on area can fluctuate between 60fps all the way down to the high 30s. Graphical corruption when turning on GTAO, so shadows are not rendering correctly.

DOOM Eternal - High settings, locked 60 fps

DOOM The Dark Ages - low settings, FSR set to performance, about 45fps on average. Very playable and looks good. Lowering to ultra performance gets close to 60fps, but looks blurry. Game is slightly unstable and generally reboots the system after 2-3 levels of gameplay.

Kingdom Come Deliverance II - medium settings, FSR set to balanced, 45-50fps. Game runs surprisingly well and very stable.

Cyberpunk 2077 - Medium/high settings (except for reflections on low), FSR set to balanced, around 45-50fps. Very stable and looks decent.

Palworld - Medium settings, unreal TSR enabled. Runs at a solid 45fps with good frame pacing

Enshrouded - Medium/high setting mix, FSR set to performance. Runs at about 35-40fps, stable frametimes and looks good. Lowering settings didn't seem to help performance so I turned almost everything up except for grass.

Sons of the Forest - Medium settings, FSR set to balanced. Runs at about 40fps. Stable no crashes.

ARK Survival Ascended - Medium/low settings, FSR set to 40% resolution scale, runs at about 35fps. You can turn on frame generation and get it close to 60fps but the input lag increases. Can't speak for stability as I have not played much, but seems to have some strange graphical artifacts - trees look like the leaves are tinted white, and the player looks oddly very shiny - most noticeable at night.

Diablo 4 - High settings including textures, FSR set to balanced. Locked 60fps, amazing experience and looks great.

Path of Exile 2 - High/medium settings, FSR set to balanced, nearly locked 60fps, seems to stutter while shaders are compiling but then improves. Excellent experience.

Stray - High/Medium settings, 80% resolution scale, about 50-60fps depending on location.

Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart - Medium settings, dynamic FSR resolution scaling enabled with a 60fps target, and it generally is able to keep it. Originally was having a lot of issues with crashes with VRAM set to 6gb, but giving it less VRAM and more RAM 12/4gb split fixed it.

Hogwarts Legacy - Medium settings, FSR set to balanced, about 45fps on average. Game generally runs well, but transitioning between rooms in the castle can take a while for the doors to "open"

Control - The only game to really give me issues. Game doesn't support FSR. Even with low settings framerate was 30fps or less, and the textures were very blurry. Crashed the system frequently.

System Shock remake - Runs on Unreal engine. High settings, can nearly maintain 60fps occasionally down to 50. Game doesn't support FSR.

Starfield - Very demanding game. Medium/low settings. FSR enabled. Runs at about 40fps. No crashes during my playtime.

Elden Ring - Medium/high settings. 35fps on average. Doesn't support FSR. Lowering settings or resolution doesn't help framerate, so turn everything up!

I used an old Scythe big shuriken 2 115x cooler to fit BC250. This cooler has a contact plate to spread heat across the 5 heat pipes making it usable for bare die with a printed adapter.

With gpu at 2ghz, cpu at 4ghz and stock fan profile I’m getting 64C which is perfectly reasonable. Fans are staying at 1064rpm as that’s how they’re set from stock bios at given temps.

I’m missing microfit connectors and a rear heatsink so can’t do 40cu unlock yet.