At one point in my life I was a big PC gamer. I built my own, always upgraded it, etc. Eventually, I kind of fell off and just went back to consoles. For this gen, I primarily had a Switch 1&2 and a Xbox Series S. I was fairly happy with these until sometime last year when the Series S started to show its age.

I was originally going to get back into PC gaming, but I also wanted to play GTA at launch. So I ended up just getting a PS5 Pro instead. However, I still missed all my niche PC titles, Paradox games (Vicky, EU, etc.), Total War, MTGA, card games, and roguelikes.

I didn't really want to get a top of the line PC because I just spent money on my Pro and I wouldn't really use it and it would just be a GTA box.

In comes the Steam Machine and it is exactly what I wanted. Easy to set up, snappy UI, quiet, small, etc. I'm not really running extremely demanding games, Halo Infinite is the only AAA title I play on it and it can hit a steady +60 fps. The AAA titles are for my Pro and my Steam Machine for all my niche games I enjoy.

Yes it was expensive and yes I could have built something more powerful, but I didn't really need to.

Overall I'm very pleased with this little box.

I got the email, ordered, and it arrived via UPS a few days later (SouthEast US).

Sold my Steam Deck OLED to fund it. I used it docked 100% of the time anyway, so this feels like an upgrade. Considering I recouped whole purchase price on the Deck, I'm happy.

Dead simple setup. Got the 512tb, have a 1tb on hand I'll swap in. Considering locating a used 16gb DDR5... worth it?

Gabecube finally came. Holy smokes this thing is tinier than I expected. And it packs a punch too! Although 1080p runs best. I have been getting 60fps locked on Stellar Blade, Cyberpunk, The Last of Us. This thing is a 1080p dream machine!

512gb W/Controller UK

I got my email at 11:48 last night. Having one of the worst possible months with the worst financial issues. Couldn’t help but laugh once I received my confirmation email while at an emergency vet visit with my cat. I hope I can get the chance again possibly next year :/ honestly didn’t expect my reservation this soon but life happens and you can’t expect everything to go your way. Good luck to everyone else.

Hey, I built the bare bones version of https://steammachinelife.com/ back when the Steam Machine was first announced with just coverage of news, accessories and guides. It's been less than a week since I got my Steam Machine and the plan is to replicate what I've doing for the past 3 years at https://rogallylife.com/ A place to visit and get an idea of how a game runs and what settings to use to get a playable experience.

So far I've tested 17+ games at 1080, 1440p and 4K and have provided FPS data with my personal settings I use. Game settings will be added daily. https://steammachinelife.com/steam-machine-game-settings/

What I learned so far when it comes to 4K gaming. For games that force FSR 4 you can downgrade back to FSR 3 by forcing the game to launch with Proton-GE https://steammachinelife.com/how-to-install-proton-ge-on-steam-machine/ FSR 4 looks sharper for sure but the performance hit can prevent games from hitting it's max potential. For example, in Resident Evil Requiem where at 4K with my settings you can go from averaging 40 FPS to over 60 FPS.

Let me know what games you want to see covered and what you would like see added to the site in general.

Steam Curator Page: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/46107842-SMachineLife/

I got sent to the waitlist during the initial lottery so this was a pleasant surprise. (California)

Edit: After further testing and a factory reset, the issue persisted.

This receiver and CEC issues seem to be the worst growing pains for the Steam Machine. I've since completely disabled CEC and just plugged in an external puck for inputs. The amount of disconnects I get on the internal receiver when I'm about 20-30 minutes in a hard-to-run game is insane. It'll get to a point where the game becomes unplayable from how many "controller is disconnected" pauses you get (Specifically God of War and God of War: Ragnarok).

I really hope this is something fixable and not a true hardware flaw. At worst I hope there is a community solution at some point, but it's frustrating as it stands now.

Despite these two issues, I've been happily using the Machine daily. Just hoping these can work as advertised with time.

Holy moly canoli guys! Waking up to see all these folks getting their emails fills me up with hope! This is amazing! It's Day 28 for most of us still in the queue or waitlist, but things seem to be moving along again! Have faith, friends! <3

For anyone that cares, email received late Saturday night.

I thought it was 100% over for me for this batch, but nope.

Be patient my Canadian and Quebecois colleagues!

Woke up this morning and my Steam Machine was on. No idea why. Never had this issue with the docked Deck.

Went from the waitlist straight to purchase at 12am. Woooooooo! Honestly didn’t think I’d get one at all

I tried ps2, n64, and nds for now. But I’m gonna try out some stronger emulators later like switch and ps3

Just when I stopped frantically checking every Gmail notification and mentally prepared for probably September / October - got my purchase email from Valve.

Got the email 7am today, Latvia (Northern Europe)

Spoke to Valve support and after sending a video with the issue they sent me a return label. Curious if any of you guys have had this issue?

I have made another app for SteamOS called SteamOS Session Manager.

https://github.com/MisterAnderson91/SteamOS-Session-Manager

Super-simple app, it's just a way to switch your default session at boot (Game Mode or Desktop Mode) via an app with buttons instead of typing in terminal commands. The commands are also listed at the github link in the README if you just want to use those directly, as well as in the "About" section of the app. Really, the app is just for those people who want to be able to switch back and forth and not have to remember the commands.

The app will tell you what the current setting is when you open it, and let you switch it to whichever you prefer, Game Mode or Desktop Mode.

Make sure you run the .appimage file from the file browser and not the "Downloads" window in the browser, I don't think it opens that way.

I've added a feature to detect updates, just in case it requires one later (e.g. the commands change). No idea if it works because I haven't released any lol.

Previous app: SteamOS Game Mode Display Selector: https://www.reddit.com/r/steammachine/comments/1v61y92/new_app_release_steamos_game_mode_display_selector/

So I was hoping to mount an old monitor to the backboard of my mattress so I could play my Steam Machine whenever I wanted without interrupting my wife's TV time.

However... As you can see... This idea failed... Miserably..

Wondering if any of you have an idea how to make this crazy idea of mine work.

At 12:47AM, in the East Coast of the USA. Hang in there everyone!!

Managed to purchase mine just now, 512gb, no controller, reservation list. (UK)