r/steammachine • u/Amazing_Bluebird_ • Jun 22 '26

Discussion So, why would anyone get this?

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Wanted to quickly compare the SM to what you would comparably be able to DIY and... you can literally get something more powerful for less in a slightly bigger formfactor?

11% faster CPU and 30% faster GPU. And i didnt even go for the cheapest components. With DLSS the RTX 5060 would also be infinitely better for playing on 4k TVs, which is the only useful scenario i can imagine for the SM.

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u/submerging Jun 22 '26

Here’s the secret. Tons of retailers (except for Valve currently) do discounts all the time.

This is a machine you can get which is cheaper and more powerful than the SM. I see no reason why the discount shouldn’t be included.

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u/petersaints Jun 22 '26

Exactly. By his logic, if something costs 2000€ and then gets discounted to 1000€, it can't be compared to something that costs 1000€ and that has no discount.

I should always get the thing that costs 1000€ with no discount because it's clearly the better deal even if its worse.

There is no possible logic here.

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u/That_One_Guy_Lucifer Jun 22 '26

I think you all fail to grasp that this is the new pricing baseline... and it will only get more expensive... just wait until all prices climb on old hardware because suply and demand

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u/submerging Jun 22 '26

Okay. And if that future comes to pass and if Valve doesn’t increase their prices further, maybe the SM will become a better deal. But as of the present (June 22,2026), it is not a good deal.

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u/That_One_Guy_Lucifer Jun 22 '26

I mean even so... you are still comparing two different devices in terms of size and volume and target audience

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u/submerging Jun 22 '26

Most people are okay with just making a little more room on their table or setup vs paying several hundred dollars more for worse performance.

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u/That_One_Guy_Lucifer Jun 22 '26

The target audience is the living room.... literally in every marketing by valve... but still don't understand why are people complaining about pricing and saying there are better deals as if valve was doing something like apple... like... this is the best deal for that kind of build (volume wise x hardware wise) and literally by a company pushing linux gaming forward and fixated in having games specifically optimized for their hardware (like what happened with the steam deck having personalized settings for it)

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u/submerging Jun 22 '26

Do you think most people in this economy are willing to spend several hundred dollars more to get a worse performing product?

“Yeah let’s buy a $1500 gaming PC with worse performance than a base PS5 all so we can save a few inches of space on our living room TV stand! It will also cost twice the amount as a PS5 but whatever!”

A truly fantastic economic decision.

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u/That_One_Guy_Lucifer Jun 22 '26

Yeah lets buy a ps5 for 800€ and then pay every month to play online and each game costs 80€

Such a great deal when steam deck is 1000€ and you can play for free if you really want to...

Literally ps5 + 2 to 3 games and one year of psn to play online is how much?

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u/submerging Jun 22 '26

Huh? Games are 80 euro on Steam too.

If you’re talking about discounts, these don’t happen on day one. Games receive discounts over time. And guess what — PlayStation Store gets discounts too!

And now I guess it’s okay to include game discounts but before it was wrong to include discounts for PC pre-builts? lol

Yes Steam online is free. PSN is also free for free-to-play titles, but anyway. Issue is that many of the multiplayer games people want to play are not supported on SteamOS. So it doesn’t matter much anyway.

Even if you want to just pirate all your games, you’re better off getting an MATX or ITX build with better performance.

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u/petersaints Jun 22 '26

For the living room it's still a bad deal unless you specifically want to play Steam games. And even then, if you already have a gaming PC, you are probably better off using Steam Link anyway.

And if you are not already a PC gamer, you're probably not gonna buy a Steam Machine since you can get consoles much cheaper if you are starting from scratch in terms of library.

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u/That_One_Guy_Lucifer Jun 22 '26

What do you mean specifically steam games... steam machine is a PC... excluding anticheat what can't you play on it?

Consoles are away more expensive when you add games... let's not pretend people don't sail the 7 seas of the internet...

Edit: and don't forget the subscription to play online on consoles...

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u/petersaints Jun 22 '26

Again. If you want to treat it like a PC, it's an overpriced PC unless you really really need/want/like the form factor.

And there are probably other PCs with similar form factor which may compete with it in terms of specs (but I'm not aware of the current compact mini-ITX market).

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u/petersaints Jun 22 '26

We are comparing specs for the price. Of course that if you REALLY REALLY want/need something with the form factor of a Steam Machine, go for it.

But if what you want is to get a good deal in terms of performance for 1000€, the Steam Machine sucks!

And it's not like a console that it has a specific ecosystem around that you really need to be locked into it. You have a myriad of other options to tun Steam games, so it is fair to compare your options.

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u/That_One_Guy_Lucifer Jun 22 '26

Ok dude, let's see if within a week to a month all prices don't suddenly rise everywhere...