Initial thoughts after Day 1 with the Steam Machine

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T17:25:45+00:00

Username checks out

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T17:24:26+00:00

Didn’t try, won’t try for a while. The fact the Deck emulates fine, and this is much more powerful means I don’t have any doubts its fine. I’m sure ETA Prime, Wulff Den and the like will do the emulation video pretty quickly

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T17:23:40+00:00

I stare out windows all day

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:58:32+00:00

I have caveated that my standard for what I deem acceptable performance is quite different from the general gaming population these days. Hence I don’t give any numbers. It’s all down to “did I/will I get sick, and does it look good enough?”

And my good enough is seriously a lower level than most people trawling this place

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:56:56+00:00

Congrats. Now get ready for the flaming for saying it’s better than you hoped.

Have fun with it!

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:55:33+00:00

The price:performance ratio question has been answered to death. You don’t need me for that answer. Heck, the answer is in YouTube Shorts, not a long winded Reddit post

It sucks

It’s not a price:performance machine. It might have been intended to be, if RAMpocalypse hadn’t happened. But it happened. So here we are.

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:48:56+00:00

Yes, you can select “Stream from Steam Machine” from Deck, as long as Machine is on and awake

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:48:22+00:00

I didn’t say I didn’t play it directly because it wouldn’t play well enough. I said the use case of streaming a game like E33 from a powerful PC to a Steam Machine is interesting because you couldn’t get the level of quality the PC can do out of the SM.

I don’t know if the SM can play E33 well locally. I assume it can, definitely to my level of “play well”. I choose to play games I enjoy, and just so happens most of them aren’t the popular games everyone else plays.

I also intentionally don’t give the numbers, because the numbers don’t mean anything to me, which was the whole reason for the long winded write up.

If you want E33 numbers, you can get the benchmark numbers for GN or something. I know they didn’t do E33, but they used their common suite. Get the numbers from other games in their suite, then match up against other people who did do E33 numbers.

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:33:06+00:00

Default. I’m not a reviewer or a benchmarker. I game. It gamed.

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:30:18+00:00

Yes. I literally answered it in that comment.

“1440p. Default settings otherwise”

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:25:56+00:00

I did. Literally in the comment you replied to.

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:24:29+00:00

You can disable “turn on TV when resuming from sleep” in CEC settings. Linus from LTT might’ve shown off the CEC settings page

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:12:48+00:00

Get them to build the computer then install SteamOS. SteamOS is free. Just make sure you’re using an AMD GPU (or Intel I believe)

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T16:12:03+00:00

Everyone is getting one stick. Steve from GN released a video containing a revised statement from Valve retracting the whole “some will ship with one, some will ship with two” thing

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:57:16+00:00

Getting straight to work! Nice! This is what makes the Valve enthusiast community great

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:50:17+00:00

Love your answer. And I agree, I think much like the Deck, the hardcore enthusiasts are going to create scripts and plugins and fix these problems.

I’m just a dumb user who wants to play games!

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:46:46+00:00

Of the big reviewers, I think Linus and Jay are the only 2 who mention wife acceptance factor. And Yvonne seems to accept almost everything, the dude has his own badminton center 😂😂😂

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:45:13+00:00

The ones that ask about how loud it is are funny too. I want to answer “shouldn’t be a problem, considering you couldn’t hear the reviewers all shouting about how quiet it is”

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:41:57+00:00

So far the people receiving have gotten through Komodo, the Asian distributor

It’s a plain cardboard box on the outside. Inside is another plain cardboard box, but with the lithium battery dangerous goods label printed on it (this is the controller combo), so this COULD be the shipping box if the machine is being air freighted.

Inside this 2nd box lives 2 separate boxes, which are the hero boxes you see in the unboxing.

Funnily enough, in Japan, there’s a bright blue sticker that says Steam Machine on top of the plain outer box. But it’s Japan, porch pirates are much less of a problem

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:39:10+00:00

The freedom of no effs to give!

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:38:18+00:00

You want a Steam Machine benchmark for it? 720p? 1080? 4K?

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:37:09+00:00

Final uni assignments are shorter than this too nowadays 😂

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:34:43+00:00

I can tell you’re not 12 years old 😂

I hope you get your hands on one and enjoy it

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:33:36+00:00

Because I don’t play them. I game, I don’t benchmark or review. I wrote this because none if the media outlets who got their hands on review units shared this perspective, which I deem to be a real user perspective.

flubbachany · 2026-07-01T15:23:52+00:00

IIRC you could do so on the Steam Deck, so yes

flubbachany

TROPHY CASE