
SteamMachines - cheald
http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamMachines/
======
simias
Sooo, it's what everybody's expected, except we don't know anything more about
it. Frustrating.

Also, only 300 boxes for beta? That seems a little small.

EDIT: actually the latest answer in the FAQ is interesting:

"Am I going to be using a mouse and a keyboard in the living-room?"

"If you want. But Steam and SteamOS work well with gamepads, too. Stay tuned,
though - we have some more to say very soon on the topic of input."

Something new on the input device front? Oculus Rift?

Valve sure is good at hyping things.

~~~
cocoflunchy
The Rift is output, not input. I think they're announcing some kind of new
controller.

~~~
simias
Technically you could say head movement is input but I get your point.

That being said it could be a combo, like Rift + a wiimote-style thing?

Mouse + keyboard break Rift immersion, pads are better but still far from
perfect.

~~~
TheCraiggers
Considering the vast majority of current Big Picture games use the Xbox360
controller, and that they'll probably already worried about getting enough
content working on this device, I highly doubt they will do something so
different as a Rift + Wiimote and the like.

My assumption is Rift will be supported, but primary controller will be
something extremely 360-like. If not made by Valve than by someone that
already makes 3rd party 360 controllers.

------
breckinloggins
I'm excited about where Valve is going with this, of course, but to be honest
I'm concerned about controllers the most. Buying a good controller for a PC is
not hard, but it's not simple either. Picture yourself as a "living room
console guy" getting into PC gaming. You'd like to use a controller for a
certain game.

Consider:

\- You can use your XBox360, PS3 controller, or WiiMote, but that's not
obvious. You'll need to do some research to figure out that you CAN do it as
well as HOW to do it. Again, the steps aren't particularly complicated
(especially for the XBox wired controller), but remember who we're targeting,
here. If you don't know much about this stuff, you might be worried you'll
break something or won't be able to hook your controller back to your console.

\- If this doesn't occur to you or you'd rather not use your console
controllers, you might be tempted to buy one of those gaming controllers you
see at Radio Shack, Best Buy, or somewhere online. Chances are high that the
controller you bought will be quite shitty in comparison to your console
controllers. You'll notice everything from drifting inputs to cheap buttons to
just plain uncomfortable hand feel. You'll convince yourself that you just
picked wrongly, so you do some more research. You eventually come upon
something pretty good, but it's expensive and it's STILL not your XBox 360
controller.

\- If you get past all this (whether that's finding a good 3rd party
controller or reusing your console controller), you're still not QUITE sure
how each new PC game will react with a controller. Sure, maybe the mappings
make sense, but you worry that you'll come upon something that requires an
action the developers forgot to map to a controller button. Or maybe it'll
just _feel_ wrong because the controls for your particular game were clearly
designed to work best for the physical characteristics of a mouse and
keyboard. You know with enough tweaking this won't be a problem, but it still
bothers you that you have to tweak anything in the first place.

Nothing I've outlined above is a problem for advanced gamers, but if something
like a Steam Machine is ever going to take over the living room, it _has_ to
be a natural plug n' play experience with respect to input devices. And I mean
natural for your mom or uncle, not for you.

Luckily it sounds like Valve will be addressing this head-on; I am more
excited about what they have to say about this than about what the specs of
any particular Steam Machine might be or what the beta might look like.

~~~
Arjuna
I believe that you will find this interesting...

[https://www.google.com/patents/US8241126](https://www.google.com/patents/US8241126)

 _Video game controller having user swappable control components_

Original Assignee: Valve Corporation

Abstract:

A game controller is provided. One or more main control input interfaces on
the game controller consist of generalized sockets. A variety of modular input
interfaces can be plugged into these sockets. Hardware specific to the input
type of the modular input is contained within the modular input itself, and
plugged in via an interface. This allows for dual analog sticks, a combination
of analog and trackball, or further any combination of touchpad, directional
pad, or additional components.

~~~
sillysaurus2
This is why I love HN. Were you randomly looking up Valve-assigned patents and
happened to stumble on this?

~~~
Arjuna
_" This is why I love HN."_

Thank you... same here!

I'm just very interested in the game industry (and a lot of other fields). I
tend to R&R (Read and Research) a lot!

\--

Edit: Valve Corporation patents, for those interested:

[https://www.google.com/search?tbm=pts&hl=en&q=%22Valve+Corpo...](https://www.google.com/search?tbm=pts&hl=en&q=%22Valve+Corporation%2C+Washington%22)

~~~
sudoscience
I don't know of R&R and a search comes up empty...anyone have a link?

~~~
VikingCoder
It's not a technology. It's how that user describes spending their time.

Like, "RTCHN - Responding To Comments on HN"

~~~
JonnieCache
It's also a pun - R&R would normally stand for "rest and recreation."

------
cptno
The two real revelations here are:

>Can I download the OS to try it out?

>>You will be able to download it (including the _source code_ ,[...]) but not
yet.

and

>Am I going to be using a mouse and a keyboard in the living-room?

>>If you want. [...] Stay tuned, though - we have some more to say very soon
on the topic of input.

~~~
nemo1618
yep, the fact that they're making the source code available is a big deal. A
lot of people were worried that SteamOS would just be another closed platform,
and this puts that fear to rest pretty definitively.

~~~
swalsh
They've positioned themselves so that none of their IP even matters as far as
their core business goes. What does matter is that they own the marketplace
for games. Giving the source code away only allows people to improve the
platform, which only strengthens their hold on the market place.

~~~
spyder
Not if somebody modifying it to use with his own marketplace, which is
unlikely but possible with the open source software.

~~~
awj
> Not if somebody modifying it to use with his own marketplace, which is
> unlikely but possible with the open source software.

People have been doing that on PCs for ages. So far Valve seems to be doing
well with "well, then, we'll just outcompete" as a solution to that issue.

------
snotrockets
Look at the beta eligibility list: they require the would be participants to
get a leg in the steam community facilities, and try playing in living room
mode.

That would give a huge crowd an incentive to try Steam the way Valve is hoping
it'd be used in the future. So they give 300 boxes, but get thousands of
people trying their console-like services.

Evil geniuses, those Valvers are.

~~~
this_user
It's not only that, but look at all the steps they have taken in the last 12
months:

1) Convince Nvidia and AMD to improve their Linux graphic drivers - probably
by promising them additional revenue from Steambox sales - to lay the
groundwork 2) Port Steam to Linux, start porting their own games 3) Build a
Steam-based Linux distribution and make it available to everyone 4) Find
partners that build custom hardware to run SteamOS

IMO Valve is trying to achieve two goals with this. The first goal seems to be
to hedge their bets OS-wise. Gabe Newell was quite explicit in his criticism
of the road MS has taken with Windows 8. Valve may very well view this as an
existential threat to their business model if MS for instance takes the Apple
route of promoting app store downloads over the old way of installing
software. Thus, it makes sense to work towards an alternative platform that is
not entirely controlled by one company. The second goal would be to introduce
a new competitor in the console market by leveraging the existing Steam
ecosystem and game catalogue. The beauty of this strategy is that each step
adds value on its own even if the ultimate goal of establishing Steamboxes
should fail

------
programminggeek
This is almost a non-annoucement. They've basically said they were doing this
for the last year. The only news is a sign up process for early steam boxes.

~~~
jljljl
That seems pretty big doesn't it? Going from "we are doing this" to "we are
going to release some of these to early adopters"?

~~~
chc
That seems pretty small to me, both in terms of progress and in terms of the
actual size of of the release.

~~~
Brakenshire
It means they are fully committed to the programme. Up to now there was
speculation that they were going to abandon it.

~~~
chc
No, it emphatically _does not_ mean that. In fact, this announcement makes it
sound even more like they are going to abandon it. As far as I can gather from
this announcement, they're releasing a very small number of units for beta
testing, and then they're getting out of the hardware game and letting third
parties carry the torch.

------
Florin_Andrei
As a parent, if these things don't come with time-based parental controls,
that would reduce their appeal A LOT. Windows, for all its warts, is great
this way. The Windows-based PC in the living room, running Steam, has time-
based parental controls configured at the OS level. This works great for
everyone involved, reduces effort and contention. Also, kids do really well on
fixed timetables.

I've opened a discussion thread in the Steam Universe forum, on this very
topic.

[http://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamuniverse/discussions/0...](http://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamuniverse/discussions/0/864980009916913495/)

~~~
InTheSwiss
Seriously? When I was a kind my NES and SNES didn't need built in time
controls and I am just fine.

I am a parent (11 year old girl and 7 month old son) and I restrict her (son
is a little too young!) time playing games in the same way my parents did by
making sure I do my chores and homework first. I don't rely on OS level
parental controls and I find it kind of sad people need to. I spend a lot of
time playing Animal Crossing with my daughter for example and she knows when
she can and can't play it.

I guess I just find it kind of depressing that we have all these kind of
digital restrictions in place for kids these days. Part of the reason I am
successful in what I do [professionally] is that I didn't have such
restrictions as a child and I hope my daughter in the same. At the end of the
day playing Mario Kart or Viva Piñata isn't going to ruin her life.

~~~
Florin_Andrei
I didn't think this would require pointing out, but amazingly it does.

So, without further ado: Each person / family is different. We could probably
sit down and have a conversation and find out some topic where some random
solution works amazingly well for me, but - surprise! - it does not seem to be
working so well for you. At which point, it would be my turn to observe how
you could just man up and do it; after all, it's so easy. _For me. In my
particular case. Which is different from yours. People and families being
different from each other._

Have I belabored the issue enough now?

~~~
InTheSwiss
I apologise if you felt my post was targeted directly at you. That certainly
was not my intention. What you do as a parent is ultimately your choice and I
have no right to tell you what is right and wrong for your family.

I was simply sharing my opinion that until a few years ago no kid grew up with
these automated digital restrictions and pretty much everyone seems to be ok.

I understand that such things can be helpful however my personal opinion is
that it is a little sad that there is such a need for such features. I would
bet that most people on Hacker News are successful in their lives because of
unrestricted access to computers as children/young adults. I know that is
certainly the case for me. I would spend hours typing in BASIC from computer
magazines sometimes into the early mornings. I would get told off and have my
computer taken away now and then for breaking the rules my parents put in
place but this was ultimately good for me I feel (both the breaking of the
rules and accepting the punishment).

------
Pxtl
> Am I going to be using a mouse and a keyboard in the living-room?

> If you want. But Steam and SteamOS work well with gamepads, too. Stay tuned,
> though - we have some more to say very soon on the topic of input.

This excites me. Valve's bread-and-butter, as a gamedev company and not a game
reseller, uses a pointing device. FPS games and Dota are both genres that do
far better with a mouse.

Obviously, supporting gamepads will get the vast ocean of console-like games
into the living room just fine. But for games originally designed for a mouse,
a gamepad is a pretty sub-par experience. Do they have some new control device
planned? Please? Pretty-please?

~~~
Recoil42
>FPS games and Dota are both genres that do far better with a mouse.

Toupée fallacy. I'd argue that games built for a gamepad -- Halo and Gears of
War come to mind -- feel much better on a gamepad than they do on a keyboard
and mouse.

~~~
14113
I've never been able to play halo on a console, it feels far too inaccurate to
me, now that I'm used to playing with a mouse.

~~~
CrazedGeek
And I've never been able to play Super Mario Bros. with a keyboard. It goes
both ways.

~~~
__david__
Wait, that doesn't make sense. Super Mario Bros. uses digital inputs, not an
analog stick, so it's essentially the same as a keyboard...Are you saying keys
are somehow different than controller buttons?

~~~
CrazedGeek
Well, yes. There is a different feel to using a d-pad and using four distinct
keys, and it throws me off when I'm playing a 2D platformer. In SMB, the
inertia feels totally wrong using the arrow keys or WASD.

~~~
foobarbazqux
I agree, but I think it's because a d-pad does two things: 1) it lets you
press two directions at once with a single finger (all four diagonals are
actually two presses, e.g. up+left); 2) it stops you from pressing two
opposing directions at the same time like you can on a keyboard, e.g. up+down.

Once you get used to these limitations or find a game where diagonal movement
isn't required (not sure about SMB), it's really quite tolerable to play a 2D
platformer with WASD or arrow keys. But you're still right it doesn't quite
have that magical kinesthetic quality that a d-pad does, and I'll always
choose a gamepad myself.

------
julius
They want SteamOS to restructure the console market like Android did with the
mobile market.

They give PC makers a great new customizable way to enter the livingroom-
computer market. With their gaming shop built in.

This is great for gamers. In a few years any SteamMachine for 300$ will easily
outperform PS4/XBone. And have way way more games. And all AAA games (all PC
releases).

~~~
ihsw
> They want SteamOS to restructure the console market like Android did with
> the mobile market.

Makes me wonder when MS will complain that SteamOS is free just like how they
complain Android is free.

[http://www.techdirt.com/blog/wireless/articles/20130409/0212...](http://www.techdirt.com/blog/wireless/articles/20130409/02120322631/google-
competitors-file-ridiculous-eu-complaint-arguing-that-free-android-is-anti-
competitive.shtml)

~~~
pekk
Given their investment in Xbox, they complain about it yesterday

------
usearegex
"Can I download the OS to try it out? You will be able to download it
(including the source code, if you're into that)"

So it _will_ be open source...

~~~
vinkelhake
Since SteamOS is Linux and they're distributing it, they have to. This doesn't
mean that any of the Valve applications running on top of it will be open
source. I don't expect them to be.

~~~
simias
The question is about "SteamOS" however, not the kernel. That means that the
userland might be open source as well (like android). Actually it's a must if
they want people to actually port their OS to a wide range of hardware.

That being said Steam (the app) will obviously remain closed source.

~~~
Touche
What userland is there? It runs startx and launches Steam Big Picture, right?

~~~
AimHere
And right there you're going to need a sizeable chunk of X windows, and a C
library, and network configuration utilities, hardware management tools (looks
like this is aimed at commodity hardware + reference machines from Valve) and
the guts of a web browser and Steam itself. I wouldn't be totally surprised to
find coreutils or at least busybox in the default install too, for aiding and
abetting system initialising (and to please the intrepid few who somehow make
their way to a command line).

~~~
Touche
Sure, not contending there is userland, just wondering if there is any
interesting userland that Valve develops. They won't be open sourcing steam,
so the fact that they release their build of X windows that is exactly the
same as upstream isn't very interesting.

------
4lun
"Am I going to be using a mouse and a keyboard in the living-room? If you
want. But Steam and SteamOS work well with gamepads, too. Stay tuned, though -
we have some more to say very soon on the topic of input."

Sounds like the next announcement is likely to be a controller then

------
venomsnake
If there was ever a good case for eyebrow dismissal it is that.

This is non announcement. They didn't tell anything. Except some weird beta
test on unspecified hardware.

------
wcchandler
It'll be interesting to hear if AMD's announcement today has anything to do
with this.

[http://ir.amd.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=74093&p=irol-
eventDetails&...](http://ir.amd.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=74093&p=irol-
eventDetails&EventId=5024687)

------
CraigJPerry
>> Make 10 Steam friends (if you haven't already)

Are there any HN groups on Steam? If I try to create a group named Hacker
News, it's already in use. If I try to find it, no results found :-)

~~~
Aloisius
Just hop on here [1] and jump to the end of the thread. View profile of 10
people & add them. Should take only a minute.

[1]
[http://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamuniverse/discussions/0...](http://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamuniverse/discussions/0/864980009908627949/)

------
pearjuice
Right now when it comes to computers, there is an implicit monopoly. There is
only 1 company on the planet that supplies both their own hardware and an
operating system of their own bundled with it. This company is Apple. Because
they supply both hardware and software, they can sell a "complete experience"
to customers who, quite frankly, will lap up anything they hear about
computers and their 'black magic'.

But Valve are about to change this.

The so called Steambox announced a day or so ago is now going to be in direct
competition with Apple's own devices as Valve can now offer this "complete
experience" package too. If you want to know why this is so important you only
need to realise that the term "Mac" for most people refers not only to the
computer itself, but to the operating system also. No other company has
anything that comes close to this, but soon Valve will, and the more time
passes and the more people get accustomed to the range of available
Steamboxes, the most ground Valve will gain, and the more Apple will lose.

------
shadowmint
I'm a tiny bit concerned.

    
    
        Can I download the OS to try it out?
        You will be able to download it (including the source code, if you're into that) but not yet.
    

Open source os. Hardware partners for devices. Sound familiar? >_> android.

So, when I buy a samsung steambox it's going to come with its own BallsWiz UI
customization as they try to differentiate isnt it?

~~~
candydance
Similarly it means that a group of consumers could work together and create a
great build to use (eg Cyanogen Mod).

As long as we can install our own OS it'll be fine.

------
dombili
So, according to the last answer, the 3rd announcement will probably be about
a gamepad or an input device of sorts. That's a bummer. I know it was very
unlikely, but HL3 announcement would have made me so happy. I'm still hopeful
though, since it's been confirmed that Source 2 is in the works. Valve usually
shows off their new engine with a new HL game.

~~~
jakebellacera
While HL3 would be an awesome announcement, it doesn't seem highly relevant to
SteamOS. I'm sure if anything, they'll release HL3 as a Steam-exclusive game
as a launch title.

------
djhworld
From the sounds of it they're producing multiple different machines.

I can imagine it being like this

1) Top of the range high spec machine running SteamOS (£500-£600) 2) Medium
spec machine running SteamOS (£250-£400) 3) Basic machine running SteamOS
that's designed for people who just want to stream games from their Desktop PC
into their living room (£60-£120)

------
devindotcom
Why on _earth_ have they not called the hardware "Steam Engine" instead of
these strange other names?

~~~
meritt
Maybe they are saving that for their Unity3D competitor :)

~~~
brymaster
I really like this theory. Seems to me that if Friday's announcement isn't a
game reveal, it'll instead be Source Engine 2 and a possible Unity competitor.
This would make a lot of sense if Valve is serious about getting developers on
board for their SteamMachine/Linux/cross-platform strategy.

Valve has already announced the OS and hardware, dev tools could be next.

------
Fuzzwah
So the only thing I learned from this is that its not a SteamBox, it is a
SteamMachine.

~~~
evanmoran
This naming saddened me, maybe in part from remembering the awesomeness that
was OrangeBox.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Orange_Box](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Orange_Box)

------
arianvanp
This cought my eye: > Can I download the OS to try it out? You will be able to
download it (including the source code, if you're into that) but not yet.

Wondering if that'd include their entire product in source code? probably not,
aye?

~~~
cheald
Almost assuredly not, since their DRM is a big part of their platform. They
may include pieces of it, though.

~~~
jmcqk6
Isn't most of their DRM encryption based? I mean, it's not all that
restrictive, and it's quite possible that simply seeing the code for the DRM
would not be enough to circumvent it. I think other companies would have a
problem, but I don't think valve is probably one of of them. I could be wrong
though.

~~~
cheald
Preorder delivery is encrypted, yeah. However, they also have bits in Steam-
delivered games that can check for a valid Steam session, terminate the game
session if the Steam session is lost, and the like. I don't think they'll be
shipping some of those components because they wouldn't want to enable people
building custom Steam installs that just stub out the DRM features.

------
msie
I wish they would follow Apple's lead and tightly control the hardware. It
would make it easier for devs to test and consumers to make a choice. Apple's
wildly successful with their iPhone business model. Please try to avoid the
fragmentation issues with Android. Windows already owns the home PC market,
why go after it?

~~~
M2Ys4U
> It would make it easier for devs to test and consumers to make a choice.

A choice of one is no choice at all

>Apple's wildly successful with their iPhone business model.

Have you seen the mobile market share? Android is king.

~~~
msie
Yes, I will admit that. Android is king with lots of devices running old
versions. Google is trying to wrestle control of OS updates away from the HW
manufacturers and Valve has to try to avoid that. Also the choice is SteamBox
vs XBOne, PS4, WiiU. Better to have one device to focus all marketing and
development efforts on than try the Windows Everywhere tactic.

------
incision
Marketing in the guise of a beta/prototype program. Google seems to have been
pretty successful doing with Glass and I'm sure there were prior examples.

In any case, I'm pretty much guaranteed to buy the finished product. What
little gaming I've done for the past 4 years or so has been almost exclusively
via Steam.

------
mikevm
I'm rather skeptical about their in-home streaming option. In a world where
games are buying LCDs to minimize input lag, what kind of a performance are
they expecting from streaming a game over LAN?

I'm interested in knowing how this streaming is going to work. Is this similar
to VNC?

~~~
millstone
I'm more concerned with the prospect of needing to buy both a PC and a
Steambox to play games.

~~~
yaeger
>needing to buy

That's a non issue. Valve would be stupid to start making Linux only games.
The SteamMachine is for people who would want to play pc games in their living
room but who don't have a PC anywhere close to connect it to the tv.

So now, they can get the Steam Machine. But since Linux based games on Steam
are still a minority, people might say they don't want that "console" if it
doesn't have much games so Valve set it up that you can stream every windows
based game from your pc that can be anywhere in your home via lan to your
SteamMachine.

------
TullamoreDude
Now they need a pusher, to get SteamMachines and SteamOs on the market. Half
Life 3 confirmed?

~~~
TheCraiggers
>Half Life 3 confirmed?

If you take the time of the announcement (in seconds elapsed since midnight,
March 14th 1993), divided by the amount of letters in the FAQ, and then find
the square root of the resulting number, you get 3!

Seriously though, are you suggesting that HL3 will only be released (even for
a short while) the SteamOS? I agree it's possible, but I think that would piss
all kinds of people off due to it obviously being a marketing ploy.

I would imagine a more likely option for them are discounts for various games
on the platform for a few weeks.

~~~
stonemetal
_but I think that would piss all kinds of people off due to it obviously being
a marketing ploy._

You mean like HL2 and the original steam release?

~~~
girvo
Everyone has short memories. I remember the uproar when that was announced...
Followed by us all dealing with it and getting steam.

Gosh I miss CS1.5

------
glazskunrukitis
At first I thought this will have to do something with steam powered
machines[1]

[1]
[http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/scottychaos/steam_washingto...](http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/scottychaos/steam_washington_forweb.jpg)

------
ludoo
Bah, I thought the link was about real steam machines, who cares about a game
platform...

------
bwilliams
That doesn't seem like a large enough beta and it really only targets PC
gamers. I would think that they would want to be trying to capture console
gamer share rather than existing PC gamers.

~~~
ivarious
I think one of the point is to make existing PC gamers to buy controller for
their Machine and use it, creating a big enough people with controller as a
leverage when dealing with publishers and developer to include controller
support in their games.

~~~
jdjb
Or more importantly, to make it easier for the console game makers to port to
Steam box since the controller will be the primary input device anyway.

------
ivarious
I want to praise the name choice. "Machine" is very catchy.

~~~
mladenkovacevic
SteamEngine would've been rather cool too... unless there is something already
called the Steam Engine... or if it didn't confuse the connotation too much
with other software types of "engines"

~~~
winslow
A few theories are Valve has been working on their Source 2 engine and will
release it as a competitor to Unity naming it SteamEngine. Supporting
win/mac/linux/steamOS etc.

Also SteamMachine might be more unique and thus easier to search for.

------
z3phyr
Android chose Java as its programming language of choice. What kind of APIs
and programming language will SteamBox use? What is the probability that it
will be C++ (C++11)?

------
dkhenry
Now I just need 10 friends

[http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197975331116](http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197975331116)

------
acd
This means we can finally ditch Windows for Linux. It also means it will be
really important for video graphics cards makers to have fast Linux drivers.

------
piinbinary
> The rest will work seamlessly via in-home streaming

Does that mean streaming from another computer (presumably running Windows) in
your house?

~~~
girvo
Yes :)

------
shurcooL
I am most curious about "Stay tuned, though - we have some more to say very
soon on the topic of input."

------
sodafountan
what MS-Dos was to PCs in the 80's or what Android was to Smartphones more
recently is exactly what Steam OS will be to home consoles in the present. I
have faith that Valve will dominate the next generation of interactive
entertainment, if of course they don't mess anything up.

------
Touche
Lessons learned:

1) Hardware is hard.

2) Apparently deadlines are important above all else, even if you have nothing
to announce/release.

------
Dirlewanger
Que numerous random friend requests for the next couple days from a lot of
people...

~~~
CrazedGeek
It'd at least be different from the random group requests I already get...

~~~
Dirlewanger
Those are so damn annoying. In addition I'd be willing to bet that ~1%
actually engage members on the group splash page. Stuff like that in Steam
seems like an oversight.

------
Tichy
Great picture, those machines remind me of the turrets from portal 2

------
nej
I'm very excited about this. Go Valve!

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oddshocks
GG Windows

------
bastards
I am not trying to be a downer, but I think this is going to be a huge flop.

Gaming appliances need to be focused at the gaming market, which Sony and MS
own like the U.S. and USSR in the mid to late 20th century. Nintendo messed up
with the Wii U and probably won't recover, and everything else is secondary,
for now. I even think Apple's move into the TV gaming market will be mostly a
bust, but I could be wrong, because the casual game market is strong.

I've personally not bought a single game from Steam. I know they are big, but
I just don't have time for it. I'm not the target market though.

~~~
tsahyt
I haven't bought a Steam game either. In fact, I don't even have an account.
For the past couple of years I've been locked into the MS ecosystem with the
Xbox 360. I will not buy the Xbox One though. I don't need a surveillance
machine in my living room. I was never a fan of the PlayStation. For a while
it looked like I had to build a PC and have it run the system I dislike the
most, just for the sake of gaming.

Seriously, I'd buy (or build) a SteamMachine in a heartbeat. It's the most
sensible option for me at this time.

------
Steko
2014 Oculus Rift expected to ship widely demoed and lauded next generation
experience.

Nov 2013 Sony and MS start shipping new consoles.

Oct 2013 Apple likely to announce and immediately ship $129=$199 A7X based
console killer.

Sep 2013 Valve announces beta opt in for SteamMachine with zero details on
product.

~~~
cheald
_> Oct 2013 Apple likely to announce $149 A7X based console killer._

Maybe I'm just missing something here, but I'm pretty sure an ARM-based system
has exactly zero chance of displacing current gaming platforms. They could
whip up a sexy Ouya competitor, sure, but Ouya isn't exactly setting the
gaming world on fire. An ARM console would be a competitor to phone/tablet
gaming, not to console gaming.

~~~
Steko
The Ouya GPU pushes 12 GFLOPs (gamecube, original xbox quality).

The GPUs in the 5S give 76 GFLOPs and are underclocked at 300 Mhz for battery
reasons. A hypothetical A7X which, following the A6X, has twice as many GPUs
as the A7, would put us at 150 GFLOPs.

Keep in mind the A6X is still on a mobile device. Up the clock speed to 500
Mhz and we've arrived at 250 GFLOPs. This is comparable to the PS3 (230) and
360 (260) and the assumptions seem pretty reasonable.

GFLOPs aren't the whole story but it's important to understand what class of
machine Apple could ship now. It's certainly console quality. Specwise it
won't hold a candle to the PS4 (1.8 TFLOPs), at least in 2013/14\. But as we
learned last generation the new stud consoles often trail not only
underpowered upstarts (Wii) but sometimes their own previous generation
consoles due to supply or price issues.

[https://www.google.com/search?q=ps2+outsells+ps3&safe=active](https://www.google.com/search?q=ps2+outsells+ps3&safe=active)

And in terms of price Apple could ship the system we're talking about with a
decent amount of RAM and a controller for $149. Of course they won't even
market it primarily as a gaming device so it would probably ship without a
(gaming) controller for $129+.

~~~
cheald
If we're going to talk about _GPUs_ , my ancient Radeon 5770 does 520 GFLOPS
all by its lonesome. The PS3 does ~400GFLOPS; the XBox 360 somewhere around
300. Getting all the way up to 250 puts you at somewhere between the Wii and
the XBox 360, right when the XBox One and PS4 are due to start shipping.
Modern discrete gaming GPUs do 2-3 TFLOPS. ARM is notable for its power usage,
not its performance profile, and in wall-connected gaming, performance is
king.

Any "console killer" is going to have to compete with...well, current consoles
(and now, Steamboxen). Apple could certainly ship an underpowered "do your
mobile gaming on your TV" device (and to be clear, I think there's room in the
market to siphon off some casual gamers), but actually going head-to-head with
the console market just isn't going to happen without putting some more raw
power into the box and shipping an architecture that won't make ports a pain
in the ass. The Xbox One, PS4, and Steambox are _all_ going to be X86-64
architectures. Throwing an ARM platform into the mix and expecting it to kill
existing consoles is silly.

~~~
Steko
" The PS3 does ~400GFLOPS; the XBox 360 somewhere around 300."

I'm showing the PS3 at 230 (various Google) and the X360 at 240 (wikipedia
Xenos). Regardless the Ouya at 12 is not in the same ballpark. To say the
hypothetical Apple system is Ouya quality and not PS3/360 console quality is
simply wrong.

"console killer" is going to have to compete with...well, current consoles
(and now, Steamboxen) ... actually going head-to-head with the console market
just isn't going to happen without putting some more raw power"

It doesn't have to compete directly though, it just has to be good enough at
gaming at the price it's selling for in addition to whatever else they're
selling to undermine the console business model. Mobiles won the point and
shoot and handheld gaming markets without competing directly on specs in those
markets.

~~~
cheald
My point with the Ouya remark is that the Ouya is an ARM machine, which runs
ARM software. Nobody makes ARM games except mobile developers. The Wii, PS3
and 360 were PPC architectures; the PS4 and Xbone are x86-64 architectures
(the Wii U, interestingly, is still PPC, but there seems to be far less of an
emphasis for the Wii on capturing third-party AAA titles than there are for
other platforms.). The raw power is a secondary concern to the fact that the
utter lack of developers making non-mobile ARM games. An A7 system would
probably easily capitalize on iOS games, and could have some PS3/360 games
ported to it, but the library runs a little thin past that. Apple would have
to get developers to port their titles to an underpowered system using a
different instruction set that doesn't have a proven sales model for their
class of product and which would involve entering into contracts with a
company that is famously hostile to developers.

Regarding undermining the console business model, consoles live and die on
their triple-A titles. Your GTAs, Halos, Marios, and Call of Duties are what
sell consoles, not cheap hardware.

Footnote: Regarding the gigaflops numbers, I got them from here - I admittedly
didn't do the math. I kind of suspect it's a combined CPU + GPU number in
light of your numbers: [http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/156273-xbox-720-vs-
ps4-vs-...](http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/156273-xbox-720-vs-ps4-vs-pc-
how-the-hardware-specs-compare/2)

~~~
Steko
I think the main difference between our views is that you're assuming our
hypothetical idevice wins or loses based on whether it gets game developers
while I'm assuming it won't even be marketed as a game machine but the
developers will move there because that's where the most customers will be. A
dedicated $400-$500 gaming machines can die from a lack of third party games.
A $130 converged set top box that people buy for netflix doesn't.

People love to watch netflix on their PS3 but at the end of the day nobody
drops $300 on a PS3 to watch netflix. Plenty of people buy Apple boxes just so
they can watch netflix. That's the difference the price point makes. When
there were 30 million 3DS's and 100 million ipod touches people stopped making
games for the 3DS.

...

"Nobody makes ARM games except mobile developers."

What developer isn't in mobile today? This is like saying no one knows how to
code for ARM except for everyone.

"consoles live and die on their triple-A titles. Your GTAs, Halos, Marios, and
Call of Duties are what sell consoles, not cheap hardware."

I would say that is misreading the biggest lesson of the current generation
which saw the Wii dominate it's first 3-4 years based on (1) the cheap
hardware and (2) Wii Sports, a new title. To some extent AAA titles will go
where the users are.

