
Valve And Xi3 Team For ‘Piston’ Steam Box - galaktor
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/01/08/it-begins-valve-and-xi3-team-for-steam-box/
======
antimatter15
This might not necessarily have bearing on their ability to create decent
hardware for running Steam, but if I'm not mistaken ISYS Technologies (the
company behind the Xi3 brand/architecture/model) started selling computers
running beta versions of the Google's open source Chromium OS under the name
"Chromium PC" and then sued Google for trademark infringement when Google
launched the Chromebook.

I feel like that kind of behavior is probably worse than being a patent troll.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chromebook#Trademark_dispute>

<http://www.isys-tech.com/xi3-architecture.php>

~~~
zachrose
Could the lawsuit be a defensive legal maneuver?

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bni
I really hope Valve succeeds in migrating the PC gaming community off of
Windows and onto Linux (maybe Blizzard will help?). It will not be easy.

~~~
officemonkey
I look to how successful Valve was in getting games for the Mac made. That
success rate is mixed:

* All the valve games were ported. * A bunch of casual games get ported. * Civilization V * Um, some of the GTA catalog, IIRC.

Frankly, it was kind of a desert. I can't imagine the Linux gaming will pick
up unless the GabeN had "bet the farm" on Linux versus Windows 8. Which I
don't see happening. He might hate Windows 8, but Steam games play nicely on
it, TTVM.

~~~
roc
At a certain point, it's up to the users to show up. I think that's what sinks
OS X support. [1] And that's the big, recurring question-mark with gaming on
Linux.

The vocal subgroup asks and cajoles and begs. But those devs who make the
effort don't seem to find a large enough market to justify it.

[1] It didn't help that Apple's Mac App Store arrived so soon after OS X Steam
showed up. Nor that mobile computing got so large to the point that PC
upgrades basically stalled.

~~~
officemonkey
Another thing to consider about Mac gaming: since iMacs and MacBooks are
essentially un-upgradable and they're not particularly designed for gaming in
mind, they tend to age faster than a similarly-priced self-built tower PC (at
least for gaming.)

I don't think that's going to be an issue for Linux enthusiasts, but it will
be an issue for this "magic grapefruit" they're talking about.

~~~
roc
I seem to recall gabeN posting to the effect that the average Mac running
Steam was better-equipped than the average PC running Steam. If that's true,
the non-upgradability might not have entered into it.

As to this "piston" thing here - I don't think upgradability will be an
anchor. The whole project isn't remotely feasible unless a distro for build-
your-own boxes is also launched. In which case the specifics of this box are
more a blueprint for builders and a performance baseline for developers.

Sales probably wouldn't even track net adoption until the enthusiasts build
out their custom rigs and start convincing their less-technical friends they
can have almost all the same awesome without getting any thermal paste on
their hands.

~~~
illuminate
"I seem to recall gabeN posting to the effect that the average Mac running
Steam was better-equipped than the average PC running Steam"

Which makes sense, however that doesn't mean that there are anywhere close to
more "gaming" level Macs running Steam than there are PCs.

------
Revisor
It will be called Piston.

The demo unit of Piston features one ethernet port, 1/8" audio in/out, SPDIF
optical audio, four USB 3.0 ports, four USB 2.0 ports (with one dedicated to
keyboard input), four eSATAp ports, two Mini Display Port ports and one
DisplayPort/HDMI port.

It will probably cost between $500 and $1000.

[http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/7/3849284/piston-valve-
steam-b...](http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/7/3849284/piston-valve-steam-box-
xi3)

Edit: for those who haven't heard of Xi3 before like me, this promotional
video shows what it's about:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-ox90oXq8c>

~~~
rplnt
> It will probably cost between $500 and $1000.

So they won't be able to subsidize the console price as Sony/Microsoft does?
Because the price seems a bit on the high end for a gaming console.

~~~
neonshot
Well the PS3 launch price was $600, seems reasonable to me.

They wont get me away from my $1600 gaming rig despite being a huge advocate
of steam.

~~~
MSM
PS3 was $500 for the lower version, $600 was for the bigger HD. It also didn't
sell well. PS3 didn't start to pick up in sales until the price started to
drop, and at the time of release PS3 was incredibly powerful.

I can't imagine someone dropping $500-$1000 on this, at that point just build
your own computer people!

------
abrahamsen
> could provide access to thousands of gaming titles

Does this mean 1) the box will be based on Windows, 2) or there have been way
more progress in getting publishers to port their games to Linux than what we
have heard of yet, 3) or that "could" indicates that "thousands" is a
meaningless hypothetical number?

~~~
mariusmg
rumored to be running Linux so definitely 3.

------
gebe
I very much doubt that this is Valve's "official" steam box offering. This
article is a bit more sensational than others' that have been posted on the
subject today.

~~~
deelowe
Agreed. Hopefully, Valve will respond with something official soon.

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bane
I think we're about to be in for a whole new console wars, except this time,
instead of pushing more bits, it'll be a battle between ecosystems. It won't
be a console war, but an ecosystem war.

By and large, with the exception of a few exclusives, the 360 and the PS3 have
more or less the same set of games. Both were incredibly advanced and were a
logical progression of the course that these systems were going. But they both
more or less have the same software ecosystem. Most of the library available
on one is available on the other.

Yet the Wii outsold both of them, using far less advanced technology and
offering far inferior on-line play. Many people credit the control scheme, but
because of the controls (and an incredible first party development house)
Nintendo offered a truly unique software ecosystem.

So this current generation we've _really_ had two software ecosystems, the
360/PS3 one and the Wii one.

So today we have three new consoles about to hit the market in the upcoming
months, Valve's, the Ouya, and Project Shield, right after the Wii U.

Valve is going to offer the PC gaming ecosystem and probably the strong on-
line offering that PC gamers enjoy, the Ouya and Shield are offering Android
(plus some exclusives on either side), and the Wii U will continue to offer
Nintendo's ecosystem. This leaves Microsoft and Sony to respond, probably with
announcements this year and releases before Christmas of next, with their next
offering.

Back in the 16-bit days, the market showed that there can really only be two
console players. Third place was a very distant third (PC Engine). But it's
worth it to keep in mind that the Megadrive/Genesis and Super Famicom/SNES had
wildly different software ecosystems as well.

In the generation following we had a plethora of platforms as well, and it
rapidly shook down to 2 (with 3rd place so bad that Sega made one more go of
it with the Dreamcast then exited the business entirely). Nobody remembers the
CD-I, 3D0, Jaguar, CD32 from this generation.

Following that we had the PS2, XBOX, Gamecube and Dreamcast. It shook down to
an unusual _3_ this time, but the XBOX was artificial in this environment with
Microsoft willing to lose tons of cash on the investment and if you look at
the numbers they really just split 2nd place with the Gamecube.

Today instead of two major consoles, we have two major ecosystems. 360/PS3 and
Nintendo (in transition to the WiiU)...and we're about to add 2 more to it. I
don't think it'll work. Somebody's going to exit the market. It just can't
sustain 4 (5 if you count iOS which is kind of stretch).

The Console business is _hard_ and the public is fickle.

~~~
chucknelson
Disagree a bit with the ecosystem comments.

You're underselling the exclusives on PS3 and X360. For all of the Zelda,
Mario, and other first party Nintendo games, you have a bunch of Uncharted,
God of War, Killzone, Gran Turismo, Halo, Gears of War, Forza, Viva Pinata,
etc. between PS3 and X360. See
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_games_exclusives_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_games_exclusives_\(seventh_generation\))
\- there are a lot of exclusives between the two.

I would just say Nintendo was left out of all of the cross-platform games,
which is a shame. Much of the Wii's "unique" ecosystem is garbage.

We may be going through a new "shakeout" period, similar to the 3DO and Jaguar
days. As for mainstream adoption, I don't see any of the newcomers (OUYA,
Project Shield, Piston) taking off, but it'll be fun to see what happens.

~~~
FredFredrickson
If Valve makes their new platform the only way to play Half-Life 3... that
might be the first game in the series that I'll have to skip. I hate to say
that, because I don't doubt that it will be an awesome game, but it's just not
enough to sell me on a whole new gaming platform.

~~~
atourgates
I don't see that happening, partially because it would be very un-Valve-like,
and partially because it would be stupid.

Valve, in the past, has pushed for more hardware to be able to play its games,
not less. Sure, it started out on Windows, but it's made a very respectable
delivery platform for the Mac, and now they're on their way to Linux. Saying,
"the only way to play our game is on this one specific piece of hardware you
have to buy from us" would go against quite a bit of what they've been doing
over the past 5 years.

Also, it would be stupid. The people who are drooling over the possibility of
HL3 are PC gamers. People who invest cash in gaming rigs, who probably like
building their own computers. Saying, "Want HL3? Now you have to buy our
hardware!" would be more or less giving their fans the middle finger.

I expect the Steam Box will be hardware, and possibly a customized Linux
distribution. And I expect that if you want to "build your own" Steam Box,
you'll be able to.

------
jofo25
I always wondered why there was this heterogeneity between consoles and PCs.
You're playing the same games, why would it be good for anyone to have to
develop/buy something twice or for one exclusively.

Hopefully the Steam Box destroys this distinction and makes a more consistent
and flexible gaming landscape.

~~~
InclinedPlane
Development-wise that problem has mostly been solved. In the past cross-
platform game development was done as separate projects, often handing off
"porting" the game to a platform to an external team, even. Today it's more
common to use engines (such as the unreal engine) which support all the major
platforms (PC, 360, and PS3 typically, for first-person, high graphic-load
style games), and then do the development for all versions concurrently.
Typically you'd just have your regular builds set up to produce versions for
each platform as a matter of routine, and you'd have a consistent testing
experience for each. You'd still end up with customizations and tweaks for
each individual platform but for the most part all of the hard work of
targeting and optimizing for each platform is automated.

~~~
JulianK
Just for another perspective, my experience doesn't really align with this.
From my (biased) perspective, this sounds like "in theory" as opposed to "in
practice" so I'm honestly curious if you've managed to get away from having to
really deal with cross-platform differences.

I know that in theory you use a cross platform engine that hides away all the
messy details from you.In practice, I've found the PS3/360 have quite
different CPU/memory architectures and you start dealing with the reality of
that sooner than you'd expect. Whether that requires manually down sizing
certain swaths of textures or writing code that will run on the SPU, there's
quite a bit of manual work involved.

Also, most game studios tend to roll their own tech which generally requires
at least a small cadre of people manually targeting and optimization for each
platform.

------
primitur
The days of walled-developer-gardens are over! The barrier to entry into the
lucrative console markets are lower and lower with every day that passes .. as
a developer who could never afford a PS3 or XBox dev license, I've been
participating as much as I can in the open hardware arena (GP32, GP2X, Wiz,
Caanoo, Open Pandora) as much as possible .. and now the dream is finally
coming true!

I can't wait until the day these things start shipping - I for one welcome the
opportunity to have as much diversity in this market as possible ..

~~~
muyuu
Not sure about that.

Valve might want to have their own walled garden rather than ending with
walled gardens. It's a tested and very profitable model.

~~~
primitur
The point is, between "totally tyrannically rulled wall garden", and "nicely
maintained arena of culture", is a big difference!

I'm perfectly fine with Linux as a dev platform. Steam on Linux is an
admission that in fact, you can use Linux to make great games. Maybe I have to
sign my binaries before Valve gives them to 20 million users, but okay; I'm
still going to be, locally, 100% developing on Linux, nevertheless.

------
programminggeek
FYI, a $500 PC that attaches to your TV is not going to sell well. It might be
profitable and a good idea, but it's not going to stop console gaming from
"winning". The magic price point is $199.

Something like the OUYA is more likely to hit the mainstream. $99 is a great
price point. What people are discounting is that something like OUYA could get
updated every 1-2 years unlike the 7ish year console lifecycle we are
currently in. ARM keeps getting faster, it will certainly be "fast enough"
soon...

------
nixarn
Is this the final design? Am I the only one who thinks this looks extremely
ugly? Hope it's not the final design, I'd love for it to succeed.

~~~
FredFredrickson
No, you're not the only one. It's awful.

~~~
regomodo
Needs some gloss, monotone finish and its shaped changed into a rectangle with
beveled edges.

~~~
FredFredrickson
Haha, well I'm no industrial designer, so who knows what it ought to look
like... but if it looks like this image, you can be sure I won't ever have one
sitting next to my TV.

I'm not really interested at this point anyway, but an ugly hardware design
virtually seals the deal.

------
galaktor
More pics on polygon [http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/7/3849284/piston-valve-
steam-b...](http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/7/3849284/piston-valve-steam-box-
xi3)

------
AndrewDucker
I'd like to know more about the OS and price.

At the moment it's just "There will be a small PC you can plug into your TV
and play games on" and I can do that for myself. What advantage will this box
have over that?

~~~
InclinedPlane
The advantage is that it will be a streamlined experienced for non tech-savvy
people.

~~~
jiggy2011
That would be effectively the same as adding Steam to startup in Windows,
which the installer does anyway.

~~~
__alexs
It doesn't go direct to Big Picture mode though and you still have to click
through UAC and firewall alerts when launching newly installed games quiet
frequently. Having full control of the software stack lets them take out quite
a friction points.

~~~
jiggy2011
Adding an option to boot directly to big picture mode would be a huge problem
and the Steam Windows client automatically adds firewall exceptions etc for
games that you install.

Since I mainly use Linux my Windows 7 PC is basically a Steam box already.

~~~
CrazedGeek
For what it's worth, there actually is an option to boot directly to Big
Picture mode.

------
andybak
Anyone got any idea how technically challenging it would be for Valve to get
Steam Linux running on ARM?

The idea of a possible future convergence between Linux and Android gaming
intrigues me.

~~~
jspthrowaway2
Modern 3D engines usually contain some not-insignificant amount of assembly
for performance reasons. It'd require almost completely retuning, probably,
undoing years of ideas since ARM is an entirely different architecture.

Wouldn't hold your breath this early.

~~~
w0utert
Modern 3D engines contain almost no assembly anymore these days, and for the
rare bits that are still hand-coded assembly, platform-independent alternative
codepaths always exist. We've been long past the point where raw CPU
performance even matters for high-end games anymore, for some time already.
Porting between e.g. PPC as used in consoles and x86 is business as usual, so
I don't see why porting to ARM would be much more difficult.

The main problem right now is that ARM performance is simply not there yet. It
might be somewhere in the future, but even that remains to be seen, it's not
entirely clear how well ARM designs will keep scaling up as they start to
approach midrange x86 chips. Right now, ARM is just starting to match Atom,
which is dog-slow compared to Core i3/i5/i7, and basically useless for non-
trivial gaming.

------
daredevildave
Would it kill them to put a f-ing link to Xi3 in that article?

~~~
AndrewDucker
You'd get more upvotes if you contributed something to the discussion, like
so:

The original article didn't have a link to xi3, so here it is:
<http://xi3.com/>

~~~
regomodo
Yes, it's all about the upvotes.

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cateye
Without matching input devices like gamepads the added value is limited. One
of the best things of console gaming is the normalized gaming experience.

------
jiggy2011
So the Steam box will basically be a standard PC in a cool box with Steam
branding on it?

~~~
sgift
Which is exactly what a console is. I do not understand all these "but if you
would pay x more you could get this and that and ..." here - yeah, you can do
this, but people still buy a X-Box/PS3/whatever. The value of a console (or
Steam box) is the _standardization_ i.e. all models of the Steambox are
exactly the same. You test one, it works on all of them. Contrast this with
the millions and millions of configurations that PCs have which are all subtle
different. People can test as long as they want but can never be sure that a
game will run on _your_ (or my or anyone else) PC.

~~~
jiggy2011
The biggest value of an xbox is probably the heavily subsidised price point
and access to a proprietary ecosystem and console exclusive games.

Unless Valve can pull out a huge amount of launch titles this will have a very
weak ecosystem of it's own so will have to compete directly against other
"gaming PC" companies such as Alienware.

------
zemanel
i tried throwing money at the page but it didn't work. Browser issues? :-)

------
leoc
Content warning on dismembered human being in background image, kthx.

~~~
freehunter
I'm not seeing a dismembered human. I'm seeing some poorly drawn cartoon
characters in what looks to be a prison fight, and the picture includes what
could possibly be poorly drawn blood on the ground. Are you seeing something
else?

~~~
leoc
> Are you seeing something else?

I was. The ad being served was Hotline: Miami not Prison Architect when I made
my comment.

