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Tag: Steam Machine

  • The great RAMaggedon of 2026 might have just claimed the Steam Deck

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    Less than a week after Valve admitted that the current shortage (and growing prices) of RAM were affecting its hardware plans, the Steam Deck is completely sold out. The Steam Deck has gone in and out of stock in the past, but as Kotaku notes, the timing does raise the question whether Valve’s RAM issues could also be impacting its Linux handheld.

    The 256GB Steam Deck LCD, and both the 512GB and 1TB models of the Steam Deck OLED, are completely sold out on Steam. Valve announced that it was discontinuing the LCD versions of its handheld and selling through its remaining inventory in December 2025, so the fact that the 256GB Steam Deck model is currently sold out isn’t surprising. That both OLED versions are also unavailable at the same time, though, is a bit more unusual.

    Engadget has contacted Valve for more information about the availability of the Steam Deck. We’ll update this article if we hear back.

    When Valve announced the Steam Machine, Steam Controller and Steam Frame, the company notably left pricing and availability off the table, presumably because tariffs and access to RAM were leaving those details in flux. The company’s announcement last week that the memory and storage shortage had pushed back its plans and would likely impact prices more or less confirmed that. At no point did Valve mention that the Steam Deck would be similarly affected, but maybe it should have.

    The rising cost of RAM has already forced other PC makers to adjust the pricing of their computers. Framework announced in January that it was raising the price of its Framework Desktop by as much as $460. Some analysts assume that the memory shortage driven by the AI industry could lead to higher prices and even an economic downturn in the wider PC industry. Ideally, the Steam Deck being out of stock is a temporary issue rather than a sign that Valve is doing something drastic. If things continue as they are, however, changes to the Steam Deck likely won’t be off the table.

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    Ian Carlos Campbell

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  • Valve’s Console Claims To Run Most Steam Games At 4K 60FPS

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    Valve still hasn’t revealed the full breakdown of what’s inside its new Steam Machine console or how much it will cost. Those details were delayed along with the device’s “early” 2026 launch due to an AI-fueled PC part shortage. But the company did offer a fresh clue about how the mini-computer will perform, and it almost sounds too good to be true.

    “In our testing the majority of Steam titles play great at 4K 60FPS with FSR on Steam Machine,” the company wrote in a new update on February 4. “That said, there are some titles that currently require more upscaling than others, and it may be preferable to play at a lower framerate with VRR to maintain a 1080p internal resolution. In the meantime, we are working on HDMI VRR, investigating improved upscaling, and optimizing ray tracing performance in the driver, so we are approaching this from multiple angles.”

    Steam users are…skeptical. “I don’t see how that’s possible on many, if not most current AAA games,” wrote one commenter. “The hardware just isn’t there. Isn’t this supposed to be a 3050 or lower class device?” Another wrote, “I don’t think the hardware is capable of delivering this promise. I have a 12 GB 3060. Which, presumably, is a significantly more powerful GPU than the one being offered. But it’s a still a lower-end GPU and I’m not playing any AAA games at 4K.”

    It’s hard to know what exactly that means since thousands of new games come to Steam every year and most of them are small indie games that aren’t very demanding to run. The Steam Machine might run Hollow Knight: Silksong and Slay the Spire 2 at 4K 60FPS no problem, but what about Resident Evil Requiem and Crimson Desert, both AAA blockbusters coming to Valve’s storefront over the next couple of months? Not to mention all of the games that launched last year with PC performance issues like Monster Hunter Wilds and Borderlands 4.

    If the Steam Machine can pull off 4K 60FPS for even some of those big games without too much frame generation or upscaling, it would have a lot to offer not just console players but people coming from lower-end or very dated PC gaming rigs. But it also probably won’t come cheap. Then again, in this new world where gaming gets more expensive every year, who’s to say what even still counts as “cheap.”

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    Ethan Gach

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  • Here’s Why You Should Care About the Next-Gen Xbox Launch

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    Xbox is in freefall, but Microsoft’s gaming platform could redeem itself as soon as next year. During AMD’s Q4 2025 earnings call on Tuesday, the chipmaker’s CEO, Lisa Su, said that “development of Microsoft’s next-gen Xbox featuring an AMD semi-custom SoC is progressing well to support a launch in 2027.”

    Up until now, Xbox President Sarah Bond had only been ready to tell us the next Xbox console was indeed in development and would deliver a “premium experience.” The console likely won’t conform to any one game launcher. Instead, it could allow players to access platforms like Steam, Epic Games Store, and GOG as well as Xbox. Essentially, it will be a PC with a less-upgradable “semi-custom” AMD SoC (system on a chip). 

    Why is AMD talking about this console even before Xbox can start its next-gen media blitz? Likely because gaming hardware will be in the doldrums all throughout 2026. Su said the company expects a “decline by a significant double-digit percentage as we enter the seventh year of what has been a very strong console cycle.” 

    2026 may be an odd year for gaming hardware

    The Steam Machine should arrive early this year, according to AMD. © Valve

    The year will start off with the launch of Valve’s long-awaited Steam Machine. Su said the device will arrive early this year, confirming what Valve had already indicated to Gizmodo and others about release timing. 

    Valve’s PC/console hybrid will sport another “semi-custom” AMD chip, though in this case it will be based on older GPU microarchitecture, namely RDNA 3.5. Valve has claimed it will be powerful enough for 4K gaming with the help of upscaling, though judging purely by specs, it may not be as powerful as graphics-obsessed gamers may demand. Later this year, we may see new handheld gaming PCs sporting an Intel Panther Lake chip, but that may be it for new gaming hardware. 

    The difficulty will be getting gamers excited for new gaming hardware, especially if it costs anything more than the current generation of consoles. More than five years after launch, the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X cost more, not less, due to last year’s tariffs. A gaming-ready PC is now enormously expensive due to the ongoing memory shortage. We still don’t know the price of the Steam Machine, but based on Valve’s statements to this point, it likely won’t be cheap. 

    The next-gen Xbox may be even costlier. Numerous leaks from reliable sources like Moore’s Law is Dead on YouTube suggest that Microsoft’s PC-like console will use AMD’s newfangled RDNA 5 microarchitecture. The specs we’ve seen from leaks—including GPU core counts—support that this could indeed be a powerful machine for playing games at 4K with ray tracing enabled. 

    The industry may be even worse off without Xbox

    Microsoft Corp. Xbox Event Ahead Of 2019 E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo
    Xbox President Sarah Bond has made it seem like the next-gen console will be a premium device. Graphics alone may not be enough to move new hardware. © Patrick T. Fallon / Bloomberg via Getty Images

    Specs are one thing, but next-gen hardware success will depend on whether Microsoft can give gamers a real reason to care. If consoles become a “premium” device built only for the most-dedicated gamers with deep pockets, it will price out many more potential players. Judging by Xbox’s reported slowdown in hardware and services revenue, just because they can’t afford a new console doesn’t mean players will run out to buy an increasingly expensive Game Pass subscription. Xbox needs to offer gamers a whole new way to play, something that re-energizes Xbox as a lifestyle brand, rather than just another manufacturer of gaming hardware.

    The gaming industry needs a win. A total of 33% of U.S.-based game developers who responded to the annual State of the Games Industry Report said they were laid off in the last two years. Many of those were due to Microsoft’s own cuts. Among its many in-house and partnered studios, Microsoft is responsible for major developers from Blizzard to Bethesda down to former indie darlings like Double Fine and Obsidian. Xbox’s slow demise will make a bad time for the gaming industry worse.

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    Kyle Barr

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  • Half-Life 3 is rumored to be a Steam Machine launch title and could arrive in spring 2026

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    Half-Life fans are nothing if not patient. For the diehard fans out there, the latest test of patience comes from Insider Gaming Weekly‘s podcast, which claimed that the third installment in the Half-Life franchise is set to release with the launch of the Steam Machine sometime in spring 2026.

    “The window I was specifically told was spring 2026 for the Steam Machine, for the Frame, for the Controller, for Half-Life 3,” Mike Straw, one of the hosts of the Insider Gaming Weekly podcast and senior editor at Insider Gaming, said. “At the end of the day, the game is real.”

    Straw added that all the previous dates for an announcement of the next Half-Life game have passed, but that his sources “are still adamant this is a game that will be a launch title with the Steam Machine.” However, being tied to Valve’s latest hardware release could be an issue since Straw noted that the explosive jump in RAM pricing is causing considerable concern for the Steam Machine’s pricing announcement.

    “There is a concern, however, they haven’t made a decision on price, which is kind of holding back the announcement of anything else,” Straw said. “There’s no doubt in my mind Valve is still trying to make decisions because of what’s going on on the component side.”

    While optimistic devotees were hoping for some teasers during The Game Awards, Valve hasn’t officially said anything. However, there’s still a lot of hope, especially considering Valve updated Half-Life 2 for its 20th anniversary, and previous rumors hinted at a game that’s still in development but is playable from beginning to end.

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    Jackson Chen

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  • Valve says that the Steam Machine’s price will be more ‘in line with current PC market’

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    Valve shook up the gaming world with the announcement of the Steam Machine, but we’re all still curious about the million-dollar question of pricing. While there’s plenty of speculation, we finally have some sort of indication from Valve directly. In an interview with Skill Up’s Friends Per Second podcast, Valve’s Pierre-Loup Griffais revealed that the Steam Machine will not be subsidized but will still have competitive pricing.

    “I think that if you build a PC from parts and get to basically the same level of performance, that’s the general price window that we aim to be at,” Griffais said on the podcast. “Obviously, our goal is for it to be a good deal at that level of performance, and then you have features that are actually really hard to build if you’re making your own gaming PC from parts.”

    Griffais didn’t offer a concrete price range since Valve was still early in the process, adding that “right now is just a hard time to have a really good idea of what the price is going to be because there’s a lot of different things that are fluctuating.” When asked if the Steam Machine would be subsidized like how other companies often sell new consoles at a loss or slim profit margin to generate early momentum, Griffais said no and that it would be “more in line with what you might expect from the current PC market.”

    However, Griffais also revealed that Valve is potentially interested in doing a Steam Machine Pro, but that the company is currently focused on this mid-range level as a “good trade off between affordability and the level of power we get.”

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    Jackson Chen

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  • The Morning After: Valve revives the Steam Machine

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    Valve has announced a raft of new hardware, including a new VR headset, Steam Machine and Controller. The devices are all designed to usher in a new era of PC gaming, with Valve’s usual focus on the player. is a slender VR headset that connects wirelessly to your PC and has a built-in battery to rid you of those pesky cables. That focus on freedom extends to the Frame operating as a standalone device, like the Meta Quest.

    At the same time, the company has revived its long-loved (but not massively successful) . This new model has semi-custom AMD silicon capable of running 4K games at 60 frames per second. Valve says it’s roughly six times as powerful as its portable unit, the Steam Deck. Rounding out the list is the controller, which looks like a Steam Deck with the screen cut out. But it’s not as if that’s a bad thing, especially as it’s got TMR sensors which, while using a different underlying technology, promise the same benefits as a Hall Effect stick.

    As someone on the not particularly game-y end of the spectrum, I use announcements like this as an exercise to see how excited I would be. To that end, I’m curious how much Valve will charge for this gear when it makes its debut early next year. On one hand, the performance promises laid out here are fairly substantial but, on the other, this is also a company that sells the base model Steam Deck for less than a Switch 2.

    That said, I would certainly get off the couch if there was a new Half-Life game in the works, and that seems plausible here. Nathan Ingraham is certainly getting his little hopes up that the revival of the Steam Machine too.

    — Dan Cooper

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    Daniel Cooper

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  • Dbrand’s Companion Cube is the perfect partner for your future Steam Machine

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    Valve’s at a console-like gaming PC for your living room is hopefully going to be a triumph worthy of plenty of cake, with or without fun accessories. But if you really want to make the Steam Machine feel extra special when it arrives in early 2026, you’re going to want to dress it up in Dbrand’s skin.

    A tribute to the iconic Weighted Companion Cube from Valve’s beloved Portal series, it’s such a fitting design that I sort of wonder if the company is kicking itself for not making something similar for its cube-shaped compact PC. Of course, putting your Steam Machine inside this will ensure it stands out from the other consoles occupying your TV unit, which is the opposite effect that the standard design is going to have. While it does have a customizable front plate and an LED light strip, the default all-black colorway could hardly be less attention-grabbing.

    In case you missed yesterday’s announcement, the Steam Machine is a Linux-based mini PC that runs SteamOS and is designed to be plugged into your TV, like a console. Valve says it’s roughly six times more powerful than a Steam Deck and is capable of supporting 4K/60fps gaming with FSR. You can also use it to stream VR games to the new headset, while the Steam Controller, with its distinctive trackpads, allows you to play your Steam games wirelessly.

    Given that we don’t yet have a release date or price for the Steam Machine, Dbrand’s accessory doesn’t have either of those yet either, but it is coming in 2026. And I’m fairly confident that isn’t a lie…

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    Matt Tate

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