Love that container case, but holy cheeses, that price. Its a nice callback to the 2000s when manufacturers realised people wanted computer cases that weren't beige, and before the "monochrome" period, when we were getting all sorts of weird & wonderful designs. Bring back cases with personality! I want my case to look like it came from the NASA JPL R&D labs!
Happy daily Bazzite user here of both DE and DX spins on a Lian-Li DAN A3/AMD based desktop PC and ROG Ally X respectively; but really, any of the main gaming distros is a win over Windows. I use Bazzite for both work and play and it just brings back the frictionless experience of using a PC I remember from early Windows before the surveillance capitalism set in... I would encourage people to give any one of SteamOS, Bazzite, CachyOS a go (only if you have AMD bits though...), but I also understand why some people just bounce off it, since while these distros do an amazing job of getting rid of the friction, there is always going to be some level of "getting in the weeds" with Linux.
Deck style spins also bring to PC handhelds what Windows fails to do, a console first, pc optional experience of "pick up and play" without a million updates to do... I just hope we can get better Intel support for some hardware diversity with the new G3 chips!
Eventually I want to do a Steam Machine-esque PC for the living room, but like a lot of people here, part prices make that a low priority...
@SteamyDeck to your point, this quote from The Verge's review summed up Valve's slow-but-steady approach quite nicely:
"In 2022, the Steam Deck handheld began as a buggy, broken mess I could only recommend to early adopters. One month later, I could recommend it to savvy friends. A year of updates later, I felt comfortable recommending it to anyone who could understand the pros and cons. By early 2024, I could recommend a Deck OLED to just about anyone. I fully expect the Steam Machine will have a similar trajectory, because nobody does updates like Valve does updates — its track record is impeccable."
Unfortunately that leaves early adopters holding the bag on future promises, but certainly no shortage of people with a fair bit of disposable income and a love of the latest (but not necessarily greatest in this case) tech gadgets...
But yeah, Valve was screwed either way by market forces; lose money/cut perf. to meet a better price point, or do what they have done.
Not releasing it was not really an option, better to get at least some money with small-scale but profitable sales than eat the opportunity cost of all of their investment in R&D, manufacturing for a platform with parts that are already close to being "outdated"
This could be summed up with a well-worn phrase repeated oft around the internet these days: "there are no bad products, only bad prices"...
apart from the obvious comparison to the Steam Deck, it's a sweet spot of Switch-like/console-like/PC-like experience and side-stepping the PC arms race, offering a nice package of big-screen, low demand games. For the right price, I'd have one for exactly that role. For. the. right. price.
I'm sure it will still sell out, since Valve is no Nintendo/Sony with mass manufacturing capability and will probably have low quantities available, and building a similiar spec "thing" is still more expensive. The biggest competition right now is the last of the affordable pre-builts, which may offer better value, but don't come pre-installed/optimised for SteamOS
In the year of our Lord Gaben 2026, everything is screwed/relative in PC space
I know we are a greedy lot, expecting cool new products and double digits improvements YoY, but AMD's announcements feels a bit nothing burger:
9850X3D: the world's greatest gaming CPU, now with 2-3% extra greatness.... and presumably a more than 2-3% price tag jump
the Ryzen AI 400 lineup; potential for good products in the prebuilt, and Mini-PC space, but the fact you have to get the top dawg 12 core chip to get the full 16CUs... and RAM right meow, eeeek! And the answer is in the name, right? Very spendy AI workstations...
Weirdly, the most exciting for me is the AI Max+ 388, since this feels like it has the potential to be a better product for low power handheld/laptop gaming than the current Strix Halo halo products. Even that is still tempered by the fact we are getting another year of RDNA3.5+++++++ while they apparently sit on RDNA4... never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity, AMD!
Maybe I'm missing an angle here, but the lack of a built in battery feels like a weird design choice. I want to like it (MOAR POWA = good!), but it just feels unbalanced as a handheld. And at that price!
And also maybe I'm just biased because I already have a high-end desktop for hi-fi gaming, and so for me, my Ally X is more of a simple pick-up-and-play device of convenience to play older/less demanding games in my backlog... as themightyant noted, this feels like it would be better implemented like a Switch; emphasizing low watt efficiency mode with a built-in 60-80wh battery in handheld mode, but can be let wild with a full power budget when docked.
I feel like this is where Strix Halo makes sense as a handheld chip vs. the Z lineup, which is a nice balance of power efficiency. I would happily buy this if it came with a Nintendo like dock solution for big screen play. Hopefully we will see some new handhelds with the new 388 chip at least!
Comments 5
Re: AMD's Ryzen 7 7700X3D Is the Heart of My New SteamOS Gaming PC
Love that container case, but holy cheeses, that price. Its a nice callback to the 2000s when manufacturers realised people wanted computer cases that weren't beige, and before the "monochrome" period, when we were getting all sorts of weird & wonderful designs. Bring back cases with personality! I want my case to look like it came from the NASA JPL R&D labs!
Happy daily Bazzite user here of both DE and DX spins on a Lian-Li DAN A3/AMD based desktop PC and ROG Ally X respectively; but really, any of the main gaming distros is a win over Windows. I use Bazzite for both work and play and it just brings back the frictionless experience of using a PC I remember from early Windows before the surveillance capitalism set in... I would encourage people to give any one of SteamOS, Bazzite, CachyOS a go (only if you have AMD bits though...), but I also understand why some people just bounce off it, since while these distros do an amazing job of getting rid of the friction, there is always going to be some level of "getting in the weeds" with Linux.
Deck style spins also bring to PC handhelds what Windows fails to do, a console first, pc optional experience of "pick up and play" without a million updates to do... I just hope we can get better Intel support for some hardware diversity with the new G3 chips!
Eventually I want to do a Steam Machine-esque PC for the living room, but like a lot of people here, part prices make that a low priority...
Re: Review: Steam Machine: Beautiful Hardware, Console Performance - At A Price
@SteamyDeck to your point, this quote from The Verge's review summed up Valve's slow-but-steady approach quite nicely:
"In 2022, the Steam Deck handheld began as a buggy, broken mess I could only recommend to early adopters. One month later, I could recommend it to savvy friends. A year of updates later, I felt comfortable recommending it to anyone who could understand the pros and cons. By early 2024, I could recommend a Deck OLED to just about anyone. I fully expect the Steam Machine will have a similar trajectory, because nobody does updates like Valve does updates — its track record is impeccable."
Unfortunately that leaves early adopters holding the bag on future promises, but certainly no shortage of people with a fair bit of disposable income and a love of the latest (but not necessarily greatest in this case) tech gadgets...
But yeah, Valve was screwed either way by market forces; lose money/cut perf. to meet a better price point, or do what they have done.
Not releasing it was not really an option, better to get at least some money with small-scale but profitable sales than eat the opportunity cost of all of their investment in R&D, manufacturing for a platform with parts that are already close to being "outdated"
Re: Review: Steam Machine: Beautiful Hardware, Console Performance - At A Price
This could be summed up with a well-worn phrase repeated oft around the internet these days: "there are no bad products, only bad prices"...
apart from the obvious comparison to the Steam Deck, it's a sweet spot of Switch-like/console-like/PC-like experience and side-stepping the PC arms race, offering a nice package of big-screen, low demand games. For the right price, I'd have one for exactly that role. For. the. right. price.
I'm sure it will still sell out, since Valve is no Nintendo/Sony with mass manufacturing capability and will probably have low quantities available, and building a similiar spec "thing" is still more expensive. The biggest competition right now is the last of the affordable pre-builts, which may offer better value, but don't come pre-installed/optimised for SteamOS
In the year of our Lord Gaben 2026, everything is screwed/relative in PC space
Re: AMD Unveils Ryzen 7 9850X3D: Fast, Incremental
I know we are a greedy lot, expecting cool new products and double digits improvements YoY, but AMD's announcements feels a bit nothing burger:
9850X3D: the world's greatest gaming CPU, now with 2-3% extra greatness.... and presumably a more than 2-3% price tag jump
the Ryzen AI 400 lineup; potential for good products in the prebuilt, and Mini-PC space, but the fact you have to get the top dawg 12 core chip to get the full 16CUs... and RAM right meow, eeeek! And the answer is in the name, right? Very spendy AI workstations...
Weirdly, the most exciting for me is the AI Max+ 388, since this feels like it has the potential to be a better product for low power handheld/laptop gaming than the current Strix Halo halo products. Even that is still tempered by the fact we are getting another year of RDNA3.5+++++++ while they apparently sit on RDNA4... never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity, AMD!
Re: GPD Win 5 Brings PS5-Class Perf To PC Handhelds
Maybe I'm missing an angle here, but the lack of a built in battery feels like a weird design choice. I want to like it (MOAR POWA = good!), but it just feels unbalanced as a handheld. And at that price!
And also maybe I'm just biased because I already have a high-end desktop for hi-fi gaming, and so for me, my Ally X is more of a simple pick-up-and-play device of convenience to play older/less demanding games in my backlog... as themightyant noted, this feels like it would be better implemented like a Switch; emphasizing low watt efficiency mode with a built-in 60-80wh battery in handheld mode, but can be let wild with a full power budget when docked.
I feel like this is where Strix Halo makes sense as a handheld chip vs. the Z lineup, which is a nice balance of power efficiency. I would happily buy this if it came with a Nintendo like dock solution for big screen play. Hopefully we will see some new handhelds with the new 388 chip at least!