Steam Machines at CES 2014 – The Verge

Steam Machines are here, but who are they for?

2014-01-10T13:05:35-05:00

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Last year at CES in Las Vegas, Valve finally announced its long-rumored Steam Machine platform, designed to bring the PC gaming experience into your living room. At the time, the appeal was obvious: a small PC that fits under your television and lets you play the thousands of games on Steam from the comfort of your couch. It even looked like a unified platform that could help simplify the notoriously complex world of PC gaming, making it accessible to a more casual audience. But one year later, the appeal is less clear. The first 13 Steam Machines were unveiled this week, and they don't quite match up to that original vision. They come in a h …

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Spec Sheet: the highs and lows of the first 13 Steam Machines

2014-01-07T10:56:21-05:00

smss

Valve's Steam Machines are reinventing the game console by transforming daunting PCs into friendly boxes for the living room. But rather than make the machines all by itself, Valve has turned to hardware partners to create a whole lineup of them, from basic consoles priced like an Xbox all the way up to towers that just barely veil their gaming PC roots.

Yesterday we got a peek at what 13 of the very first of those Steam Machines will look like. Their prices range from $499 all the way up to $6,000, putting Valve's goal of a diverse ecosystem on the right track. But there's still the question of what that will get you. We're taking a look a …

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Steam Machines are here: how Alienware is realizing Valve’s console dream

2025-11-12T13:13:02-05:00

Gallery Photo: Alienware Steam Machine industrial design

Nearly two years ago, we broke the news that Valve was working on its very own game console. The reasons weren't yet clear. We didn't yet know that the company wanted to throw off the shackles of Windows with its own Linux-based operating system, or that a host of PC manufacturers would take it seriously enough to build hardware.

Today, the Steam Machines are here. Valve has just announced the first wave of computers that can officially be called Steam Machines at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

So what is a Steam Machine, anyhow? Just ask Alienware.

Last month, we sat down with Valve designer Greg Coomer and Alienware product …

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Valve announces 13 Steam Machine partners, including Alienware

2014-01-06T20:05:19-05:00

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Valve has been unveiling its SteamOS initiative piece by piece, and at a brief event today it announced an important new detail: which companies will actually be selling Steam Machines. Thirteen partners were announced at the event, including Alienware, Falcon Northwest, and iBuyPower, among other custom PC makers. There's no word on precisely when the machines will hit the market, but Valve business manager DJ Powers tells us that its hoping to see some on the shelf in the latter half of 2014.

As for whether we'll see hardware from Valve itself, it isn't something the company is ruling out - though it is staying typically quiet on the subj …

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CyberPowerPC Steam Machine will compete with consoles at $499

2014-01-06T13:04:42-05:00

cyberpowerpc steam machine

While some of the companies adopting Valve's living room gaming fomula are simply grafting the SteamOS operating system onto powerful Windows PCs, CyberPowerPC has just announced a Steam Machine designed to actually compete with the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 for around the same price point.

AMD makes for an inexpensive PC

Starting at just $499, the new CyberPowerPC Steam Machine A will come with a 3.9GHz AMD A6-6400K processor and AMD Radeon R9 270 discrete graphics, 8GB of RAM and a 500GB hard drive in a new custom case, and come complete with a Steam Controller and SteamOS when it ships in the second half of 2014. It won't be able to run …

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Digital Storm details its first Steam Machine: a hybrid Windows and SteamOS combo for $1,899

2014-01-06T12:00:24-05:00

digital storm bolt ii flat stock

Digital Storm was one of the first companies to reveal its Steam Machine - its own take on Valve's formula for the perfect living room gaming PC. Today, the company's getting the news out ahead of Valve's announcement yet again, formally announcing that the new Digital Storm Bolt II will go on sale later this month for $1,899.

The Bolt II dual-boots Windows and SteamOS, and features liquid cooling by default - which allows the company to overclock the Intel Core i5-4670K processor to a speedy 4.2GHz right out of the reasonably small box. While the case features quite a few screws, PC builders will find components relatively easy to remove, …

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Valve reportedly has 12 Steam Machine partners

2014-01-05T20:29:40-05:00

ibuypower steam machine 1020

iBuyPower, Digital Storm, and Piixl have all announced their Steam Machines - computers which run Valve's SteamOS game platform - and tomorrow Valve is holding a press conference to announce many more. How many? Engadget has a list of 12 companies that it claims are all among Valve's official Steam Machine hardware partners. According to the publication, usual suspects like Alienware, Falcon Northwest, and Origin PC are all on the list, as well as Gigabyte, CyberPowerPC, Zotac, Next, Webhallen, Alternate, Materiel.net, and Scan Computers. While some of those names are boutique PC builders, others are electronics retailers.

Engadget writes t …

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