Post Comment - Blue's News

Steam Hardware Plans?

[Mar 03, 2012, 12:09 pm ET] - Share - Viewing Comments

A post on The Verge follows up on recent comments by Valve's Gabe Newell about the possibility of Steam hardware by saying this is exactly what Valve is working on, and a reveal may come as early as next week at San Francisco's Game Developer's Conference (thanks Kotaku).

The article cites unnamed "sources" who say Valve is working with various hardware vendors on a "Steam Box," which sounds more exotic than "Windows PC," which is what this seems like, as word is: "Apparently meetings were held during CES to demo a hand-built version of the device to potential partners. We're told that the basic specs of the Steam Box include a Core i7 CPU, 8GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA GPU. The devices will be able to run any standard PC titles, and will also allow for rival gaming services (like EA's Origin) to be loaded up." They note a couple of possibilities that may make this more distinctive than a hardware specification, speculating it may include a proprietary controller, a biometric feedback device, and could take better advantage of Steam's "big picture mode."

This all still speculation at this point, as Valve has not responded to their request for comment.

Post Comment
Enter the details of the comment you'd like to post in the boxes below and click the button at the bottom of the form.

120.

Re: Steam Hardware Plans?

Mar 4, 2012, 23:15

Jerykk

Bhruic wrote on Mar 4, 2012, 21:43: Even if Valve hides all the OS stuff, you still have the in-game stuff to deal with. How many console gamers know what V-Sync is? Or mouse smoothing? Or DX11? Or triple buffering? Or anisotropic filtering? Or antialiasing? The average console gamer doesn't know or care about any of these things. They just want to sit on their couch and play games. Sure, players can skip all the video and control configuration and just jump into the game, but that typically results in an inferior experience because default settings are usually crap. And if someone doesn't care about having an inferior experience, they'll just stick with consoles. If you've got dedicated hardware then you can ship a config file specifically designed for that hardware, and eliminate the need for the end user to fiddle with settings. True. That said, some options are pretty subjective. V-sync, for example. People with 60 Hz monitors tend to swear by V-Sync, as they're willing to deal with input lag in favor of preventing tearing. Conversely, others are more tolerant of tearing instead of input lag. Same deal with mouse smoothing. There's also the matter of standards. What will be considered a minimum acceptable framerate? Or resolution? Or AA level? Or AF level? Given the size of the machine, I highly doubt it'll be capable of running every game at 1080p, 8xAA, 16xAF, all at 60 FPS. It's much more likely that 30 FPS will be considered standard, in which case the Steam Box won't be much of an improvement over consoles. I just really can't see the Steam Box appealing to either console or PC gamers. It won't be as cheap, easy or convenient as a console, nor will it be as powerful or flexible as a regular PC. It also won't have any high-profile exclusives. It will suffer from the same issue that the WiiU will inevitably face; no definitive target audience.

Subject

Comment [quote="Jerykk"Mar 4, 2012, 23:15][quote="Bhruic"Mar 4, 2012, 21:43]q[Even if Valve hides all the OS stuff, you still have the in-game stuff to deal with. How many console gamers know what V-Sync is? Or mouse smoothing? Or DX11? Or triple buffering? Or anisotropic filtering? Or antialiasing? The average console gamer doesn't know or care about any of these things. They just want to sit on their couch and play games. Sure, players can skip all the video and control configuration and just jump into the game, but that typically results in an inferior experience because default settings are usually crap. And if someone doesn't care about having an inferior experience, they'll just stick with consoles. ]q If you've got dedicated hardware then you can ship a config file specifically designed for that hardware, and eliminate the need for the end user to fiddle with settings. [/quote] True. That said, some options are pretty subjective. V-sync, for example. People with 60 Hz monitors tend to swear by V-Sync, as they're willing to deal with input lag in favor of preventing tearing. Conversely, others are more tolerant of tearing instead of input lag. Same deal with mouse smoothing. There's also the matter of standards. What will be considered a minimum acceptable framerate? Or resolution? Or AA level? Or AF level? Given the size of the machine, I highly doubt it'll be capable of running every game at 1080p, 8xAA, 16xAF, all at 60 FPS. It's much more likely that 30 FPS will be considered standard, in which case the Steam Box won't be much of an improvement over consoles. I just really can't see the Steam Box appealing to either console or PC gamers. It won't be as cheap, easy or convenient as a console, nor will it be as powerful or flexible as a regular PC. It also won't have any high-profile exclusives. It will suffer from the same issue that the WiiU will inevitably face; no definitive target audience. [/quote]

;) :( :o %) :) :| ;P X| :D More

If you have a signature set up, it will be automatically appended to your comment.
If you don't already have a Blue's News user account, you can sign up here.
Forgotten your password? Click here.

Email me when this topic is updated.

Special Codes

b[bold text]b
i[italic text]i
u[underline text]u
-[~~strikethrough text~~]-
c[code text]c
+[bullet point]+
q[quote text (indented)]q
[quote="Author"]quote text (indented)[/quote]
[url=Link]text[/url]
r{red text}r
g{green text}g
b{blue text}b
m{maroon text}m
s{secret text (shows in the background colour)}s

Forum Rules

Disagree all you want but attacks of a personal nature will not be tolerated.
Ethnic slurs and homophobic language will not be tolerated.
Do not post spam, links to warez sites, or instructions on how to obtain pirated software.
Abusing the forums in any manner that could be construed as 'griefing' will not be tolerated.