WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.000 Valve dropped three absolute bombs today. The Steam Frame standalone VR headset, 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:09.160 that's gonna have to be a separate video. This one focusing on the new Steam Machine, 00:00:09.160 --> 00:00:14.880 and yes, the wait is finally over, the 2026 edition Steam Controller. 00:00:14.880 --> 00:00:19.280 Let's start with a little history. Over 10 years ago, Valve announced their first version 00:00:19.280 --> 00:00:23.640 of SteamOS, a Linux-based operating system that would free gamers from the shackles 00:00:23.640 --> 00:00:28.560 of Microsoft Windows. No, it was a total commercial flop. 00:00:28.560 --> 00:00:34.120 But instead of giving up on Steam Machines, Valve doubled down, working with game developers 00:00:34.120 --> 00:00:37.760 on Linux native ports of their games, and with open source developers 00:00:37.760 --> 00:00:41.680 on the proton compatibility layer that makes their Steam Deck handheld 00:00:41.680 --> 00:00:46.680 out of the box compatible with thousands of Steam games, even ones that only ever shipped on Windows. 00:00:46.680 --> 00:00:50.400 The Steam Deck is believed to have sold millions of units at this point, and no wonder, 00:00:50.400 --> 00:00:54.480 given its great balance of solid gaming and outstanding affordability. 00:00:54.480 --> 00:01:00.240 But its mobile form factor has given it certain limitations, and left gamers hungry 00:01:00.240 --> 00:01:04.520 for something more substantial. And well, here it is. 00:01:04.520 --> 00:01:09.800 I'm calling it the lunchbox. One, because it's substantial, like lunch. 00:01:09.800 --> 00:01:14.920 Two, because it's cube-shaped, like a box. And three, because I think this thing is going 00:01:14.920 --> 00:01:19.400 to eat Xbox's lunch. Okay, that last one was a bit of a reach. 00:01:19.400 --> 00:01:22.040 But not as far as I'm reaching for this segue 00:01:23.280 --> 00:01:27.360 to our sponsor. In what has become typical Valve fashion, 00:01:27.360 --> 00:01:30.600 they've been atypically open about the new Steam machine, 00:01:30.600 --> 00:01:35.160 giving us direct access to the engineering folks who worked on these devices. 00:01:35.160 --> 00:01:39.440 The only thing I didn't have today was time, so we're going to get through this as fast as we can. 00:01:39.440 --> 00:01:43.400 At the heart of the Steam machine is a six-core AMD Zen 4-based CPU 00:01:43.400 --> 00:01:46.560 that turbos up to 4.8 gigahertz with 16 gigahertz. 00:01:46.560 --> 00:01:50.280 And it's a very powerful machine, and it's a very powerful machine. 00:01:50.280 --> 00:01:56.560 And it's a very powerful machine. 4.8 gigahertz with 16 gigs of RAM and an eight gig GPU 00:01:56.560 --> 00:01:59.760 that they compared to a 7,600 XT-ish. 00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:04.080 But they were also quick to point out that it might not be apples to apples 00:02:04.080 --> 00:02:09.480 thanks to their custom software stack and power tuning. Basically, the goal was that pretty much anything on Steam 00:02:09.480 --> 00:02:13.640 should run at 4K 60 FPS, if you're willing to turn down the details 00:02:13.640 --> 00:02:18.120 and use a little bit of FSR upscaling. And we saw that on display with Cyberpunk 00:02:18.120 --> 00:02:22.520 running in the demo room at these settings. Valve says to expect about six times 00:02:22.520 --> 00:02:27.000 the performance of the Steam Deck. Now, I was a little surprised to not see an SOC 00:02:27.000 --> 00:02:31.880 with shared memory, but apparently the decision to go for a discrete CPU and GPU 00:02:31.880 --> 00:02:35.600 came down to balancing cost, power, size, and performance. 00:02:35.600 --> 00:02:38.600 And also they just didn't feel like they needed to. 00:02:38.600 --> 00:02:42.960 And I guess Valve was right because they nailed this thing. 00:02:42.960 --> 00:02:46.160 Compared to a more traditional ITX small form factor machine 00:02:46.160 --> 00:02:52.480 like the OG Steam machine reference design, you can see that it's a lot smaller, 00:02:52.480 --> 00:02:58.520 more on par with a highly integrated design like something like the framework desktop investment disclosure. 00:02:58.520 --> 00:03:02.000 Like the framework desktop, Valve allows customization of the front panel 00:03:02.000 --> 00:03:05.160 using these magnetic plates and they're gonna provide the CAD files 00:03:05.160 --> 00:03:08.880 so you can put whatever your heart desires on here. They even had a machine in the demo room 00:03:08.880 --> 00:03:13.680 with an E-ink display that was showing system vitals. Pretty darn cool, but unlike the framework, 00:03:13.680 --> 00:03:18.040 it has a programmable RGB strip in the front that could be used to personalize your style 00:03:18.440 --> 00:03:23.280 or maybe show a progress bar while you switch your TV input and wait for your game to be downloaded. 00:03:23.280 --> 00:03:27.680 The sky's kind of the limit. The front of the device has a power button, micro SD slot, 00:03:27.680 --> 00:03:30.880 two USB three, five gigabit per second ports, 00:03:30.880 --> 00:03:35.560 then the rest of the IO is in the back where you'll find two USB two type A ports, 00:03:35.560 --> 00:03:40.960 a USB-C 10 gigabit per second port, no DisplayPort on there, that is worth noting, 00:03:40.960 --> 00:03:44.580 gigabit Ethernet, power in for the integrated power supply. 00:03:44.580 --> 00:03:51.200 Good gravy, this thing is compact, as well as an HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort 1.4 port. 00:03:51.200 --> 00:03:56.040 It is worth noting that HDMI 2.0 port, they have tested it at HDMI 2.1 speeds, 00:03:56.040 --> 00:04:00.400 but there are a couple of features that are not implemented so they can't call it HDMI 2.1. 00:04:00.400 --> 00:04:03.960 Also at the back, we have a large 120 millimeter cooling fan 00:04:03.960 --> 00:04:07.000 that draws air from both the intake on the bottom 00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:12.760 that comes up through the power supply as well as the large heat sink on the front. 00:04:12.760 --> 00:04:17.760 We're gonna crack this thing fully open in a sec, but first I wanna talk about the steam controller. 00:04:17.760 --> 00:04:22.520 No, no, not that steam controller, the new one with the exact same name. 00:04:22.520 --> 00:04:27.520 Before you ask, yes, I made my case to Valve that this is unnecessarily confusing. 00:04:27.520 --> 00:04:32.400 No, they're not going to change it. The good news is Valve learned a lot 00:04:32.400 --> 00:04:37.960 from the first steam controller and this appears to be their most complete offering ever. 00:04:37.960 --> 00:04:42.080 To be fair, the original was really cool. I mean, it made non-controller games 00:04:42.080 --> 00:04:45.800 finally playable from the couch thanks to their innovative haptic touchpad. 00:04:45.800 --> 00:04:51.920 They also unlocked novel input schemes with gesture controller like swiping with momentum, 00:04:51.920 --> 00:04:55.400 but they also turned off a lot of folks 00:04:55.400 --> 00:05:00.160 due to their deficiency of traditional joysticks. 00:05:00.160 --> 00:05:05.240 Well, that's solved now. The steam controller is everything that is great 00:05:05.240 --> 00:05:10.520 about the controller on the steam deck, but usable when your steam deck is in dock mode 00:05:10.520 --> 00:05:15.880 or with your steam machine or with any other PC investment disclosure. 00:05:15.880 --> 00:05:19.400 On the surface, it offers up a conventional ABXY button layout 00:05:19.400 --> 00:05:23.480 with a PlayStation style symmetric joystick design that will work seamlessly out of the box 00:05:23.480 --> 00:05:27.440 with basically any game. The track pads have been repositioned 00:05:27.440 --> 00:05:30.440 to better accommodate the ARM's natural position 00:05:30.440 --> 00:05:33.920 while holding a smaller device compared to the wider steam deck 00:05:33.920 --> 00:05:38.320 and all of the usual Valve buttons are included. A steam button for opening the menu, 00:05:38.320 --> 00:05:41.320 their quick access button for bringing up the SteamOS overlay, 00:05:41.360 --> 00:05:45.000 four rear programmable buttons. The face buttons are satisfying 00:05:45.000 --> 00:05:48.320 with a nice amount of resistance and the D-pad has been tuned from the steam deck 00:05:48.320 --> 00:05:52.680 for better feel. It feels okay to me, but I only got a couple of minutes with it 00:05:52.680 --> 00:05:57.360 before Valve blew my mind. The joysticks are next generation TMR 00:05:57.360 --> 00:06:02.880 or tunneling magneto resistant joysticks boasting superior accuracy and durability 00:06:02.880 --> 00:06:08.280 even compared to hull effect joysticks. And the controller has been designed from the ground up 00:06:08.320 --> 00:06:12.240 for a superior gyroscopic aiming or mousing experience 00:06:12.240 --> 00:06:16.040 with capacitive thumb sticks and even capacitive grips. 00:06:16.040 --> 00:06:19.240 So you can configure your gyro to enable or disable 00:06:19.240 --> 00:06:24.800 depending on whether you put your thumb on the stick or even by simply loosening your grip, 00:06:24.800 --> 00:06:28.400 say to re-center and then reactivate gyroscopic aiming. 00:06:28.400 --> 00:06:33.160 They had a great demo with Bellatro showing how you can use the game's built-in 00:06:33.160 --> 00:06:37.600 controller compatibility like a PLAB or hear me out. 00:06:37.600 --> 00:06:41.080 Track pads with the right for movement and the left one split down the middle 00:06:41.080 --> 00:06:46.880 for left and right click. Or hear me out again. Gyro mouse using the face buttons for clicks. 00:06:46.880 --> 00:06:52.280 And if you don't care about gyro aiming, these capacitive inputs are all remappable as well 00:06:52.280 --> 00:06:55.520 opening up a whole world of possibilities. 00:06:55.520 --> 00:07:00.760 Let's go even deeper. In addition to the haptic texture-like feedback 00:07:00.760 --> 00:07:04.560 that you know and love from Valve's previous touch pads, the steam controller has been upgraded 00:07:04.560 --> 00:07:09.240 with large rumble motors for better immersion and a large battery that they claim should be good 00:07:09.240 --> 00:07:15.160 for 35 hours in the most demanding applications and even better if you don't need quite as much rumble. 00:07:15.160 --> 00:07:18.920 But I haven't even talked about the best part. If you've ever gamed over Bluetooth, 00:07:18.920 --> 00:07:22.960 you know that it can be inconsistent at best. 00:07:22.960 --> 00:07:28.160 Valve solution, the puck. Every steam controller comes with a wireless dongle 00:07:28.160 --> 00:07:33.120 that clips magnetically to the steam controller using a couple of nice strong alignment magnets. 00:07:33.120 --> 00:07:36.600 And it uses a proprietary 2.4 gigahertz wireless interface 00:07:36.600 --> 00:07:43.320 that Valve claims is good for about eight milliseconds end-to-end latency and offers up superior resiliency 00:07:43.320 --> 00:07:47.480 when you're using multiple controllers. It allows four controllers per puck, 00:07:47.480 --> 00:07:53.280 so that's not as good as the Xbox dongle, which can do eight, but Valve has tested up 00:07:53.280 --> 00:07:57.480 to four pucks on a single system for a maximum of 16 players, 00:07:57.480 --> 00:08:02.880 meaning that you're probably gonna run out of seats on your couch before you run out of controller compatibility. 00:08:02.880 --> 00:08:07.000 The last mwah chef kiss on top is an IR emitter 00:08:07.000 --> 00:08:11.920 that's cozyed up beside the power LED to help you find your controller when you're in VR. 00:08:11.920 --> 00:08:18.760 I love it. Now let's get back to the steam machine who got naked while we were busy, oh you. 00:08:18.760 --> 00:08:24.400 While Valve's goal was to build something that is zero hassle, grab and game for the non-tinkverse, 00:08:24.400 --> 00:08:27.400 they really were laser focused on a console-like experience 00:08:27.400 --> 00:08:31.840 with quick suspend and resume and modern standby so that your games are already updated 00:08:31.840 --> 00:08:36.800 when you sit down to play. They also fully acknowledged that there are folks out there 00:08:36.800 --> 00:08:41.040 guilty who are tinkerers and they've come up with an ingenious design for this thing 00:08:41.040 --> 00:08:46.120 that allows it to cater to both audiences. In advance, no, you're not gonna be swapping out 00:08:46.120 --> 00:08:50.460 the BGA soldered processors, but what you can do 00:08:50.460 --> 00:08:53.760 is upgrade the storage with next to no hassle 00:08:53.760 --> 00:08:58.760 to a 2230 or larger 2280 sized M.2 drive 00:08:58.760 --> 00:09:03.160 and while we couldn't go that deep today, Valve also confirmed that the memory 00:09:03.160 --> 00:09:08.920 uses standard Sodium slots. Finally, while Valve hasn't actually told iFixit 00:09:08.920 --> 00:09:12.320 that this product is coming yet, they did say that they're hoping to continue 00:09:12.320 --> 00:09:17.160 their partnership that they've had on the Steam Deck, making replacement parts available for end users. 00:09:17.160 --> 00:09:20.640 Awesome. Since we're in here by the way, there are some really cool details 00:09:20.640 --> 00:09:25.200 that I'd love to highlight. The power supply for one thing is fully integrated 00:09:25.200 --> 00:09:30.360 to the point where it's actually part of the chassis and the cooling solution pulls air directly through it 00:09:30.400 --> 00:09:34.880 which avoids any need for it to have its own fan. The aforementioned Delta cooling fan 00:09:34.880 --> 00:09:38.080 is actually slightly thicker than the standard 25 millimeter 00:09:38.080 --> 00:09:41.680 for extra static pressure and it includes antenna mounts 00:09:41.680 --> 00:09:45.440 that are integrated into it along with IO mounts. 00:09:45.440 --> 00:09:49.540 Cool, right? Oh, this is actually a great look at the four antennas. 00:09:49.540 --> 00:09:53.920 So this is the back of the device where you have your two antennas for Wi-Fi 6E. 00:09:53.920 --> 00:09:57.600 Then if we flip it around to the front, we've got one antenna for Bluetooth peripherals 00:09:57.600 --> 00:10:01.880 and another one that is dedicated to your Steam controller or controllers. 00:10:01.880 --> 00:10:07.080 So that puck that's included with your controller is actually extra and you could chuck it on another PC 00:10:07.080 --> 00:10:11.680 or next to your couch for charging. A major question mark though is of course price. 00:10:11.680 --> 00:10:17.120 Valve wasn't able to give any specific numbers due to rapidly evolving market conditions 00:10:17.120 --> 00:10:22.160 but they will obviously have it nailed down when the Steam machine launches in Q1 2026 00:10:22.160 --> 00:10:26.200 alongside the new Steam controller. They did give me one hint though. 00:10:26.200 --> 00:10:30.640 They said that while they expect it to be very competitively priced with a PC, 00:10:30.640 --> 00:10:34.360 that it will be priced like a PC rather than like a console 00:10:34.360 --> 00:10:38.120 with games subsidizing the upfront hardware purchase. 00:10:38.120 --> 00:10:43.200 They wouldn't say why but if I had to guess, I'd say it's partially to avoid stepping on the margin 00:10:43.200 --> 00:10:47.640 opportunities of their potential partners for Steam games and Steam software 00:10:47.640 --> 00:10:53.280 but also because they recognize that the Steam machine is a full-fledged PC capable of being used 00:10:53.280 --> 00:10:58.900 as a full-fledged PC. There's no guarantee then that say a corporate purchase 00:10:58.900 --> 00:11:02.900 of 10,000 of these things would result in a single game sale. 00:11:02.900 --> 00:11:07.500 So they really do need to protect the sustainability of their hardware business. 00:11:07.500 --> 00:11:10.740 Another major question mark is where the heck 00:11:10.740 --> 00:11:13.880 is standalone Steam OS for custom PC builders? 00:11:14.820 --> 00:11:20.660 Well, we aren't gonna get a formal Steam OS release for BYO hardware configurations anytime soon 00:11:20.660 --> 00:11:23.780 but Valve has expanded the list of supported 00:11:23.780 --> 00:11:28.780 third-party devices and they have supported installing the Steam Deck recovery image 00:11:28.780 --> 00:11:32.460 on AMD CPU and GPU systems for some time 00:11:32.460 --> 00:11:35.580 and recently updated it to support their latest Zen5 00:11:35.580 --> 00:11:42.020 and RDNA4 architecture processors. So nothing prevents you from building your own Steam machine 00:11:42.020 --> 00:11:45.900 and installing the software for free. Though you will miss out on some things. 00:11:45.900 --> 00:11:51.620 HDMI CEC control for instance, required Valve to build a custom motherboard 00:11:51.620 --> 00:11:55.700 in order to have your computer turn on alongside your AV receiver. 00:11:55.700 --> 00:11:58.700 And to get that on a BYO PC would require 00:11:58.700 --> 00:12:05.260 some serious cooperation between hardware makers that I don't know if we should hold our breath for. 00:12:05.260 --> 00:12:09.260 But the bulk of the experience should work pretty much out of the box. 00:12:09.260 --> 00:12:13.140 We may even get a release that supports a broader range of hardware in the future 00:12:13.140 --> 00:12:17.620 but the vibe I'm picking up on around here is that it really depends on better support for Intel 00:12:17.620 --> 00:12:22.900 and especially NVIDIA GPUs. I'm also picking up this vibe to our sponsor. 00:12:22.900 --> 00:12:28.220 I tried to get through everything but I only had about four hours to get briefed on everything right and film so my apologies. 00:12:28.220 --> 00:12:32.820 Now, assuming that that one's up yet, go check out the video on the Steam Frame VR headset 00:12:32.820 --> 00:12:39.740 because it's a game changer, it's a big deal. Please make it clear that this is not a real product. 00:12:39.740 --> 00:12:40.580 Sorry.