4 ms·

I wasn't expecting so many different machines. I was thinking of a cheap steam machine (300/400 $) to play indie games and game about 4 years old, a medium spec

by Vaskivo 13y ago

I wasn't expecting so many different machines. I was thinking of a cheap steam machine (300/400 $) to play indie games and game about 4 years old, a medium spec'd machine for about 700 $ that can play everything in the market, and a 1500 $ machine with high specs. Still, one of the great points in PCs is the variety of hardware. I'm just curious on how Valve (or the HW vendors) are gonna market it. With consoles you have the idea that with that unit you can play everything. With a steam machine is different. I'd like a "with version A you can play X, with version B you can play X+Y, with version C you can play X+Y and have 3D"... I don't care too much for graphics, so hardware specs don't speak too much for me. Tell me how these specs translate in certain game. I just need enough resolution and enought effects to feel imersed to be happy with the graphics.

captainmuon 13y ago
I think they're not so much building "the steam machines", but they are developing a spec. > 'm just curious on how Valve (or the HW vendors) are gonna market it. With consoles you have the idea that with that unit you can play everything. With a steam machine is different. I'd like a "with version A you can play X, with version B you can play X+Y, with version C you can play X+Y and have 3D"... This is nowadays already not much of a problem. If you build a mid-high end PC now, you can expect it to play every game at least at reasonable settings for the next couple of years. How long it's going to hold is always a bit of speculation, but you can get hardware reccomendations from certain magazines or websites. The same is true for the games' side. If I buy a new game, gaming magazines/websites will tell you how much CPU, GPU, RAM you need to play it on minimal, medium, and maximal settings (the hardware requirements on the boxes are usually rubbish, unfortunately). They usually also say something like "works fine if you've built your PC in the last 3 years". You don't need to match the specs exactly, because games have gotten pretty good at automatically adjusting settings. So it works now, but it's only going to get easier with Steam machines. You'll probably see games advertized as "Works great with 2015 steam boxes. Best effects with a 2016 steam box, or AMD Radeon OMG9000. Minimal requirements: 2014 steam box or equivalent (Intel Core i5 xxxx, 8 GB RAM, ...)." If I were them, I'd either have yearly revisions, or hardware levels. So in 2014, a low-end will be HW level 5, a mid-end will be level 6, and a high-end will be level 7. One year later, a new high-end will maybe be level 9. Games would then just say you need a level 7 PC to run (very much like the windows hardware index, except PC's will be built to reach a certain number).
- justin66 13y ago
  > If I were them, I'd either have yearly revisions, or hardware levels. They'll probably end up using something like the Windows Experience Index. People shouldn't have to worry about the specifics of their CPU, etc. unless they want to.

by Vaskivo 13y ago

captainmuon 13y ago

I think they're not so much building "the steam machines", but they are developing a spec. > 'm just curious on how Valve (or the HW vendors) are gonna market it. With consoles you have the idea that with that unit you can play everything. With a steam machine is different. I'd like a "with version A you can play X, with version B you can play X+Y, with version C you can play X+Y and have 3D"... This is nowadays already not much of a problem. If you build a mid-high end PC now, you can expect it to play every game at least at reasonable settings for the next couple of years. How long it's going to hold is always a bit of speculation, but you can get hardware reccomendations from certain magazines or websites. The same is true for the games' side. If I buy a new game, gaming magazines/websites will tell you how much CPU, GPU, RAM you need to play it on minimal, medium, and maximal settings (the hardware requirements on the boxes are usually rubbish, unfortunately). They usually also say something like "works fine if you've built your PC in the last 3 years". You don't need to match the specs exactly, because games have gotten pretty good at automatically adjusting settings. So it works now, but it's only going to get easier with Steam machines. You'll probably see games advertized as "Works great with 2015 steam boxes. Best effects with a 2016 steam box, or AMD Radeon OMG9000. Minimal requirements: 2014 steam box or equivalent (Intel Core i5 xxxx, 8 GB RAM, ...)." If I were them, I'd either have yearly revisions, or hardware levels. So in 2014, a low-end will be HW level 5, a mid-end will be level 6, and a high-end will be level 7. One year later, a new high-end will maybe be level 9. Games would then just say you need a level 7 PC to run (very much like the windows hardware index, except PC's will be built to reach a certain number).

justin66 13y ago
> If I were them, I'd either have yearly revisions, or hardware levels. They'll probably end up using something like the Windows Experience Index. People shouldn't have to worry about the specifics of their CPU, etc. unless they want to.