Sylvia

1 week ago

Sylvia
1 week ago

So, Valve, probably the biggest gaming company in the world, just announced 3 new pieces of hardware after the success of their last Linux-powered gaming handheld "Steam Deck".

A controller, a small little gaming desktop PC and a VR headset. All of them (aside from the controller of course) running SteamOS, a full Arch-based Linux OS with KDE Plasma.

Excited to see so many new people potentially see how cool Linux is when it ships early 2026!

infosec.exchange/@SteamDB/1155…

SteamDB

2025-11-12 18:02:20

Announcing new Steam Hardware, coming in 2026! /announcements/detail/578276333072679813?utm_source=SteamDB]https://steamcommunity.com/gid/[g:1:45479024]/announcements/detail/578276333072679813?utm_source=SteamDB

Steam Community :: Group :: Steam Hardware
^{steamcommunity.com}

in reply to Sylvia

Sylvia

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

Even for those who don't care for gaming, the Steam Machine could potentially be fairly interesting. Valve has always been very open to letting people modify their devices and run whatever OS they want on it and the devices have had a pretty fair price/value ratio. So for those who want a desktop PC without a Windows license, the Steam Machine will be one to watch!

Personally, I'll be keeping my eye on the Steam Frame and hope it won't be too pricey 😅

in reply to Sylvia

Sylvia

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

Apparently you can sideload "VR APKs" on Steam Frame because it "supports Android". I assume Waydroid or something?

Anyway I will sideload Catima on it if I end up buying it because why not. Who cares if it's useless if it's funny.

in reply to Sylvia

rugk

in reply to Sylvia 6 days ago

Wait why #Catima? Then scan your bonus Barcode by holding your vr headset in the right angle? 😅

#catima

in reply to rugk

Sylvia

in reply to rugk 6 days ago

@rugk Because why not! If I can sideload an APK I will run Catima on it, no matter how useless :D

@rugk

in reply to Sylvia

Oblomov

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

I'm reading about soldered RAM for the Steam Cube? If that's confirmed, that might be a bit of a holdback for some people.

in reply to Oblomov

Sylvia

in reply to Oblomov 1 week ago

@oblomov The CPU and GPU are soldered I believe, but the RAM isn't: rockpapershotgun.com/hands-on-…

I'm not super likely to buy it myself (though the little LED strip that can be a progress bar sounds exciting), but I am just happy to see more Linux devices on the market :)

Hands-on with the new Steam Machine, Valve’s square shot at SteamOS PC redemption

RPS tries and tests the resurrected Steam Machine, a 4K-capable SteamOS PC built in-house by Valve.

^{James Archer (Rock Paper Shotgun)}

@Oblomov

in reply to Sylvia

Oblomov

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

I think it's OK that the CPU and GPU are soldered, especially with the GPU being a semi-custom. Apparently the info I had found about the RAM was poorly sourced. Good to know. That makes it even more appealing. And harder to resist, since I got a new home and I do plan on setting up a “home theater” there …

in reply to Sylvia

Gabriele Svelto

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

I can't help but think that "run whatever OS you want" is a very low bar to jump, but it's become a highlight because of just how shitty the rest of the tech ecosystem has become

in reply to Gabriele Svelto

Sylvia

in reply to Gabriele Svelto 1 week ago

@gabrielesvelto "The default 10 years ago" is remarkably progressive nowadays yeah 😅

@Gabriele Svelto

in reply to Sylvia

Mans R

in reply to Sylvia 6 days ago

SteamOS also has a desktop mode, no changes necessary.

in reply to Sylvia

Wren 🐁

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

I’m excited about the headset especially - having had the steam deck for a while, it does incredibly well running windows games through proton, and to have something that can do that for VR games too is huge (though VRChat still probably won’t work lol)

in reply to Wren 🐁

Sylvia

in reply to Wren 🐁 1 week ago

@Wren I hope it is strong enough for basic VRChat locally, the specs seem better than the Meta Quest 2 at least and that gets a solid puke-friendly 15FPS :D

I'm sure someone will try it day 1 and we will hear more about how viable it is soon :)

@Wren 🐁

in reply to Sylvia

Wren 🐁

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

I played a lot of VRChat at 10-12 fps on my old PC so that sounds promising at least! It does run ok on the Steam deck but struggles with full 80 person instances so I’m not holding out hope

in reply to Wren 🐁

Sylvia

in reply to Wren 🐁 1 week ago

@Wren I've never tried 80 people, 5 is more than busy enough for me generally 😅

@Wren 🐁

in reply to Sylvia

Samantaz Fox

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

Dang, I'm hyped! I love what Steam is doing here, especially if all that new hardware is as repairable as the SteamDeck.

in reply to Sylvia

bovaz

in reply to Sylvia 1 week ago

I can't find a 100% answer: is steamos, basically, the windows 8 of linux distros? I mean, whether it starts from a steam interface, but you can go to the desktop and use it as any other linux distro? If it makes that easy, it would have a chance to become my "me-time" device, used as media center, and for my hobby stuff as well as gaming.

in reply to bovaz

Sylvia

in reply to bovaz 1 week ago

@bovaz On my Steam Deck it starts a big media center display style UI of just the Steam client (big picture mode) but I can click Power -> Switch to desktop mode to get a full KDE Linux desktop. I assume it will be similar, but who knows

@bovaz

Unknown parent

Sylvia

Unknown parent 6 days ago

@jakob Apparently they'll be using github.com/FEX-Emu/FEX for that. The idea of using 2 translation layers makes me worry about performance, but then again, Proton does way better than I expected too, so I'm carefully optimistic it'll end up fine enough. We'll see.

GitHub - FEX-Emu/FEX: A fast usermode x86 and x86-64 emulator for Arm64 Linux

A fast usermode x86 and x86-64 emulator for Arm64 Linux - FEX-Emu/FEX

^GitHub

@jakob

⇧

Sylvia 1 week ago • •

Sylvia
1 week ago