Paying as much or more for the same hardware to have access to less software and lower performance.
Where is the compelling reason to choose a steam box?
It fits in your entertainment system to hook up to your TV.
Sure, you can build or buy other PCs that will do so as well, but most won't fit.
Plus, they are trying to create the ecosystem around Steam - you have the controller, steam link, and steam machines. A single steam machine hooked up to one TV in the house, a steam link can stream it to any other TV in the house, the controller to play the games from your couch, and Steam to get you all the games you could want to play.
Sure, you can do all of that separately and independently. But they are trying to create the ecosystem, and this is just Phase 1 of whatever else they have planned to expand that ecosystem out even further.
I'm not saying I necessarily buy into it - I love Steam's In-Home streaming and I'm a big Steam user in general, but I don't really see the necessity of using Valve's hardware to do that and I am extremely glad they aren't locking it to their hardware (or at least haven't yet, and I wouldn't expect them to given their overall philosophy to date).
Maybe it will make more sense when SteamVR/Vive becomes part of that ecosystem.
SteamOS doesn't need to be faster than Windows. It doesn't even need to be as fast. It just needs to be "fast enough".
After all, it's free, not $100+. I wouldn't expect it to out-perform an OS that costs money. I would expect it to be adequate enough though.
I don't agree - SteamOS is more than capable of keeping up with Windows when the drivers and the game development is there. I think the first 'real' test will be when Dota 2 for Vulkan is released in beta, quite possibly before Christmas.
edit - current benchmarks on Dota 2 (Source2) show SteamOS outperforming Windows 10 on the same hardware. The clickbait article from ars uses a single benchmark in one game on one machine to draw extremely wide conclusions from.
The real question is why. If they're compiling the same shader code written in the same language, I'm skeptical that what happens on the GPU proper would be wildly different.
They went out of their way to give it a very weak CPU: a 3.0 GHz dual core. That might have turned it into a CPU bottleneck that would have been fine on a faster CPU.
There's also a question of whether the code was comparably optimized. If you have one person write code for Windows and another person write code for Linux and one runs twice as fast as the other, that doesn't mean that one OS is twice as fast as the other. It more likely means that one person optimized code better than the other.
The code is not optimised for Linux. Games are designed and optimised with Windows in mind (and MAC if it's supported). These are pretty much "ports" to Linux and that's why they are shit. I am not defneding Linux or anything. I think Linux is shit and I would never ever use that "shit".
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
What is the point of using Linux? I am honestly curious? It seems like a convoluted mess that doesn't give you that much for the all the headaches it's going to cause you.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
current benchmarks on Dota 2 (Source2) show SteamOS outperforming Windows 10 on the same hardware.
LOL
Got anything more useful to come back with?
Still waiting for some real proofs and benchmarks for more. Jeez, man, you don't really believe that propaganda, right ?
There are plenty of benchmarks that show identical performance between SteamOS and Windows in standard gaming benchmarks, I've posted some on this thread. There are also benchmarks showing SteamOS outperforming Windows in Dota 2, but they're impossible to find at the moment thanks to this clickbait article getting its intended result absolutely filling Google with references to it on every tech site that exists. Just saying it's not true isn't actual fact.
SteamOS doesn't need to be faster than Windows. It doesn't even need to be as fast. It just needs to be "fast enough".
After all, it's free, not $100+. I wouldn't expect it to out-perform an OS that costs money. I would expect it to be adequate enough though.
I don't agree - SteamOS is more than capable of keeping up with Windows when the drivers and the game development is there. I think the first 'real' test will be when Dota 2 for Vulkan is released in beta, quite possibly before Christmas.
edit - current benchmarks on Dota 2 (Source2) show SteamOS outperforming Windows 10 on the same hardware. The clickbait article from ars uses a single benchmark in one game on one machine to draw extremely wide conclusions from.
For sure same hardware but windows have better drivers support from the 2 major video card drivers then on linux. It was just giving just going to happen. But I think the long run that linux going to have hard time with is to get over is mass amount of windows fan boys even if linux does well over windows people will still side with windows due to how people general are.
SteamOS doesn't need to be faster than Windows. It doesn't even need to be as fast. It just needs to be "fast enough".
After all, it's free, not $100+. I wouldn't expect it to out-perform an OS that costs money. I would expect it to be adequate enough though.
I don't agree - SteamOS is more than capable of keeping up with Windows when the drivers and the game development is there. I think the first 'real' test will be when Dota 2 for Vulkan is released in beta, quite possibly before Christmas.
edit - current benchmarks on Dota 2 (Source2) show SteamOS outperforming Windows 10 on the same hardware. The clickbait article from ars uses a single benchmark in one game on one machine to draw extremely wide conclusions from.
For sure same hardware but windows have better drivers support from the 2 major video card drivers then on linux. It was just giving just going to happen. But I think the long run that linux going to have hard time with is to get over is mass amount of windows fan boys even if linux does well over windows people will still side with windows due to how people general are.
It's true driver support is far superior on DirectX (not Windows, the OpenGL implementation is pretty much identical on Windows and Linux), and I don't see that about to change. But like I say, Valve is looking for the very long run, not the situation right now. Valve isn't trying to convert people to SteamOS, rather get a strong foothold in the PC gaming market without any dependence on Windows.
The article here is really about DirectX vs OpenGL, not Windows vs SteamOS. OpenGL is a specification, just a description of how to do things; an analogy is a blueprint for a house -- if a builder makes the cement wrong, the house falls down. You don't blame the blueprint, that's not a problem with the spec. Similarly, with OpenGL there are various implementations that all differ in performance. OpenGL is largely used for indie games, where generally performance is not an issue, and so the drivers are generally not tuned for performance.
What is the point of using Linux? I am honestly curious? It seems like a convoluted mess that doesn't give you that much for the all the headaches it's going to cause you.
Linux is less relevant today, it had more relevance in the past.
It offered platform independence. It was good for doing a science project, for servers, because it was simply a kernel, you could make it run on any platform. It also didn't have any license fees attached to it.
But now that software is more complex, now that there are more standards, now that time is money, you just want the easiest platform to develop for, and that's Windows by a massive margin. Especially because of .Net and how it is completely integrated in Visual Studio, Windows has become much easier to develop for.
Also simply support, driver support for Windows has become rock solid in Windows since Windows 7, all major hardware devices have preloaded drivers in Windows (that's half the reason why Windows is a large install, it comes with pretested drivers for thousands of devices).
Driver support in Linux is a horrible mess. That's really why Linux leaves a bad taste in people's mouth. Most of the issues center around drivers support being a complete mess. From graphics drivers, to network, to sound, to video playback, to gaming, Linux has a horrible track record when it comes to drivers and this is actually worsening on desktops, because Linux lost a lot of desktop users, they are down to below 1% marketshare. When you don't have marketshare, no one develops drivers for your OS.
As far as consumer desktop use, Linux has never been relevant.
The problem with SteamOS, is that it is trying to solve a non-existing problem. There is nothing that makes SteamOS better than just plugging a Windows PC to your TV. It offers LESS than plugging Windows into your TV. In fact, I'm writing on a Windows PC plugged into my TV right now.
The problem with SteamOS, is that it is trying to solve a non-existing problem. There is nothing that makes SteamOS better than just plugging a Windows PC to your TV. It offers LESS than plugging Windows into your TV. In fact, I'm writing on a Windows PC plugged into my TV right now.
Still not true, even to this day. Sure windows had made some big leaps in the realm of game streamlining for development and performance. But it is sill an OS that is designed to do many things, not one thing.
Steam is trying to make an OS that is completely designed for gaming from the ground up. They used Linux because despite the benefits windows has oday, it will never be as easily customized at the kernal layer as Linux is.
If steam can pull off their OS with windows emulation w/o performance hits then it will be a gaming OS, the first of its kind. Imo it is not a bad thing to try and make an OS designed for games from the ground up, its exactly what we as gamers need.
Once STeam OS has the decades that windows has had to refine itself then we can judge them as equals. As it stands its just too early to judge steamOS imo, hell if we did this kind of blind judgement to windows when it first came out we would still be pimping DOS boxes.
Bloated software isn't a relative thing, it is not subjective, it can accurately be measured. There is no semantic ambiguity in the word.
Considering the amount of different organisations contributing to the Linux Kernel, the amount of code Linux has to deal with is massive. Every couple of minutes someone suggests code, this of course leads to bloat.
When I was more into Linux, I used Arch as my happy medium. If you do what most desktop Linux users do, and go download Ubuntu or some fork and yeah, you got bloat. You go to the source and build it yourself and install only that which pertains to your system and needs, (http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/) Then you have zero bloat. IMO, the worst thing that ever happened to Linux was Knoppix.
Steam is trying to make an OS that is completely designed for gaming from the ground up.
We already have those devices, they're called gaming consoles.
They have a much larger gaming library and are much easier to use than SteamOS.
Took them years to get this point of time. If Sony or Microsoft started now still take them years get easyer for user to use just take time for better software, but for steamOS the software can be much better in the long term over time as pretty much can be installed on closely anything then xbox or ps4 OS.
But on the Library part on steam for it's OS that haves about 3279 games that works for it so far on linux and growing faster then any console out there, and I'm Not sure how big Sony or Xbox library are that do work with the gen that are out now and there still some games still needed to go out by a older gen just to play it.
SteamOS Only big problem it will have to get pass is that there is no game that will makes people go out and buy the machine or install the OS. Unlike xbox or sony that pack a game on to there system that makes you want to get there system like no candy to drive people massively to go after the machine.
Time will tell is like apple vs google people said same thing about google android.
Let's not forget that now, unlike in previous years, basically all engines will support SteamOS/Linux natively, and OpenGL is effectively getting dumped in favour of the vastly superior performing Vulkan, which will run on all platforms. People talking about the Linux situation 5 years ago or even last year, it's irrelevant to what Valve is looking at.
Steam is trying to make an OS that is completely designed for gaming from the ground up.
We already have those devices, they're called gaming consoles.
They have a much larger gaming library and are much easier to use than SteamOS.
Took them years to get this point of time. If Sony or Microsoft started now still take them years get easyer for user to use just take time for better software, but for steamOS the software can be much better in the long term over time as pretty much can be installed on closely anything then xbox or ps4 OS.
But on the Library part on steam for it's OS that haves about 3279 games that works for it so far on linux and growing faster then any console out there, and I'm Not sure how big Sony or Xbox library are that do work with the gen that are out now and there still some games still needed to go out by a older gen just to play it.
SteamOS Only big problem it will have to get pass is that there is no game that will makes people go out and buy the machine or install the OS. Unlike xbox or sony that pack a game on to there system that makes you want to get there system like no candy to drive people massively to go after the machine.
Time will tell is like apple vs google people said same thing about google android.
I don't know, I honestly don't see the benefit of steamos. It just feels like a gimmicky power grab from valve. And valve can't seem to code well to save their lives. Dota2 is a horrible mess with so many bugs and issues and it's been out for years now...
i can can play anything on my Windows system, why would I get an extra device like steamos. It really can't replace my PC now can it cause there are tons of other things you do on your PC.
Android was solving a problem. Apple smartphones are expensive and a lot of people couldn't afford them. Android introduced cheap smartphones and it got massive market share. However, despite android having a massive market share, Apple still takes a huge proportion of the industry profits. What was it, 92% of all profits go to Apple? I mean, really you know you are totally crushing your competition when you make 92% of the profits in the entire smartphone industry. Is Google even making money out of it? Cause they seem to only care about flogging ads to people.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
You can compare Alienware Alpha machines to Alienware Steam Machines. The full Windows 10 machines are only $50 more and have a lot more flexibility, but are still small form factor prebuilds that are the same size as the Steam version.
They are essentially the same hardware ranging from $500 - $800 for the Windows machine and $450 - $750 for the Steam machine. The Windows version has a full running copy of Windows 10 and can do all that the Steam machine can, but also whatever a full desktop can including DLNA, Netflix, Plex, Windows 10 XBox game app, and anything else you want to do. The Steam machine has access to 1500 SteamOS titles. The Windows machine has access to 6500 Steam titles and anything outside of Steam you want to play.
So again, what void is Steam fulfilling other than Gabe's fantasy of trying to crush Windows.
If you check steam check linux and steamOS it's 3279 games not 1500 and more still coming, I know still far less then windows. It's growing but I don't want linux or steamOS to crash windows it needs to take some the market share for the desktop so microsoft get there act together as there alot the time that microsoft does alot sneaky stuff in how there doing with windows 10 just to point it out people need a program just to turn off some of the hidding stuff that OS hiding.
I know windows was free for alot of us, but people who pay for windows 10 get the same deal with windows spyware that wrong and dangerous later on when microsoft server get hacked and can happen. But it's bad for all the people credit card or SSN and names to the hacker hand as it like pointing it out look here I'm here all the info they need in one place.
And Me and you know better to turn that crap off but people that are new trying to get in to pc gaming if something bad should happen then it can hurt it for us all. Just cuz microsoft want to be even more greedy.
Steam is trying to make an OS that is completely designed for gaming from the ground up.
We already have those devices, they're called gaming consoles.
They have a much larger gaming library and are much easier to use than SteamOS.
Library part on steam for it's OS that haves about 3279 games that works for it so far on linux and growing faster then any console out there
How many games are specifically developed for that steam controller, and how many are PC ports / hacks of already established PC games, that make them work on Steam OS?
How many are high quality games and how many are indie junk?
I've seen some videos of PC games made for keyboard and mouse, being played with a steam controller, and it's a nightmare for strategy games where you need precise mouse movement for example.
It's a bit like arguing you can play all PC games through WINE on Linux, but everyone who has done that knows what a nightmare that is for most games.
You can compare Alienware Alpha machines to Alienware Steam Machines. The full Windows 10 machines are only $50 more and have a lot more flexibility, but are still small form factor prebuilds that are the same size as the Steam version.
They are essentially the same hardware ranging from $500 - $800 for the Windows machine and $450 - $750 for the Steam machine. The Windows version has a full running copy of Windows 10 and can do all that the Steam machine can, but also whatever a full desktop can including DLNA, Netflix, Plex, Windows 10 XBox game app, and anything else you want to do. The Steam machine has access to 1500 SteamOS titles. The Windows machine has access to 6500 Steam titles and anything outside of Steam you want to play.
So again, what void is Steam fulfilling other than Gabe's fantasy of trying to crush Windows.
If you check steam check linux and steamOS it's 3279 games not 1500 and more still coming, I know still far less then windows. It's growing but I don't want linux or steamOS to crash windows it needs to take some the market share for the desktop so microsoft get there act together as there alot the time that microsoft does alot sneaky stuff in how there doing with windows 10 just to point it out people need a program just to turn off some of the hidding stuff that OS hiding.
I know windows was free for alot of us, but people who pay for windows 10 get the same deal with windows spyware that wrong and dangerous later on when microsoft server get hacked and can happen. But it's bad for all the people credit card or SSN and names to the hacker hand as it like pointing it out look here I'm here all the info they need in one place.
And Me and you know better to turn that crap off but people that are new trying to get in to pc gaming if something bad should happen then it can hurt it for us all. Just cuz microsoft want to be even more greedy.
What are you smoking? If there were no games for Windows and all games released exclusively for Linux I would give up gaming than switch to an inferior OS. SteamOs is not even a real OS, it's never even going to remotely influence people decision. Windows is here to stay. I guess the only other pc OS that will be even remotely popular is MAC but that's it.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
How many games are specifically developed for that steam controller, and how many are PC ports / hacks of already established PC games, that make them work on Steam OS?
How many are high quality games and how many are indie junk?
I've seen some videos of PC games made for keyboard and mouse, being played with a steam controller, and it's a nightmare for strategy games where you need precise mouse movement for example.
It's a bit like arguing you can play all PC games through WINE on Linux, but everyone who has done that knows what a nightmare that is for most games.
The point of the controller was not made only to bring in the gap between keyboard and mouse in to the living room, that why with the controller if a game didn't have controller support and was made with the idea keyboard and mouse the controller helps with that. Not 100% games out there will work with the controller I know that but alot better then other controller that are out there.
What are you smoking? If there were no games for Windows and all games released exclusively for Linux I would give up gaming than switch to an inferior OS. SteamOs is not even a real OS, it's never even going to remotely influence people decision. Windows is here to stay. I guess the only other pc OS that will be even remotely popular is MAC but that's it.
That is why thinking like this is one side does not make thing better for gaming for the long run, the truth is yes I know windows does better gaming, I don't want windows to go away but I don't want windows to be the only OS with a high amount of market share. if was not for AMD we would not have DX12, as microsoft had time and the man power to have a low level api to give gamers better options years of ago.
And right now people can game on linux, is it better to game on it if your looking for high fps?, no still need tons of work it's going time sometime for it to get better. For you thats fine don't want to deal anything with linux when you didn't follow linux how much it grown for the gaming on the side for linux. And more and more games being made for linux even with a low level % that are out there on the desktop.
Pretty much in the long run you don't have to buy it or install it, other people will but who know much more work valve going put in to the OS time will tell.
And don't forget there many inferior OS that are out there does less then windows but still get the job done even for gaming.
Comments
Sure, you can build or buy other PCs that will do so as well, but most won't fit.
Plus, they are trying to create the ecosystem around Steam - you have the controller, steam link, and steam machines. A single steam machine hooked up to one TV in the house, a steam link can stream it to any other TV in the house, the controller to play the games from your couch, and Steam to get you all the games you could want to play.
Sure, you can do all of that separately and independently. But they are trying to create the ecosystem, and this is just Phase 1 of whatever else they have planned to expand that ecosystem out even further.
I'm not saying I necessarily buy into it - I love Steam's In-Home streaming and I'm a big Steam user in general, but I don't really see the necessity of using Valve's hardware to do that and I am extremely glad they aren't locking it to their hardware (or at least haven't yet, and I wouldn't expect them to given their overall philosophy to date).
Maybe it will make more sense when SteamVR/Vive becomes part of that ecosystem.
SteamOS doesn't need to be faster than Windows. It doesn't even need to be as fast. It just needs to be "fast enough".
After all, it's free, not $100+. I wouldn't expect it to out-perform an OS that costs money. I would expect it to be adequate enough though.
edit - current benchmarks on Dota 2 (Source2) show SteamOS outperforming Windows 10 on the same hardware. The clickbait article from ars uses a single benchmark in one game on one machine to draw extremely wide conclusions from.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
The article here is really about DirectX vs OpenGL, not Windows vs SteamOS. OpenGL is a specification, just a description of how to do things; an analogy is a blueprint for a house -- if a builder makes the cement wrong, the house falls down. You don't blame the blueprint, that's not a problem with the spec. Similarly, with OpenGL there are various implementations that all differ in performance. OpenGL is largely used for indie games, where generally performance is not an issue, and so the drivers are generally not tuned for performance.
It offered platform independence. It was good for doing a science project, for servers, because it was simply a kernel, you could make it run on any platform. It also didn't have any license fees attached to it.
But now that software is more complex, now that there are more standards, now that time is money, you just want the easiest platform to develop for, and that's Windows by a massive margin. Especially because of .Net and how it is completely integrated in Visual Studio, Windows has become much easier to develop for.
Also simply support, driver support for Windows has become rock solid in Windows since Windows 7, all major hardware devices have preloaded drivers in Windows (that's half the reason why Windows is a large install, it comes with pretested drivers for thousands of devices).
Driver support in Linux is a horrible mess. That's really why Linux leaves a bad taste in people's mouth. Most of the issues center around drivers support being a complete mess. From graphics drivers, to network, to sound, to video playback, to gaming, Linux has a horrible track record when it comes to drivers and this is actually worsening on desktops, because Linux lost a lot of desktop users, they are down to below 1% marketshare. When you don't have marketshare, no one develops drivers for your OS.
As far as consumer desktop use, Linux has never been relevant.
The problem with SteamOS, is that it is trying to solve a non-existing problem. There is nothing that makes SteamOS better than just plugging a Windows PC to your TV. It offers LESS than plugging Windows into your TV. In fact, I'm writing on a Windows PC plugged into my TV right now.
Steam is trying to make an OS that is completely designed for gaming from the ground up. They used Linux because despite the benefits windows has oday, it will never be as easily customized at the kernal layer as Linux is.
If steam can pull off their OS with windows emulation w/o performance hits then it will be a gaming OS, the first of its kind. Imo it is not a bad thing to try and make an OS designed for games from the ground up, its exactly what we as gamers need.
Once STeam OS has the decades that windows has had to refine itself then we can judge them as equals. As it stands its just too early to judge steamOS imo, hell if we did this kind of blind judgement to windows when it first came out we would still be pimping DOS boxes.
They have a much larger gaming library and are much easier to use than SteamOS.
But on the Library part on steam for it's OS that haves about 3279 games that works for it so far on linux and growing faster then any console out there, and I'm Not sure how big Sony or Xbox library are that do work with the gen that are out now and there still some games still needed to go out by a older gen just to play it.
SteamOS Only big problem it will have to get pass is that there is no game that will makes people go out and buy the machine or install the OS. Unlike xbox or sony that pack a game on to there system that makes you want to get there system like no candy to drive people massively to go after the machine.
Time will tell is like apple vs google people said same thing about google android.
i can can play anything on my Windows system, why would I get an extra device like steamos. It really can't replace my PC now can it cause there are tons of other things you do on your PC.
Android was solving a problem. Apple smartphones are expensive and a lot of people couldn't afford them. Android introduced cheap smartphones and it got massive market share. However, despite android having a massive market share, Apple still takes a huge proportion of the industry profits. What was it, 92% of all profits go to Apple? I mean, really you know you are totally crushing your competition when you make 92% of the profits in the entire smartphone industry. Is Google even making money out of it? Cause they seem to only care about flogging ads to people.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
I know windows was free for alot of us, but people who pay for windows 10 get the same deal with windows spyware that wrong and dangerous later on when microsoft server get hacked and can happen. But it's bad for all the people credit card or SSN and names to the hacker hand as it like pointing it out look here I'm here all the info they need in one place.
And Me and you know better to turn that crap off but people that are new trying to get in to pc gaming if something bad should happen then it can hurt it for us all. Just cuz microsoft want to be even more greedy.
How many are high quality games and how many are indie junk?
I've seen some videos of PC games made for keyboard and mouse, being played with a steam controller, and it's a nightmare for strategy games where you need precise mouse movement for example.
It's a bit like arguing you can play all PC games through WINE on Linux, but everyone who has done that knows what a nightmare that is for most games.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
That is why thinking like this is one side does not make thing better for gaming for the long run, the truth is yes I know windows does better gaming, I don't want windows to go away but I don't want windows to be the only OS with a high amount of market share. if was not for AMD we would not have DX12, as microsoft had time and the man power to have a low level api to give gamers better options years of ago.
And right now people can game on linux, is it better to game on it if your looking for high fps?, no still need tons of work it's going time sometime for it to get better. For you thats fine don't want to deal anything with linux when you didn't follow linux how much it grown for the gaming on the side for linux. And more and more games being made for linux even with a low level % that are out there on the desktop.
Pretty much in the long run you don't have to buy it or install it, other people will but who know much more work valve going put in to the OS time will tell.
And don't forget there many inferior OS that are out there does less then windows but still get the job done even for gaming.