Soldato
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hear, hear sayso!
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Nvidia powering Valve's Steam Box prototypes
- Thread starter Boomstick777
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Soldato
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Hmm it would have been funny then I looked at the sig.
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This is looking more and more like a Gaming PC pre build under another name, and no doubt with the appropriate price tag, what's the point in it?
I have a steam box sitting right next to me, it also doubles up as a gaming PC.
I have a steam box sitting right next to me, it also doubles up as a gaming PC.
Why is it then that DirectX games ported to OSX, run worse in OpenGL on OSX than they do in DirectX on the same machine running Windows via Bootcamp?
Not having a go its a genuine question.
Three things - OS X is a poor gaming OS, the OpenGL drivers are likely poor, and the coding isn't necessarily as good.
TBH a lot of games that get ported to OSX are done in programmer's spare time and/or if theres a bit of a lull in workload for the company and compatibility and just getting it running in the first place are a higher priority than performance.
Caporegime
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Yup, when it was rumoured they were AMD I didn't see the reason, also worth noting that the prototypes being Nvidia doesn't mean the final ones or all of them will be anyway. WOuldn't be surprising at this point in time that AMD have bigger fish to fry in terms of offering support.
Thing with the Steambox is, they either want hardcore gamers to buy their boxes which seemed aimed at TV. But how many hard core PC guys will swap keyboard and mouse for a controller and a big screen, you'd have to pay me to do so.
Or they want the guys who stick with cheaper indie games which are so often platformers and clearly lend themselves to controllers better... but the hardware is expensive and isn't aimed at "cheap" gaming at all. Or console gamers, what upside is there for a Steambox over console, no EA games(most likely), higher cost?
A super cheap box for a HTPC and Steam OS with streaming from main PC has some potential, but there isn't particularly any reason they couldn't do that via an Android stick at a fraction of the cost. I just can't really see which particular set of gamers they are hoping to get outside of a few Valve fanboys that want their PC to say Valve on it. Most steam users today.... have a PC, and most of them can upgrade individual parts for better performance if they want to at a much lower cost, or they already have a great PC.
It seems this is just an alternative to Alienware, overpriced gaming PC. Maybe that is all Valve intend, though it's still pretty odd for them to go to the expense of designing and releasing systems and supporting them for small sales.
I'm quite up for installing SteamOS on a dual boot system.... but I can't see any reason to overpay for a Valve branded one under any circumstances.
^^ Its trying to cater for both markets, those who will use a controller and want something in the living room and not overly familiar with a PC and those who will make use of extended PC functionality and use keyboard+mouse and/or both controller and keyboard+mouse.
Caporegime
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The problem is just Windows is better supported for games,and TBH is not really expensive. You are talking years of support for £25 to £70.
Valve really need to get Intel and AMD more interested on the GPU side,otherwise SteamOS will be DOA.
The biggest cost over say 5 years is the hardware for gaming PCs,not the cost of the OS.
The competition between the companies is what keeps hardware affordable in the first place for Windows gaming PCs.
Take that away,and you are spending pounds to save pennies.
ATM,my £25(or whatever the pre-order offers cost me) licenses for Windows 7 and Windows 8 look like they will offer be better longterm value for my gaming PCs.
Valve really need to get Intel and AMD more interested on the GPU side,otherwise SteamOS will be DOA.
The biggest cost over say 5 years is the hardware for gaming PCs,not the cost of the OS.
The competition between the companies is what keeps hardware affordable in the first place for Windows gaming PCs.
Take that away,and you are spending pounds to save pennies.
ATM,my £25(or whatever the pre-order offers cost me) licenses for Windows 7 and Windows 8 look like they will offer be better longterm value for my gaming PCs.
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I think this may work if its Game Box / HTPC thats small compact and inexpensive, a bit like a digi box that just nestles discretely next to your TV which supports lots of cheap or free OpenGL Games.
The new Game Consoles are something like that but expensive, as are the games. Steam box could have carved out a nice little niche.
This is just another huge impractical box costing anything upto thousands.... a PC! these things already exist there just not called "Steam Box"
To me this is just another way for hardware makers to try and find another avenue to sell products, which is fine, but i think up take of it will be very limited, people who spend big money like this don't spend it on something that can't do "mainstream" and they tend to spend their gaming money on, well, a PC!
Steam missed a trick, i think, and it will fail.
The new Game Consoles are something like that but expensive, as are the games. Steam box could have carved out a nice little niche.
This is just another huge impractical box costing anything upto thousands.... a PC! these things already exist there just not called "Steam Box"
To me this is just another way for hardware makers to try and find another avenue to sell products, which is fine, but i think up take of it will be very limited, people who spend big money like this don't spend it on something that can't do "mainstream" and they tend to spend their gaming money on, well, a PC!
Steam missed a trick, i think, and it will fail.
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Dunno I think Intel are probably more on board that people think, nVidia certainly so.
Theres been quite a big uptake recently from some related companies with people that have skills with:
Intel hardware
Android and/or Linux
nVidia
Open GL
Unreal Engine
Unity Engine
Valve is still somewhat backing Oculus Rift and a number of key players have moved over there to as well as tightening relations with Epic. Throw a few things like nVidia's shield in there and you have an interesting mix of uncertain but certainly shouldn't be underestimated potential. (Thats making some assumptions theres even a relationship there beyond coincidence).
I think someone(s) backing this horse pretty hard.
Theres been quite a big uptake recently from some related companies with people that have skills with:
Intel hardware
Android and/or Linux
nVidia
Open GL
Unreal Engine
Unity Engine
Valve is still somewhat backing Oculus Rift and a number of key players have moved over there to as well as tightening relations with Epic. Throw a few things like nVidia's shield in there and you have an interesting mix of uncertain but certainly shouldn't be underestimated potential. (Thats making some assumptions theres even a relationship there beyond coincidence).
I think someone(s) backing this horse pretty hard.
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Caporegime
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Unless it supports all the big players SteamOS is DOA. Moreover,Linux still needs more farting about with than Windows.
Only anti-MS fanbois probably would be ditching Windows anytime soon for a standard gaming rig using SteamOS.
Moreover,are people thinking MS is going to sit back and let Valve challenge Windows for gaming?? Nope.
The fact that BOTH Windows 7 and Windows 8 costed less than £30 on pre-order means SteamOS might not be so attractive as people think.
Considering you can still run all DX11 games on an ancient Vista install from over 6 years ago,Windows is a tiny part of the cost of a Windows gaming PC.
I have known plenty of Linux fans,who have not bothered with using Linux for any gaming purposes(even with WINE and the like),since it is not worth the effort.
Also,why would anyone really want to be locked into an OS with such limited hardware choices?? Windows has none of these issues.
SteamOS will only cost you more in hardware in the longterm. This is why Windows gaming PCs are cheap. Choice,and not lack of it. Choice leads to competition and better bang for buck.
If I want no hardware choices,I would have bought a console,and I have no interested in buying an overpriced prebuilt desktop.
Count me out of this OS.
Maybe,when Valve has bothered to engage everyone in a few years,I might be interested.
However,my Windows 7 and Windows 8 installs already would have been doing the job fine for years by then.
I am not spending pounds to save pennies.
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Nvidia are backing OpenGL, thats it.... and they would as they want to be in the Steam Box.
Intel, they are just happy to sell Steam their CPU's.
As for shield, Fail so far.
I probably will install Steam OS on my own rig in dual boot to create my own "Steam Box"
Or those features will no doubt be integrated into a normal Unix OS like Ubuntu, so i will use that, just to get to the OpenGL games, Steam is already available on Ubuntu with a selection of OpenGL games.
No need to buy another box.
Caporegime
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My use of Linux will stick to older machines,media usage,server usage,or if I need to run some scientific applications.
I have tried using Linux for gaming in the past,as have some of my mates(who are fans of Linux),but in the end we have all just stuck with Windows in the end.
Linux is only going to challenge Windows for gaming when it can have no problems running hardware from any of the major vendors. Microsoft is already here with the support,and even then tens of millions think using consoles is still easier.
I do use Ubuntu, i have Steam on it and am Playing OpenGL games without issue and with excellent performance, so much for AMD's Linux problems....
My problem with Linux / Ubuntu is not hardware support, its perfectly fine. its Ubuntu its self, its still painfully unstable, buggy and lacking serius software compatibility and ease or use.
Ubuntu Developers seem to have a church mentality, anything outside of the every day mundane apps needs 10 independent pieces of software that need the source code editing and then compiled together, i find that talking to some of those developers they are very anti (click install) and don't like pepole who don't believe in hours of programming before getting anything to work, have no business using Ubuntu.
And thats why it will never be mainstream, at least not until that breed die off.