Valve have released a lot of info about their bakers dozen of Steam boxes at CES. Here’s a quick run-down of the press conference.
There are thirteen in total, and they vary from sleek, polished boxes suitable for the modern living room to some of your more traditional gaming PC boxes, with glowing fans and dark metal grills.
The boxes are coming from a big variety of makers, both established and relatively unknown. Alienware is the biggest name maker of the bunch, but all the boxes are filled with a variety of AMD, Intel, Nvidia and ATi hardware. And with brand name hardware, comes brand name prices. They currently range from $500 to (and hold on to your hats) $6000.
That six grand is the top end of the configurable options, which may end up being the Steam boxes biggest selling point over a console, but not necessarily over a PC. Ben Kuchera over at Polygon has written a really good piece on the press conference and the limits of the Steam box. It’s hard to disagree with his points at the moment, the concept of a Steam box is interesting but they’re not doing a great job of making me want one. This year is PC upgrade year for me, and I was hoping a Steam box would give me a decent, purely gaming PC-esque platform. But for now, I think I’m just gonna buy me some barebones. Unless a wealthy, but very distant, relative sadly passes away.
Gabe Newell’s (All Hail Lord Gabe of Newell) press conference can be found here.
Sources: Engadget & Polygon
