A well-known tech YouTuber wanted to recreate the Steam Machine. It even worked, but the price doesn’t please the viewers – as it is clearly over 1,000 euros.
JayzTwoCents is a well-known tech YouTuber who deals with PC hardware. In a video, he has now tested whether he can recreate the Steam Machine as a gaming PC. Because Valve emphasizes itself, that the Steam Machine should be like a real PC and offer more performance.
The YouTuber went to the electronics store and assembled a setup that should compete with the Steam Machine. But in the end, the price turns out to be very high, higher than feared. However, there are several reasons for the high price.
YouTuber searches for hardware similar to the Steam Machine, stumbles over power supply and high RAM costs
Which hardware did he choose? For the case, he chose the smallest available case, the Fractal Terra. But it is still somewhat larger than the case of the Steam Machine.
For the CPU and graphics card, he chose components that should offer similar performance to the Steam Machine: an AMD Ryzen 7 7700X and an AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT. He deliberately opted for the variant of the graphics card with 8 GB of video memory, even though 8 GB of VRAM is no longer future-proof.
What problems arise in the selection? He faces a first problem with the power supply: There is only a specific power supply that fits his system, but it is both very expensive and offers far too much power. JayzTwoCents refers to it as a “placeholder power supply” because there is simply nothing else available.
Another problem is the high prices of RAM, which also drive up the overall costs.
The selected hardware:
- Case: Fractal Terra
- Mainboard: MSI MPG B850I Edge Wifi
- CPU: Ryzen 7 7700X
- Cooler: BeQuiet Pure Rock LP, 100 Watt
- GPU: AMD Radeon Rx 9060 XT
- Power Supply: Asus ROG Loki 1000 Watt Platinum
- RAM: 32 GB DDR5
- Storage: M.2 SSD with 1 TB storage
What does the entire system cost? In total, he paid about 1,500 to 1,600 US dollars for all the hardware, as he calculates in the video. That converts to about 1,300 to 1,400 euros. He himself explains that he is not happy with the selection of components, but even with perfect parts, the price would only be about 250 dollars less. That would still be 1,350 US dollars or about 1,166 euros:
- Case: 199 US dollars
- Mainboard: 300 US dollars
- CPU: 169 US dollars
- GPU: 299 US dollars
- Power Supply: 230 US dollars
- RAM: 169 US dollars
- Storage: 85 US dollars
He emphasizes: Just for RAM and case, he paid nearly 200 US dollars each, which is already a substantial amount of money. But small (ITX) cases and components are simply more expensive than normal sizes.
Even the viewers who stand in front of him in the video, following his explanations and the assembly of the PCs, find the price far too high.
What is his conclusion? The YouTuber explains that the Steam Machine and gaming PC are hard to compare. He adds that the Steam Machine is more between a PC and a console, between casual gamers and enthusiasts. He says:
The Steam Machine will have a hard time keeping up in terms of PC building. But I don’t think that’s the intention. I don’t think it’s supposed to replace a PC.
And he once again emphasizes the biggest advantage of the gaming PC compared to the Steam Machine, which is the upgradeability of the PC. An advantage that the Steam Machine has not inherited from the PC:
A PC build like this is somewhat better than buying a fully soldered and assembled device, as there are no upgrade options for that. But this device here can be upgraded.
The problematic RX 9060 XT with just 8 GB of video memory could therefore easily be replaced later if there is enough space in the case. A reason why he opted against a 16 GB model of the RX 9060 XT.
Linus Tech Tips is also a well-known figure on YouTube when it comes to computers and tech. Linus spoke with Valve about the price of the Steam Machine. But the reaction was not what he had hoped for. More about this can be found on MeinMMO: Famous tech YouTuber hopes the Steam Machine will cost only 500 dollars, but Valve’s reaction is quite clear
