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Valve Will Finally Let You Build Your Own Steam Machine With SteamOS For Desktop (theverge.com) 45

Posted by BeauHD from the DIY-friendly dept.
With the price of the new Steam Machine starting at $1,049, you might want to consider making your own Steam Machine instead. An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Valve says that "starting with the SteamOS 3.8 release, you can put together your own Steam Machine using whatever PC parts you want." SteamOS 3.8.10 launched last week with a slew of updates, including "improved compatibility with recent Intel and AMD platforms." Alongside that improved compatibility, Valve is giving gamers the green light to install SteamOS on their own desktops. In an interview with The Verge, Valve's Pierre-Loup Griffais said Valve has been "rolling out improvements to [SteamOS] so it's more compatible with desktop hardware," including eventual support for Nvidia graphics. Griffais says Valve has "a growing team" working on Nvidia driver support for SteamOS, adding, "We're collaborating with Nvidia very closely." While he mentioned that Nvidia support might not come this year, Griffais emphasized that "it's certainly something that we're working on in the background."

It's technically been possible to run SteamOS on your own hardware for a while now, but compatibility has been mostly limited to AMD systems. So far installing it has also required using a Steam Deck recovery image, a process that, speaking from experience, is much less straightforward than the installation process for most other Linux distributions. Trying to run SteamOS on Intel or Nvidia hardware has not been easy so far. According to Griffais, Valve is working to change that, which could mean that down the line, you'll be able to run SteamOS on just about any gaming PC hardware you want, including Nvidia.

For the more immediate future, Griffais says SteamOS in its current state should offer a "good experience" on console-like PC setups: "If you have something that is similar to the use case of a Steam Machine, where you have a PC that's gonna be plugged into a TV, and has a single hard drive that you're not going to try and dual boot [] you can put SteamOS on there, and you'll have an experience that is very similar to a Steam Deck docked or a Steam Machine, with some caveats, of course," like a lack of HDMI-CEC support. But "the core bits of the experience are there. The SteamOS graphics driver, the shader precompilation [...] you can get at all of that with the SteamOS." Griffais says SteamOS does not yet offer an easy way to dual-boot alongside Windows or another operating system, but envisions "a time where it's a better experience to install on your desktop and have it coexist with a different operating system."

Valve Will Finally Let You Build Your Own Steam Machine With SteamOS For Desktop More | Reply

Valve Will Finally Let You Build Your Own Steam Machine With SteamOS For Desktop

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  • Datacenters have effectively killed gaming (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Wayyyy too expensive now. Thankfully, we have a ton of old games that will run on modest hardware for the occasional binge.

    • Re:Datacenters have effectively killed gaming (Score:5, Interesting)

      by sound+vision ( 884283 ) on Monday June 22, 2026 @05:29PM (#66204820) Journal

      The article quotes that $1000 figure as if it's something outlandish. It was a normal price for lower-mid-tier gaming PC last year. And this year the $1000 mark is more of a floor, a minimum you have to spend to get a gaming PC. Anything under that, you might as well get a Playstation. Although those are raising up now too.

      • The problem is AI data centers and a complete lack of antitrust law enforcement so nobody is going to risk getting into RAM or storage manufacturer even though there's half a dozen companies that could be up and running in 6 months to a year. Several of them have had their CEOs interviewed and just quietly hinted that they wouldn't take the risk. They usually talk about the bubble but the underlining thing that they will hint at but never outright say is that they all know if they enter the market the exist

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Shmoe ( 17051 )

        The article quotes that $1000 figure as if it's something outlandish. It was a normal price for lower-mid-tier gaming PC last year. And this year the $1000 mark is more of a floor, a minimum you have to spend to get a gaming PC. Anything under that, you might as well get a Playstation. Although those are raising up now too.

        People expected console pricing.. and it would've been if not for the AI run.

  • This may be the catalyst.

    Historically, focus has been placed on “converting” existing users. This is an uphill battle against adults set in their ways. Kids, meanwhile, are largely blank slates, have free time, and want to play games.

    Get the kids to install SteamOS, and you can have your year.

    • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

      by aergern ( 127031 )

      The "Year of the Linux Desktop" started a long while ago, we're not waiting. It intensified when Win10 was abandon. We will never get the 1 req folks seem to think we need which is laptops and desktops with Linux preinstalled sold at BestBuy. It won't happen. BUT that doesn't mean Linux is niche anymore.

    • Re:Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:5, Funny)

      by OrangeTide ( 124937 ) on Monday June 22, 2026 @07:18PM (#66204962) Homepage Journal

      If their not editing Xorg config to add modelines, then is it really Linux anymore?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dddux ( 3656447 )

        Good Lord, what distro are you using to have to add modelines to the Xorg.conf?? I use Debian and it's pretty close to PNP these days. When I started, though, yes Xorg.conf editing was one of the first things to do.

        • ;-)

          • I installed Gentoo on a new machine this morning in the fastest possible time because of nomodeset. Pretty much copied a working system with an AMD kernel to an Intel box with an arc GPU. Ended up just booting in with nomodeset. Recompiling, and done.

        • FreeBSD
          and you can only add modelines with ed.

        • I use Debian and it's pretty close to PNP these days.

          I can tell you don't have a gaming monitor and a normal monitor attached to the same machine. To this day you will not get a plug and play experience with your monitors running at the correct native refresh rate without some serious xorg.conf fuckery.

          Linux is getting so much better every day, but there's still plenty about it that isn't PNP.

          Mind you this problem itself has also be solved, but I dare not say so. If I say something positivise about Wayland here Slashdotters will lose their fucking minds.

      • Real men hand configure sendmail configs to configure their home email server.

        Remember when we all used to do that?

        It wasn't fun.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Z80a ( 971949 )

        Mostly to make it look like a 1999 OS while using modern software, instead of using a OS that looks like 2026 but half of the components are straight up from 1999

    • This won't be "the year of the Linux desktop" anymore than last year or the year before was "the year of the Linux desktop".
      Linux becoming a mainstream OS on the same level as Windows is going to require Linux software that is 1,000% compatible for a totally seamless transition (where the Linux equivalent can open every file you made in Windows without a single issue, office files obey the formatting exactly like the Windows equivalent).

      Maybe if someone came up with a Linux that could install Windows progra

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jezwel ( 2451108 )
        Every couple of years I float the option of converting work PCs from windows to linux, just to see how it would go. Usually it's a shoe-in for retaining Windows because of application compatibility.
        This year it's no longer so cut and dried - the prevalence of SaaS via web browser, remote desktop access to Windows Servers, plus AWS Appstream, all reduce the reliance on Windows on the desktop such that the only real sticking point is MS Office productivity - Outlook and Excel in particular.
        It'll be interesti

  • If I have steam installed on top of Linux (Score:3)

    by sarren1901 ( 5415506 ) on Monday June 22, 2026 @05:51PM (#66204842)

    Then why would I bother with this? Does SteamOS give me more access to games that the regular Steam platform cannot do? I guess I literally don't see the point in SteamOS if you already have a desktop already.

    Maybe someone can enlighten me on this one.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Tarlus ( 1000874 )

      The purpose of SteamOS is to streamline the setup for a device that will primarily function as a gaming console. It doesn't give you any more access to content than your current setup cannot already provide. Someone building a TV-attached living room gaming PC may find this appealing.

      If you're already happy with what you have, this won't offer you any advantage. But if you wanted to build a

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Moryath ( 553296 )
      I want it for a computer that can't take Win11, but is perfectly usable hardware otehrwise. My plan is to convert it to a dedicated Steam game machine and have the SteamOS features included, and I'd rather it be actual SteamOS with Arch instead of Bazzite (on Fedora) or something else similar that's more likely to get abandoned by the maintainers down the road.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Shmoe ( 17051 )

      Then why would I bother with this? Does SteamOS give me more access to games that the regular Steam platform cannot do? I guess I literally don't see the point in SteamOS if you already have a desktop already.

      Maybe someone can enlighten me on this one.

      Yes, SteamOS has the Proton layer for running Windows games on top of Linux.

      • I use the Steam app that already runs on Linux to run games via proton. There's even a way through steam to install non-steam apps and then you can fiddle with which proton version you want to use.

        Still, thank you everyone for the input on this.

        Sounds like this SteamOS may be a more console-like interface that would be different then a regular computer connected to a tv. I can see the appeal there even if it doesn't apply to myself.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by evanh ( 627108 )

      It theoretically provides an auto-updating modern gaming OS, complete. No need to work out how to do piecemeal updates yourself.

    • Then why would I bother with this? Does SteamOS give me more access to games that the regular Steam platform cannot do? I guess I literally don't see the point in SteamOS if you already have a desktop already.

      Maybe someone can enlighten me on this one.

      I know a guy using a Steam Deck as a DAW for his live band, running lights and backing tracks. He said the kernel they ship with is perfectly suited to the task, with low-latency setup out of the box and single task prioritization better than any stock distribution he's managed to find. I would imagine SteamOS would have those same tweaks if you install it on commodity hardware. Frankly, I'm tempted to test it out. I've had decent success with Arch Linux, Debian, and AVLinux in the past, but there's always some gotchyas with latency and audio glitching. It's possible that the Steam developers have dedicated enough resources to studying exactly how to set things up to avoid all that.

      • I have never had any luck with running DAWs on Linux. I've goddamn tried. Actually I've tried with Ubuntu's low latency kernel and could probably try harder with something not Ubuntu studio. But I though Ubuntu "Studio" would work out of the box on the really good, well supported hardware (SSL DACs, mac pro on Intel).
        A kernel made for optimized 60+ fps performance without dropping frames will be ideal for audio too.

        • I have never had any luck with running DAWs on Linux. I've goddamn tried. Actually I've tried with Ubuntu's low latency kernel and could probably try harder with something not Ubuntu studio. But I though Ubuntu "Studio" would work out of the box on the really good, well supported hardware (SSL DACs, mac pro on Intel). A kernel made for optimized 60+ fps performance without dropping frames will be ideal for audio too.

          I've had semi-decent luck, but it seems like no matter how perfectly tuned it is, all it takes is one background process jumping up to cause glitching audio, which is completely unacceptable when you're trying a tricky take. It's been about three or four years since my last attempt, so I should probably try again, but I hate to waste the recording time on setup time.

          • Yeah I cannot justify spending a Saturday trying to figure out how to tune the kernel for low-latency, especially when it's already called a "low latency kernel", which doesn't mean it handles interrupts well.
            I have an M2 Ultra-powered Mac Studio that I can run gigantic DSP chains AND run other software in the background without so much as a phase flip in the audio.

    • There is a whole world of gaming level optimisations in Linux that you can benefit from. Unlike Window's take it or leave it approach there's actual meaningful performance differences between gaming dedicated Linux distros.

      For your general purpose all around computer this may not interest you. If you're a gamer this very much may. One of the better gaming oriented distros is Bazzite, but if you have AMD hardware there's still a lot of optimisation left on the table you can get from using SteamOS.

    • 1:) Install one of the 50 Arch distros with plasma as the DE
      2:) Have Steam launch on start-up
      3:) In Steam prefs, check "launch in 'big picture' mode"

      Viola! You just made a diy steamOS that's identical to the actual steamOS

  • Just after the Steam machine was announced with specs, and just before hardware prices jumped back in November.
    Ryzen 5800X, 32GB, 2TB, RX9600XT (16GB) so above the specs of the OEM machine
    It cost me $650 (including some parts that I already had like PSU etc)
    It's a nice gaming machine, and a capable desktop PC as well.
    It's not a small cube with detachable face plates, but fairly small anyway. I like it.

  • Hi guys, I'm asking because I'm clueless. Last time I used Steam platform was to play Counter Strike on the computer. I haven't used it in probably 15+ years. What is Steam capable of today?

  • Microsoft Unhappy about this (Score:5, Interesting)

    by nehumanuscrede ( 624750 ) on Tuesday June 23, 2026 @02:02PM (#66206198)

    I would think a decent amount of folks only have a Windows based system to run Steam and play games.
    ( aka, a gaming rig )

    Yes, I know linux is a thing and it's getting better but it's still no where near ready for the average person to make the switch.
    ( emphasis on -average- )

    If those folks now have the means to run Steam based games on hardware that doesn't include a Microsoft OS as a mandatory
    prerequisite, this will probably eat into all future sales of Windows operating systems.

    After all, why do they need all the bullsh*t Microsoft has forced down everyones throat in the form of Copilot, Windows Recall,
    forced updates ( that break almost as much as they fix ) and telemetry when Steam has built a streamlined OS that is focused
    around gaming ?

    • I don't think Microsoft give a shit about PCs in general anymore. Want to know where Windows sits in the org chart? See if you can spot it:

      a) Cloud and AI
      b) Productivity and Business Processes
      c) Experiences and Devices
      d) Technologies and Research
      e) Gaming

      Hint: Windows isn't in either Productivity or Business Processes. They care about the personal computer so little in 2026 that they don't even have a VP dedicated to it. I do have to admit though, as on the nose as it is, Windows is definitely an "experienc

    • Yes, please kick Microsoft out of the gaming ecosystem. The Windows operating system is evolving into something else entirely, and gamers don't want to use their sloppy operating system anymore.

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