Valve’s Steam Machine finally has a price: a whopping $1,049 for the 512GB configuration or $1,349 for the 2TB version. And those are without bundled controllers, which drive up the cost more.
The prices are so high in part because Valve isn’t subsidizing the hardware, and the company has already indicated that the component crisis forced it to reconsider its initial pricing plans. In an interview with the YouTube channel Gamers Nexus, Valve engineers discussed the reality of sourcing RAM in 2026, with take-it-or-leave-it prices as memory and other components remain in short supply, from only a few vendors like Samsung, Micron, and SK Hynix.
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Valve, of course, isn’t the only company in a bind over memory shortages, as the crunch is forcing many hardware makers to make significant pricing changes. Even Apple CEO Tim Cook is warning of incoming price hikes for iPhones, Macs, and other devices. And the RAM crunch isn’t projected to get better anytime soon.
Not particularly. Steam gets 30% back on all game sales, so if they can make sure the steam machine gets only to people with established steam accounts, then they’re probably coming out ahead.
That’s… pretty much my point.
For the steam deck where 99% of people will use it with steam, selling at a loss is acceptable, so they do it.
The steam machine is just a pc, so they can’t make sure that people use steam, hence the normal market price.
I’m pretty sure the person you’re responding to is referring to the fact that in order to buy the steam machine you have to have a steam account in good standing of a certain age. I guess that does not necessarily ensure that the end user will be a big gamer, but it certainly helps.
I’m not suggesting it makes sense to sell it a loss, just providing that information in case people were not aware.
My point is that while it’s a pc, it’s more positioned to be a console. If steam limited sales to one per customer and only for established steam accounts for the first runs (like they are already beginning to do for the steam deck and controllers), then they could force it to be more of a console. I do think it’ll still be a bad launch, as the goal of the steam machine clearly is to put them in Xbox territory for regular consumers, and the current price and any other changes probably won’t help that for new customers.