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Valve now has its own solution for a living room gaming PC in Steam Machine, with the appeal of loading straight into a player’s gaming library at the touch of a button. It’s a solid solution for those overwhelmed by the customization options of gaming PCs, but the Steam Machine’s value-to-performance ratio isn’t great, thanks to the ongoing chip shortage caused by the AI datacenter boom that makes the Steam Machine cost nearly twice as much as a PlayStation 5 Pro.
Plenty of options out there give players more bang for their buck, but users who already have a gaming PC can instead install SteamOS and get their own custom Steam Machine for free.
I’ve tried this with a Linux build called Bazzite, which is heavily inspired by SteamOS and can be booted into gaming mode, which is the same as SteamOS’ Big Picture mode. I did this as it’s more stable and compatible with various hardware configurations than SteamOS, although Valve is clearly improving it. It works great on my MainGear Ultima 18, Atomman G1 Pro, and RDY Scale R04, boosting frames and load times significantly over a stock Windows 11 install. For those who want to play games that run anti-cheat software at the kernel level, it’s possible to get similar results with Xbox mode on Windows 11, but it requires a bit more optimization than a fresh operating system install.
Buy new or secondhand gaming PCs instead
Instead of upgrading an existing gaming PC, many will be tempted to just buy a Steam Machine. But looking at the specs you actually get for the money, it’s just not worth it, and players with an average gaming PC likely already have better performance.
The price hike of components is being passed down directly to the average consumer. For example, MSI’s latest gaming handheld, Claw 8 EX AI+, costs a staggering $1,800, which is insane considering the Acer Predator Helios Neo 16 AI Gaming Laptop featuring an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070Ti costs $1,599.99.
It’s a similar situation with the Steam Machine. With a starting price of $1,049, players can go to Amazon right now and get an Acer Nitro V Slim ANV16S-41-R3Q0 Gaming Laptop with an RTX 5070 and Ryzen 7 260 processor for $999.99. This laptop supports SteamOS, Bazzite, or Xbox Mode on boot with significantly better performance for less, and it can be played on the go. Just for comparison, the graphical power of a Steam Machine is equivalent to an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 mobile GPU.
How to install the latest SteamOS update
As of SteamOS 3.8.11, players can install the Linux-based Valve gaming operating system on any PC with varying results, as this update only supports AMD GPUs. Anyone running Nvidia and Intel GPUs should download and install Bazzite instead due to compatibility issues.
Either option will look exactly like a docked Steam Deck, allowing users to navigate their Steam game library using a controller (choose “Game Mode” for Bazzite). The installation process is simple enough: download SteamOS or Bazzite, and make sure to have a USB drive with 16GB of free space. Use a disk image writing program such as Rufus or Fedora to flash the operating system to the stick. Once this has been completed, restart and go into your computer’s BIOS, usually by hitting the relevant keyboard key when booting. Some of the most used keys are:
- ASUS: F2 or Delete
- Dell: F2 or F12
- HP: F10 or Escape
- Lenovo: F1, F2, or Enter
- Acer: F2 or Delete
- MSI: Delete
Change your computer’s boot order to allow the flashed USB stick to boot first, which will take you to the installation process of the operating system. For more information, Bazzite and SteamOS official websites have comprehensive installation guides. Once you complete the installation and initial setup, your computer will feel just like a Steam Machine.
