The Steam Machine won't be subsidized like consoles, Valve aiming to compete with PC market only
Despite having two-thirds the GPU performance of a base PS5, ETA Prime discovered the BC-250 mining board performs adequately as a DIY Steam machine for 1080p gaming. After overclocking the GPU to 2000MHz, their benchmarks saw the SoC running Left 4 Dead 2 at well over 150 FPS at 1080p with max settings, Spider-Man 2 running at around 60 FPS at 1080p medium settings with FSR set to Balanced, The Witcher 3 running at around 75 FPS at 1080p with high settings, and Forza Horizon 5 running at around 80 FPS at 1080p medium settings. Cyberpunk 2077 was able to hit almost 60 FPS on average at 1080p with medium settings, as well.
However, being optimized for a server environment, the BC-250 does have some weird quirks. ETA Prime had to update the BIOS to a custom version to make it work as a gaming machine, and the board only has a single slow PCIe 2.0 x2 M.2 slot, limiting storage options. The board is also incompatible with standard PC cases and cooling solutions; however, you can find cases that work with the BC-250 for around $50 on eBay (at the time of writing).
If you can get around these issues, ETA Prime's work reveals that the BC-250 represents one of the cheapest methods to get into PC gaming right now. All in all, you are probably looking at a $200-$300 machine accounting for SSD storage and a power supply (though some BC-250 eBay listings include a PSU). The best part about this budget setup is that it includes 16GB of GDDR6 memory, making the outgoing RAM pricing crisis completely irrelevant.
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Key considerations
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Reference reading
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/gpus/SPONSORED_LINK_URL
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/gpus/usd100-steam-machine-uses-a-cut-down-ps5-apu-with-bazzite-diy-console-offers-60-fps-at-1080p-with-16gb-of-gddr6#main
- https://www.tomshardware.com
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Informational only. No financial advice. Do your own research.