Valve looks like they are working on their own Steam Box hardware

Read that as well, but there's one thing that sticks out to me, and is making sure I don't get my hopes up. They deliberately focus on the "Even basic input, the keyboard and mouse..." in that job posting. Why would they focus on that specifically. They denied working on the Steam Box a while ago, but they never said they weren't working on their own peripherals ala Logitech or Razer.

Makes me think they are making a sort of Steam console that pretty much IS a computer but with a band new interface designed for use on regular TV/HDTV.

Sounds like DLJ would LOVE this!

Game consoles are computers, but with a custom OS.

I'm not really looking forward to this if it simply means valve is making a proprietary console, since I'd figured it was Big Picture they were pushing, although development on Linux will be.

Umm, yeah..... I know. Just saying this would probably be a big push for their new UI.

Call me uninterested for the time being.

^ Same. What's the point in this mystery hardware? Seems like a waste of time. I have a PC otherwise I'd have bought a console. Well I have consoles too but I mean I don't need yet another closed system. I can't see how this can be anything that will get my needle moving. Yet.

Well, Sony and Microsoft are coming out with new systems within the next few years. My biggest gripe is the lack of keyboard/mouse options on the ps3 and 360. The controllers i've seen that try to do something of the sort are a joke.

If this console can play newer games with mouse and keyboard i'll give it a try. Steam has killer deals on PC games. Everything is going digital anyway, and they are even wanting to do away with used games. Steam has the PC version of most games way cheaper then consoles.

I'm an avid PC gamer, but being in IT i would like to be able to play my games in front of my tv and not still be sitting at a PC. I know you can just build a HTPC, but the "guaranteed compatible" idea of consoles is much better in the long run because PC's cost much more then a console and you dont need to upgrade after a few years to play a game. Most high end video cards cost more then any current gen. console.

I just hope they are not going to try to do the streaming video game thing.

It's funny that people say about PC's that you "have to" upgrade them in a couple/few years unlike consoles except for that, up until recently, consoles were being replaced ENTIRELY with new ones and priced at full. Now that they have been around longer than usualy, everyone is complaining that they are old and new ones should be out by now.

Lol! I mean really.

I think this thing is a new controller setup of some sort.

A custom console or PC box doesn't make any sense. PC hardware is commoditized and margins are super tight. They couldn't do anything in a box that a million other companies are already doing for less.

But a controller is definitely possible... they could sell it, support it with their games, add support to Steamworks, etc. A lot of novel PC devices have failed over the years because of a lack of standards but Valve can get around that.

Well back in the day things where different. I am still running a video card in my machine that is on par with the current consoles, but by computer standards is way outdated. I can play games still, but im having to lower the specs more and more. My card is a Direct X9 card so i can't even see the current games in all their glory and neither can game concoles.

Those consoles are based on Direct X9, we are on direct X11 now. So games that come out are dumbed down for PCs to be used by consoles. Just look at Crysis vs Crysis 2. Crysis 2 has worse graphics then Crysis(a pc only game) and they had to release an "update" to make it take advantage of new tech which still wasn't good at all. Crysis 3 is not going to be done that way.

And I will not spend 600$ on a new game system. But when a Smartphone has as much processing power as a 360(its been talked about in several articles lately), yeah its time to upgrade. Technology in this arena changes fast, and is increasing in speed. I mean new tvs have DUAL CORE. lol.
However, the being outdated part really isnt their fault. It cost millions to develop a new console and by the time it comes out, its already behind. I think the new systems will be direct X 10 unless that has changed, already a generation behind. At the end of the day i'm happy with the visuals of the game systems i have now, but i get tired of playing on a controller. Especially FPS.

All in all video games are being held back by current generation consoles, because all the new visual effects they come up with to make it more realistic the more the list of things consoles cant do increases, so games don't get them. You'd be amazed at the quality of games if consoles would be a third cheaper and come out every 5 years and not 7-10.

I agree Valve can't build a system of their own, but a good set of peripherals would be great.

Well, I thought Steam would have ruined Valve when they rammed it down your throat with Half Life 2. How wrong I was...

I then thought having digital only games (no phyiscal CD/DVD media) would've crashed and burned because people would always want to own physical copies of their games. How wrong I was...

Next I thought Valve would have alienated the gargantuan Dota / LoL / HoN video game crowd by throwing their hat in with Dota 2. How ridiculously wrong I was..... Wait what? $1 million grand prize? 567,000 spectators? For a video game?


So keep doing what I'm doing folks. Keep doubting them. I'm certain this hardware thing-a-ma-gig will fail

Well since I have seen valve supporting the "Oculus Rift" I thought there sudden interest in hardware had to do with that. I could be wrong though

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1523379957/oculus-rift-step-into-the-game

But I like my PC! And my monitor that can display a LOT higher resolution per square inch than any current HD TV...

A smartphone won't reach 360 processing power in a few years. The PS Vita is based on smartphone hardware in part, and puts out games far prettier than anything on any phone. And even then it's nowhere near a 360.

Today's smartphones are closer to Xbox 1 tech than 360.

I beg to differ, the hardware has already almost caught up. we have phones with quad cores in them (the 360 is triple), maybe not quite up to the clock speed yet. The Mali-400 GPU is quite good for it's size (granted it's not quite at the 360 level, but at least the games can run natively at 720p unlike the 360 which is 1024x720p for most games. And some phones, like mine, have 2 gigs of RAM in them compared to the 360s massive 512mb.

Smartphones not able to equal a home console power within a few years? Are you kidding? We're nearly there already.

The Xenos GPU in the 360 is capable of 240 GFLOPs. The Mali-400 is capable of about 11. So, no, it's not even close.

I mean, show me some games running on a smartphone that even come close to what you see on either console. There aren't any.

I've seen a couple games on Android that come close but can't think of any names. Everything else looks like Wii quality.

N.O.V.A. 3 to name one.


And yes, that is ingame, that's from the first level, was playing it earlier today. I've seen 360 games that look far worse than that. And I own a 360.

Good lord that looks nuts for a ... cell phone game.

But you've seen games that look far better, right? Because that's what matters.

If you look at the tech specs, cell phone hardware is a bit beyond the Xbox 1 than 360. Even that NOVA 3, it looks nice but there were games that looked similar on the old hardware (like BLACK).

We've seen good ports of Max Payne and GTA3 on cell phones, but no, the cell phones couldn't do GTA4 or Max Payne 3.

The Vita has the best looking portable games out there by far, and even then if I had to apply an arbitrary number to what I've seen, it's like... 50% of what the PS3 could do. If that. And it's running hardware that is similar-but-more-powerful than the stuff in phones.

GTA4 is a horrible example game, some computers can't run it still due to its terrible optimization. And I seriously think you need to look at the hardware in the original Xbox. Cellphones today (flagship cellphones) are already FAR beyond that in hardware specs. Remember, the cellphone is also a phone/mini computer. unlike the console or the Vita, which are dedicated gaming machines.


The Xbox -

CPU - Custom 733 MHz Intel Pentium III "Coppermine-based" processor
Memory - 64 MB of DDR SDRAM @ 200 MHz
Graphics - 233 MHz nVidia NV2A


The Xbox 360 -

CPU - 3.2 GHz PowerPC Tri-Core Xenon
Memory - 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM clocked at 700 MHz
Graphics - 500 MHz ATI Xenos


PS Vita -

CPU - 4-core ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore
Memory - 512 MB RAM, 128 MB VRAM
Graphics - 4-core SGX543MP4+


Samsung Galaxy S III - (Used as the example because it's what I have. The Note 2 has even better specs)

CPU - 1.4 GHz quad-core Cortex-A9 (international and KR versions) 1.5 GHz dual-core Krait (NA and JP versions)
Memory - 1 GB RAM (international version) 2 GB RAM (NA, KR and JP versions)
GPU - Mali-400 MP (international and KR versions) Adreno 225 (NA and JP versions)


So yes, it's not quite at 360 specs, (never said it was, I said I think you're wrong in saying it won't be there withing a few years, it easily will be) But phones are far past the original Xbox, and very close to the Vita.

Actually, GTA4 is a very good example. It not only runs well on modern gaming computers that cost as much as the Galaxy S3 phone does but it also runs on both the Xbox 360 and PS3.

Of course it runs well on the 360 and PS3, it was built around those. But try running it on a PC with comparable specs to the 360/PS3 and see what happens. Modern PCs yes, but not on tech that's 10 years old at this point...

I know but you said that modern cell phones are "almost caught up" to the 360, which they are not. Just looking at the basic numbers would imply that they do but they don't.

Cell phones using ARM type cpu's have a long way to go still as far as raw computing power. That's what number1laing is saying. I do agree that we are getting close though.

Oh I know, and thankfully ARM has been getting better. but he talks about the Vita being the best hardware-wise for portable. The Note 2 uses a quad core ARM (just like the Vita) has 2gb of RAM (unlike the Vita at 512mb) and uses a quad core GPU (just like the Vita) and aside from being able to run games, it functions as a phone as well, among it's other functionalities. My point this whole time is that he stated that phones wouldn't be comparable hardware-wise within a few years, and judging by where we are now... I completely disagree. What's the old rule of thumb? New tech every 6mo or so?

Lol, new phones every 6 months. Crap. Practically every three months, really. Heh. But processor power doubles every two years... if that's what you're thinking of.

Phones now are pretty powerful but they still have a LONG way to go. Comparing current high-end to a 360, for example? They'd need to be 20x as powerful. Soo... yeah. Do they do other things? Yes but what real power does that require? You know me and my simpleton Nokia 900. I don't need a crap ton of processing power in my phone anyway cuz... it's just a damn phone. Lol.

Wasn't this thread about Steam or some crap?

I think it was about Valve entering the hardware market. Can't remember anymore lol