I’m riding into my fifties - and given recent pricing ridiculousness with video cards and now ram, my desire to build my own is significantly less. No cost savings and then adding the time investment starts to become less attractive as years go by.
I was looking forward in the next year or two to upgrade my circa 2020 build. I’ve held off due to abhorrent video card pricing - Love me some games but I’ve been playing more single player non-demanding games (metroidvania types).
There have been multiple points in history where stripping a pre-built for parts was cheaper than buying those parts individually. Honestly, that is probably the case more often than not because they get the parts cheaper.
Prebuilts are often cheaper due to the manufacturers selling bloatet crap as “preinstalled OEM Windows” where they get paid to include a bunch of unnecessary software into their images. That way, they can sell their PCs for cheaper while still making a profit.
I think the argument is the Steam Machine won’t get that advantage because it’s running Linux out-of-the-box. There’s still some stuff that could be bundled, but I expect it not to do so for money. I don’t think the Deck does.
One thing to note is that the GPU that Valve is using is apparently a custom one that was created for a cancelled Microsoft project or something, and so Valve is probably getting a better deal on it than we ever could because they’re the only ones buying it off the manufacturer.
But regardless, anybody who is willing to build their own PC is not the target market for Valve. The target market is the other 80% of Steam users and potentially console players. A coworker of mine was just talking the other day about a friend of theirs who is replacing their PS4 because Sony is shutting down the PS4 servers, and they were telling them to wait and get the Steam Machine and get out from under Sony’s thumb.
It’s a safe bet that this will be true. It’ll be priced like a prebuilt PC which are always a little more expensive than building yourself
I kinda think the controllers and size justify a slight premium over building as well though. At least in this stage (mid 40s) of my life.
I’m riding into my fifties - and given recent pricing ridiculousness with video cards and now ram, my desire to build my own is significantly less. No cost savings and then adding the time investment starts to become less attractive as years go by. I was looking forward in the next year or two to upgrade my circa 2020 build. I’ve held off due to abhorrent video card pricing - Love me some games but I’ve been playing more single player non-demanding games (metroidvania types).
There have been multiple points in history where stripping a pre-built for parts was cheaper than buying those parts individually. Honestly, that is probably the case more often than not because they get the parts cheaper.
Lol prebuilts were actually cheaper when GPU prices skyrocketed and it may happen again thanks to RAM prices
Prebuilts are often cheaper due to the manufacturers selling bloatet crap as “preinstalled OEM Windows” where they get paid to include a bunch of unnecessary software into their images. That way, they can sell their PCs for cheaper while still making a profit.
They also get better parts prices than consumers if they buy bulk.
So things you can easily remove by resetting Windows, ok got it.
Yes, that has been the conventional wisdom for the last 20 or so years.
I think the argument is the Steam Machine won’t get that advantage because it’s running Linux out-of-the-box. There’s still some stuff that could be bundled, but I expect it not to do so for money. I don’t think the Deck does.
One thing to note is that the GPU that Valve is using is apparently a custom one that was created for a cancelled Microsoft project or something, and so Valve is probably getting a better deal on it than we ever could because they’re the only ones buying it off the manufacturer.
But regardless, anybody who is willing to build their own PC is not the target market for Valve. The target market is the other 80% of Steam users and potentially console players. A coworker of mine was just talking the other day about a friend of theirs who is replacing their PS4 because Sony is shutting down the PS4 servers, and they were telling them to wait and get the Steam Machine and get out from under Sony’s thumb.