- cross-posted to:
- pcmasterrace
- cross-posted to:
- pcmasterrace
It is a bigger, don’t have the Steam Controller dongle integrated, and you need to manually install SteamOS on it.
But you get a machine that can be upgraded way more easily than the Steam Machine, and a better GPU from the start.
Building a PC isn’t that bad. $1000 is plenty for a competent 1080p machine, especially with DLSS or FSR or even just Lossless Scaling involved.
If you don’t care about playing the latest and greatest, you can come in around 500 if you can find some decent secondhand deals. 3060’s can be had for around 200 used and they’ll play pretty much anything indie just fine and can probably even handle modern demanding titles with aggressive DLSS and turning features down or off. You can go cheaper with a 2060 super for about 50 less or get a 4060 for about 50 more. Team red will probably be a little cheaper overall, although FSR isn’t quite as good as DLSS at squeezing every last frame out of the chip.
If you’ll only be playing stuff like Stardew, Crosscode, etc - and there’s a ton of great games like that - then you don’t even need a discrete GPU at all.