Was there ever an actual statement from Valve on this? All I see is a company called Xi3 showing of their computer, while making some vague remarks about having received an investment from Valve - whatever that means. Not to doubt it, but if this is really "the thing", I'd like to hear some actual conformation.
More pictures and info here: <a href="http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/7/3849284/piston-valve-steam-box-xi3" rel="nofollow">http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/7/3849284/piston-valve-steam-b...</a><p>8 USB ports? Ha wow.
There's no mention in these articles about the most important thing; what kind of GPU is in these if any? If they rely on the HD4000 included in an i3/i5 CPU then they're going to make for really shitty gaming consoles.
As long as games released for this console would be regular Linux games runnable on the PC as well, it wouldn't be too bad. But in general old beaten console vs PC gaming arguments stay in place. Console market degrades games quality (interfaces and performance wise), which backfires to PC gaming scene with crippled console versions being adapted for PC by developers with minimal changes, instead of creating normal and rich PC interfaces for games from the beginning.
you can already have the Steam console experience in your living room if you hook up a computer to your tv.
so buying this console wont even be a requirement, if it happens to be underpowered<p><a href="http://store.steampowered.com/bigpicture/" rel="nofollow">http://store.steampowered.com/bigpicture/</a>