SteamOS - SteamWare

Jovec

Jovec

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ThunderCougarFalconBird_sl said:
Read through some more of Valve's blogs, and they seem to be pretty stoked about OpenGL. They're also working directly with hardware vendors to improve the API both in hardware, software, and drivers.

Perhaps this is their play, to finally get OpenGL accepted as the state-of-the-art go-to API for gaming. They'll have to solve some of its problems, and get developers on board, and that is no small task. However the API is platform agnostic, and has an open license so those are some things working in its favor.

OpenGL competed for a little while with DirectX but it didn't quite have the support to win that war. Perhaps Gaben's golden beard is the magic dust that can make it happen. Still doesn't resolve Steam's massive catalogue of DirectX games, though.
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This comes up alot in Direct3D versus OpenGL, but it's the entirety of the DirectX suite that won the API "war." Probably every OGL game on Windows still uses numerous parts of DX, and that is what has always been lacking on Linux. D3D wasn't necessarily better to start, but MS responded to developers quickly and provided feature updates quickly. It also doesn't need to be 100% accurate (most games approximate their calculations), whereas OpenGL had to serve two masters (game use and rendering/modeling use) that had different goals, and is subject to design and approval by committee.
 
Araxen

Araxen

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Some new info I found on NeoGaf...http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=506899

German site Golem.de attended a conference on the 29th of December where Ben Krasnow, Valve electronics engineer, talked ( among other stuff) about the company's plans for a Linux-based console. Here are the main takeaways from the article:

- Valve's console will launch in 2013
- It will use Linux, not Windows
- Valve's hardware labs will reveal other stuff in 2013 (possibly controllers? VR?)
- Krasnow has been working on Valve hardware with Jeri Ellsworth since 2011
- Possible reveal at GDC, Phoronix thinks that E3 is more likely

The article is in German so it would be great if a german GAFer could translate.

Edit: Translation of the important bits, courtesy of Yoshi:

Quote:
Steam Box without Windows

the Valve developed PC-game-console Steam Box will seemingly be based in Linux, not Windows. And it's not the only exciting hardware project, that Valve will present in 2013.

It doesn't come off as a huge surprise, considering that Valve-boss Gabe Newell views Windows 8 as a catastrophe: Steam Box will not be based on Windows, but on Linux instead. this was confirmed by Ben Krasnow, one of Valves hardware developers, when inquired on this topic. With that, the Linux client for Valves download and community platform Steam, which is currently in its Beta phase, gets an all new background because of this - especially as Linux will also support the big-picture-mode.

(some blurb on what Big Picture is and what Krasnow is doing in his free time and that Valve is also working on Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality projects.)

But according to him, there's more than just the introduction of the Steam Box: "the hardware lab has some secret projects that will be released in 2013. We have a good groop of electronic- and mechanics-engineers and we are glad to build some really cool things", says Krasnow. In summer 2012 Valve's higher ups crticised a frustrating lack of innovation in the area of computer hardware - in a job offer. In that they also wrote: "... we want to change this."

So it's going to be exciting, if there will already be a concrete announcement on the GDC 2013 from March 25th till March 29th 2013 in San Francisco, or if we will have to wait until the US-trade show E3 2013, which is going to take place in Las Vegas from June 11th till June 13th 2013.

Sony Computer Entertainment, Nintendo and Microsoft might well get some serious competition from the PC sector - while Ouya is attacking from the mobile side with the Android console of the same name Ouya.
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http://www.golem.de/news/pc-spieleko...212-96609.html
Google Translated Link:http://translate.google.com/translat...212-96609.html
 
Xalara

Xalara

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Jovec_sl said:
This comes up alot in Direct3D versus OpenGL, but it's the entirety of the DirectX suite that won the API "war." Probably every OGL game on Windows still uses numerous parts of DX, and that is what has always been lacking on Linux. D3D wasn't necessarily better to start, but MS responded to developers quickly and provided feature updates quickly. It also doesn't need to be 100% accurate (most games approximate their calculations), whereas OpenGL had to serve two masters (game use and rendering/modeling use) that had different goals, and is subject to design and approval by committee.
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If you're just comparing the two graphics APIs OpenGL wins over Direct3D. It's more or less as fast, but beyond performance I find programming in Direct3D to be a a pain in the ass compared to OpenGL. Now I'm a bit of a hobbyist when it comes to computer graphics, but I do have discussions on this topic with friends who maintain multi-platform graphics libraries and they also agree that programming for Direct3D is more difficult than OpenGL. That said, your point about DirectX having other libraries making it easier for devs is still valid to a degree.
 
Selix

Selix

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Lodor_sl said:
The problem with that is the costs. You would have to sell it as a pc because no way youd coin it a console and have it run the top end games for pc ona console budget without a major loss for each unit sold.
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Actually have you looked at the price of HTPCs lately? They could definitely compete with console pricing.

Also another thing to consider is that if the Steambox works with a keyboard and a mouse then a developer would just need to take their game already released on steam and make it compatible with the SB then release it again for more cash. For some games this would be hard if not difficult but for other games (ESP. Indie developers) it might just be a small patch.



The biggest thing going for the SB for me though would be the Steam Sales. Nothing turns me off consoles faster then how much everything costs after getting the hardware. And how long they artificially keep the price of games high.
 
Tuco

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Big questions for it:
1. How well can they run games on linux.
2. Is the price subsidized by game sales like xbox/ps.
3. Are the hardware components powerful enough to play the latest games?

So far it seems like: probably not, nope and probably not.

No idea why they're targeting a happy meal box sized version when xbox/ps get away with something twice or three times the size.
 
Haast

Haast

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Wouldn't they be 100x better served making Big Picture as good as possible and encouraging people to build media PCs? Valve is possibly the best-in-class at software, but they are not a hardware company.
 
Zaphid

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I always saw Steam Box as something to show it off and make it more like a specification for other manufacturers to follow ala Intel and ultrabooks, at worst create some rating system that let's you judge whether your specific Steam Box lets you run game X. If it's distributed by Valve, then yeah, I imagine they could sell it at loss, if other people can make their own Box, no way.

It sounds interesting simply because it's by Valve, but until I have some hard facts and numbers, I'll withhold judgement.
 
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Sean_sl

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CES 2013: Completely pointless shit everywhere. That thing is just about as useless as Nvidia's new version of the N-Gage.
 
Zaphid

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Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't THE steam box, the guy doing the presentations seems to mostly dodge all the questions related to the relationship between this thing and Valve.
 
gogusrl

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I'd do something like a i5 ivy + 660ti + 8gb ram in a lian li / silverstone quality htpc case. A quick build on newegg gets me a system like that @ 750$ so steam should be able to pull it off for ~500$ if they sell it at no profit and look to earn from game sales.

wBm5Ll.jpg

edit : actually I forgot about storage so slap another 100$ to that.
 
Selix

Selix

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If this comes with full HTPC compatability then I'll consider it at that price. Of course it will need to be compatiable with every steam game I already own and a keyboard and mouse. It would take a considerable amount of work to do that in Linux if my guess is correct.
 
Tuco

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Everything about it makes it seem like it's not built for gaming but is instead a way to do all non-gaming stuffs through your TV. Maybe it's a introduction model and they'll increase the game capability with more iterations.
 
xrg

xrg

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That's kind of a boring design if that is what they're going with. I was hoping they'd make something really steam-punk looking.
 
Zaphid

Zaphid

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Yeah, because that fits into average living room under a TV. Case mod your heart out though.
 
Tripamang

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From what I read the it would be have fully replaceable parts, meaning you could change the motherboard/cpu/gpu (It's an AMD APU according to engadget) as well as the drive which means it's more like a form factor. With the Nvidia keynote where they have ironed out their cloud gaming strategy I wouldn't be surprised if Valve somehow works that into steam and their steam box to make games that aren't optimized for the steam box work on it via streaming. AMD has a similar strategy but it doesn't look as complete (And with them having all the next gen consoles it doesn't really have to be).
 
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Man0warr

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The Linux version of Steam hardly has any games, don't see how this Steam Box will be able to. Unless Valve is working hard on an emulator that doesn't exist yet.
 
Tuco

Tuco

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Man0warr_sl said:
The Linux version of Steam hardly has any games, don't see how this Steam Box will be able to. Unless Valve is working hard on an emulator that doesn't exist yet.
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I think we have to assume that they've got that emulator/support or are planning on rolling it out on a future version. Otherwise we'll all get to point and laugh at how it fails.
 
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