Project Steamboy - The Portable Steam Machine

[Foxi4]

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During E3 the eyes of the whole world were fixed on the big three - Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft, but they're not the whole world, are they? There's still the Steam Machines looming on the horizon, and now it seems that there's an incoming portable one ready to exchange blows with Nintendo's 3DS and Sony's PSVita​

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"Project Steamboy" is the world's first portable Steam Machine, the device packs a quad-core CPU, 4GB RAM, 32GB built-in storage, support for WiFi and 3G, a 5" 16:9 screen and the trademark Steam Machine touchpads on each side - a modest, but sufficient setup, especially once you factor in SteamOS's streaming capabilites.​

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Not much is known about the device for now, but until more information surfaces we can at least feast our eyes on the flashy teaser.​

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Source (SteamBoyMachine)​

Source (The Escapist)

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Interesting...but not interesting enough.

My Shield has similar specs (Well, depending on what the CPU ends up being anyways, and it only has 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage, but it also supports 64GB+ MSD cards) and I can already stream just about any PC game to the Shield so I probably won't bother with this.

Unless it has an insane price point like the Shield going for $200, otherwise I'll just stick with my Shield...

 

[mrtofu]

deleted

 

[ilman]

If this is actually real, has decent battery life and doesn't cost as much as a full-blown PC, then I'll surely be buying one.
Wonder if DoTA 2 will be playable with a BT mouse and keyboard on it.

Interesting...but not interesting enough.

My Shield has similar specs (Well, depending on what the CPU ends up being anyways, and it only has 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage, but it also supports 64GB+ MSD cards) and I can already stream just about any PC game to the Shield so I probably won't bother with this.

Unless it has an insane price point like the Shield going for $200, otherwise I'll just stick with my Shield...

You can't compare an x86 CPU with an ARM one...just sayin'...

 

[T-hug]

Interesting premise but I'm skeptical on battery life lol

 

[GameWinner]

Looks like I'll have to find a new handheld to follow if Sony doesn't do another one.

 

[Foxi4]

Considering the fact that Steam Machines are all running on x86_64 CPU's, chances are that this will have an AMD APU or one of Intel's new mobile x86_64 CPU's powering it. Moreover, Steam's library of games doesn't run on ARM CPU's, so it's practically definite that this will be x86_64-powered, and in that case it'll probably sh*t all over the Shield.

EDIT: To address the concerns about whether this is "only streaming" or "running games natively", it'll be capable of doing both as it'll run SteamOS natively.

Meanwhile at Valve...

 

[KingBlank]

But if its a AMD cpu its gonna use loads more power than a tegra mobile processor.

 

[nando]

i thought it was some sort of travel ironing device.

 

[Foxi4]

But if its a AMD cpu its gonna use loads more power than a tegra mobile processor.

The Jaguar microarchitecture uses between 25 and 3.9 watts, that's entirely acceptable for portable use.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

But if its a AMD cpu its gonna use loads more power than a tegra mobile processor.

Actually, quite a few of AMDs APUs use very little power compared to similar-spec'd CPUs/GPUs. I think their Jaguar line can run off of <25W.

And, AFAIK, there isn't a lot of info as to how much power NVIDIA's Tegra 4 consumes (at least, none I could find with a quick google search.) so it's sort of debatable as to how much power the Tegra 4 actually uses.

EDIT: Goddamit Foxi

 

[Gahars]

There's still the Steam Machines looming on the horizon, and now it seems that there's an incoming portable one ready to exchange blows with Nintendo's 3DS and Sony's PSVita

I don't know. The Vita's big selling point revolved around taking console experiences on the go, and seeing how it's performed... a Steamboy sounds like a mist-take.

 

[Hyro-Sama]

Pass. I just can't get over the weird touchpad/control stick hybrid thing its got going on.

 

[KingBlank]

I don't know. The Vita's big selling point revolved around taking console experiences on the go, and seeing how it's performed... a Steamboy sounds like a mist-take.

Yeah, exchanging blows with vita is a bit like beating up a disabled kid.

 

[Foxchild]

Wonder how long before Nintendo sues them for having "boy" in the name... also, were those arrow buttons instead of a d-pad? Not sure I like that.

 

[Foxi4]

Wonder how long before Nintendo sues them for having "boy" in the name... also, were those arrow buttons instead of a d-pad? Not sure I like that.

Probably "never" because Nintendo doesn't own the word "boy", I doubt that anyone would ever confuse this thing for a Game Boy. As for the arrow buttons, the Steam controller is still in the prototype stages so chances are that if it changes into a standard d-pad, the Steamboy's design will be adjusted to reflect that.

Yeah, exchanging blows with vita is a bit like beating up a disabled kid.

Well, it sold over 8 million units so far. It's not doing very well, but it's not dramatically poor either.

 

[XDel]

Hope the prices are fair (cheap netbook range). Glad I didn't invest in a Pandora now.

 

[KingBlank]

Hope the prices are fair (cheap netbook range). Glad I didn't invest in a Pandora now.

Yeah me too, I have a shield atm and am looking foward to gen 2... But it looks like I will have to make a choice now.
Well, whatever one emulates PS2 games best wins

 

[Mario92]

I don't know. The Vita's big selling point revolved around taking console experiences on the go, and seeing how it's performed... a Steamboy sounds like a mist-take.

Well if "console experience" means ports of indie games then it's pretty much spot on. I'm guessing this machine should have enough power to run indie and old stuff without problems by itself and of course one same lisence should do.

But this is done by third party and there's so much variables right now that can make it really bad machine.

 

[KingVamp]

That's at least interesting. Maybe even more interesting than the Steam Machines. Why can't we get 4G on these things?
I wonder if there's going to be multiple Steamboys.

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