Which "Steam console" should I buy?

[Sam]

For a while my only console has been the Switch but I'm sick of Nintendo's bullshit so I conviced my dad to buy me something I could run Steam on for my birthday , the thing here is that my house is relatively small and every single corner has something in it so there isn't really anywhere I could put a PC and play comfortably   but fortunately for me there's a few "consoles" made by Steam (Steam Deck and Steam Machine) so which one would you recomend getting? I'm more inclined towards the Steam Deck (no idea which model though) since I'm more familiar with it bt I don't really understand ANYTHING about hardware so I would really appreciate it if anyone could explain the pros and cons of both  

[Melooon]

So right now the only one you can actually buy is the Steam Deck, the others are not on sale yet; I'm really excited for the steam VR headset (only if its under 500 euro though) because I wanna try making some VR worlds again (I do have an old Oculus Rift but its such a massive hassle to set up and it needs Facebook cameras); however I don't think a VR headset is ever a good idea as a primary game system. The Steam Machine I suspect will be around 1300 euro by the time it arrives and its unclear when that is (I don't recommend waiting for it - you can replicate 95% of what it does using an any gaming pc/laptop running Bazzite)

I think you are best sticking with the Steam Deck (I have an OLED one); its a great device, although it is getting a touch old now so best for emulators, older games and indie games. They only sell the newer OLED model these days, so if you want the cheaper LCD one you have to get it second hand; however I would suggest even if you're on a budget, get the OLED one, its really a huge jump.
There is a thread for it here: https://forum.melonland.net/index.php?topic=1381.0

*edit:* Also to explain screens! OLED is a newer and all-around better screen technology than LCD. On the OLED Steam deck the screen is bigger, the contrast is vastly better, the colors are a lot better, it uses less battery; and since so much of your game-playing experience is looking at the screen, all that has a huge impact.

I'd suggest looking for a second hand one in good shape, it will save you a bit of money and there are a few out there depending on where you live!

*This has been your Melon Tech Tips report* 

[BasilABST]

Seconding the Steam Deck OLED! I got a third party dock for it, connected a screen/kbm to it and I have a setup to play my preferred way as well. But the actual console itself is really responsive, I just prefer that way of doing stuff :P

It should be able to run most games, except the big AAA ones. Forget about UE5 lol, but if you're used to a Switch expect something a bit better but overall similar preformance-wise. It has some really intuitive emulation software too, and the fact it can go into a desktop mode can enhance its customizability and it's honestly just really cool for me, as someone who is not used to consoles doing that.

It also has a microSD slot so I won't worry about the more expensive version with extra storage. You can get a card for way cheaper :P just remember to remove it if you wanna swap the case, lol.

[Dan Q]

Seconding the Steam Deck. I have one and it's pretty slick.

I looked at the (upcoming) Steam Frame and personally I wouldn't bother. You can build the equivalent for the same or cheaper, with greater customisability, and you can even run SteamOS on it if you like. I built "Bee" earlier this year to be a "Steam Frame"-like box for my kids: under-construction pic attached. Bee is running Bazzite and it's working out really well (and has helped me reclaim the use of the living room, where the kids used to monopolise the media centre PC, by sending them up to the playroom insyead!).

[Melooon]

I looked at the (upcoming) Steam Frame

I think you might be confusing the Steam Frame with the Steam Machine. The Steam Frame is a VR headset and you can definitely not make one yourself from bits from a computer parts bin the Steam Machine on the other hand is a boxy-pc and you totally can make your own, as you have!

Also that build is super cool! On the subject of Bazzite, have you had any issues with it? For 99.9% of things it works really well for me; HOWEVER for some reason I'm able to install The Sims 3 under Proton on my Steam Deck, but not on Bazzite; it just errors out every time!

As far as I know the key thing about the Steam Machine is that its small and can auto-turn-on TVs; but if you enjoy tinkering even a little bit, doing a custom PC is still the more fun option.

Here's my "Steam Machine" 

[Dan Q]

I think you might be confusing the Steam Frame with the Steam Machine.

You're right, I am. Sorry! I've not been sleeping well since The Flood; my brain's running at about 60%!

Also that build is super cool! On the subject of Bazzite, have you had any issues with it? For 99.9% of things it works really well for me; HOWEVER for some reason I'm able to install The Sims 3 under Proton on my Steam Deck, but not on Bazzite; it just errors out every time!

I've had a few issues with OpenXR-powered games in SteamVR, otherwise it's been fine.

Possibly you need to play with your Proton settings to make The Sims 3 play nicely. I gather there are some clever things you can do to improve compatibility with things that were intended for Windows, but I've not had reason (nor a chance) to try them myself yet.

the key thing about the Steam Machine is that its small and can auto-turn-on TVs

Some of my PCs can do this too! I haven't found a graphics card that supports the requisite standard (HDMI-CEC), but you can get a thing called a USB HDMI-CEC injector that puts power into the HDMI relevant lines, from your USB port. Plug that into a USB port that isn't powered until the PC turns on (some PCs power some USB ports while they're in standby; watch out for that!) and then put it into your HDMI port, and then put your regular HDMI 2.1+ cable into that, and voila: your PC can turn on your TV!

(I've previously used IR blasters too, but then I got a TV that didn't like my IR blaster, boo!)

[Dan Q]

Here's my "Steam Machine" 

That's freakin' gorgeous. How's the cardboard's thermal properties? I once built a case out of LEGO bricks and it got silly hot inside, but perhaps I didn't plan the ventilation well enough. What're your components mounted to inside there? Is that a slab of wood at the back?

[Melooon]

Is that a slab of wood at the back?

So its actually really simple and quite open plan; I made it for taking to indie game events, so its just a rectangle of wood that acts as a mounting spine (plus a handle you can use to carry it) - most components just hang off the wooden frame, the outer box just holds the power supply, fans, and helps keep things steady and neat.

The fan in the box is really necessary, it creates a kind of airflow wave that goes up the motherboard and keeps all the bits cool, if you turn it off it gets toasty. The upper fan is less needed, but it helps keeps some bits cool that were getting weirdly hot (the upper fan is actually the old CPU cooler fan) - The pipes and the car radiator looking thingy are an AIO cooler for the CPU.

(Work in progress image showing it better)


As for the PC itself; it actually started life as my dads media center/home server in 2009; I turned it into a gaming PC in 2013 (I upgraded the CPU to a Quad Core AMD Phenom 3.4GHz back then - still what it has today, I also added a new GPU, a 650Ti, and 16GB DDR3) - Then I sold it to a friend for 250 euro in 2017, and he used it as his main gaming rig until 2023 (he upgraded it to 32GB ram and added a better gpu) - then it got stripped and was used in a student art project - then last year my friend showed up with the parts in a plastic bag (no case) and asked if I wanted it

So TODAY its:

• My dads original media center motherboard (GIGABYTE Dual Layer something-something - it has a floppy drive connector, IDE, SATA and PCI + PCIe)
• My AMD Phenom 3.4GHz from 2013 (overclocked to 3.8GHz , I've read people can get these to break the 4GHz wall, but mine always gets angry!
• A Corsair AIO liquid cooler I got free in a deal in 2015 and never used till this 2025 build
• 16GB of my ram, plus 16GB of my friends ram - so 32GB quad channel
• A GTX 980Ti graphics card (that I also stole from my dad a while ago)
• A SoundBlaster Live from 1998 (I dunno it just seemed funny)
• A brand new Corsair PSU because I didn't want it to go on fire
• The wood came from a rubbish bin, and the box came free from Aldi, paint and glitter glue from an art supply shop

The best thing about this build is that it's actually able to run Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows 10 and Bazzite - all natively, all you have to do is swap the hard drive!

I know all that sounds a bit off topic for the thread, but its actually not - so much of this did not involve any buying at all, and yet it still makes a fun games system 

[Zero Kirby]

Gonna add another vote for getting a Steam Deck (if you can get one these days, anyway). My OLED model has served me quite well over the time I've had it, surprisingly comfortable ergonomics and while it works well for most Steam games out of the box, if you're willing to get into the weeds a bit you can get a ton of mileage out of it for non-Steam games, like emulators or old CD-ROM games.

The most important thing to note is that it will require certain compromises for most games released towards the end of the PS4/Xbone era. While it'll run basically anything from the PS3/360 era flawlessly, anything after that you'll likely have to make some decisions between visuals and performance. Since the screen's resolution is 1280x800 you can get away with surprisingly a lot but I've found a lot of use in using the system-level framerate limiter to cap framerates to 30 or 45 FPS for when a game just won't run stably otherwise. I've gotten heavy games like Arkham Knight to run surprisingly well this way with pretty good settings on top of that.

Any big huge AAA title that released within the last year is gonna be a struggle no matter what you do, unless it had optimizations specifically for the Deck - but if you've got a backlog of games from a few years ago, or a bunch of indie titles, this is a fantastic little device.