It’s 2026, the Steam Link is nearly 10 years old (released in 2018) and the new Steam Machine has just been announced. Hot on the heels of the release of the excellent Steam Controller.
With your Steam Deck and your ever-growing library of games in Steam. It’s becoming very apparent that Valve want you to play your games everywhere. Now, whilst the Steam Controller is a second-attempt at the peripheral. The Steam Link seems to just sit, lost to the annals of time. Remote play is available on your deck or other devices if you want.
It’s easy to see why the Steam Machine might be appealing! Aiming to get you playing your Steam games in your living room is the final piece of the puzzle. Give everyone chance to play one consistent library, anywhere you are. It seems great, albeit quite expensive (thanks to the rising costs of components).
But, if you have a PC already and want that “play it in the living room” experience. You really don’t need a Steam Machine. In fact, since getting the Steam Controller, the Steam Link has started to get more use than ever at home.
Steam Link
Ok, first, let’s try to reduce the use of the word “Steam”. Crikey! They’ve got the market covered, haven’t they? For the purposes of SEO I’ll continue to use “Steam Link” intermittently but I’ll do my best to leave it at that.
The Steam Link is a tiny black box that lets you stream games from your PC to any screen you connect it to. It’s genius is in it’s simplicity. A couple of USB ports, an RJ45 Network port, power and HDMI out.
Connect it to your network, turn your PC on. Let the Steam Link find it on the network, hit play and you’re in. Presented with Steam in big picture mode. It’s similar to using Steam OS on the Deck.
Pick your game (already installed on the PC, of course). And off you go.
Now, with the new controller and the wonderful puck/receiver. You suddenly have a very comfortable, low-latency PC stream anywhere you have a screen. The controller being wireless makes all the difference, and the low latency from that as well, means you’re essentially on your PC.
You could actually get a similar experience by just docking your Steam Deck and similarly hooking it up to a TV and your controller. Granted, the performance may not rival that of your home PC. But again, there’s no real need to get a Steam Machine when you have options like this.
PC Gaming
Chances are, you’re either looking for a way to enjoy your already-established Steam library, and wondering how a Steam Machine would fit into that. Or….you’re PC-curious and weighing-up the pros and cons of building a PC vs buying the pre-built, console-style Steam Machine.
The appeal is obvious, and were the prices cheaper, I’d be incredibly interested in Valve’s new hardware. But for the same money you could build a similar spec PC, which you could then go on to upgrade over years. Or you could get a Steam Deck and play way more games than a handheld has any right to be able to run, on the go.
Add-in a dock or a Steam Link, and you have the best of both worlds anyway. It’s maybe not the most premium setup, but if your goal is PC gaming in comfort, you can absolutely pull that off.
What to do
It’s 2026, we have more options than ever to get into PC gaming with less friction than ever before. But with that said, the cost is becoming increasingly prohibitive. We know Valve aren’t trying to maximise profits (sure, the have to make a margin!), but they can’t sell at a loss, and items like RAM and solid-state storage are becoming so expensive to manufacture, or source. The entire market is a mess.
Getting second-hand PC parts, hand-building your own machine, and then linking it up with a Steam Link is such a great alternative option and one that feels more viable now than when the Steam Link came out.
Throw-in the viability of a Deck and Dock setup, and you’ve got the world at your feet.
None of this is cheap. But if you can get a Steam Link on eBay like I did, and you can build an affordable PC. You may very well be happier with this setup longer-term. Plus, you can start building that library of sick Indie games asap.
Time will tell how the Steam Machine does, but early impressions are very strong. So you might end up struggling to buy one anyway. So don’t over-think it, you have options, and honestly the Steam Link might just be the answer.
