Lets talk: PISTON - Xi3's Steambox

[Alfanhui]

http://gizmodo.com/5974346/meet-piston-valves-steam-box-love+child


So here it is. Piston. At first glance I was not interested as I thought the specs wouldn't be good enough. However, futher inspection has revealed that Piston is based on Xi3's X7a modular PC, which apprently powers Quad Core, 4-8GB Ram and a GPU which can run Crysis 2. (I have never played Crysis, but I know of its demanding power requirement.)

Its an interesting console, brings me back to the days of 'DISCover' and 'The Phantom Entertainment Console'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DISCover

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Entertainment

DISCover actually very much like Steambox, trying to standardise the PC gaming market for the masses.

I love how Valve is pushing linux. Its the platform were gaming should be. We are so restricted by windows and mac, and linux is the way forward for PC's with complete customisation and control. Its a shame Linus Torvalds expressed his displeasure for Nvidia.. but Im sure Nvidia has forgiven him, or not cared.

Piston is a great Idea once the ball is rolling, my macbook is not very reliable/compatible at playing games, so having a steam box is really appealing.

One thing I don't get, is why there is 4x eSata ports on the back of that thing.. WHO USES YE OL' ESATA THESE DAYS?

[gggg336]

I am not very into console gaming, but this thing might entice me to try a demo version at the local electronics store (which may arrive in time just before the 10th generation of consoles, living in the current richest country by GDP and having to deal with the backwater of electronics; makes perfect sense, right? Of course not, I was being sacrastic if you weren't aware.). The swaping of hardware is nice, but like PCs, there would be a never ending stream "I must buy this to get good <something>" or "this is just a marketing scheme that only works for the developer". The thing is, I prefer handheld solutions like the 3DS for light mobile gaming because lugging around something big like a Razer Edge, for example, is just unslightly and bulky. This thing those not even have a small screen to view something with. If I am going to play games at home, I'd prefer a desktop or a stupendously heavy and huge gaming laptop that might not even match an equal level gaming desktop. If Valve or Xi3 is pushing it as a mobile gaming device that you can take to your friend's houses, it would be a very good competitor to the dominent consoles out there now. These solutions are good when you have games that your friends what to buy but don't know whether they themselves would like it and it is a major inconvinence to them to travel to you but not vice versa. Just hook it up to a monitor, plug in the controls and you're good to go. No lugging of a 3 kilo console in a bag that looks like you are carrying gold bars or stones (I had a friend who once put his PS2 in a sling bag that nearly exploded because the bulky-ness of it and rode his bicycle to my house (great feat btw, as my house was about a kilometre away with many twist and turns)). I want to play some games now, so I will jump to my conclusion: It is good for gamers looking for a portable version of their desktop due to the fact it is upgradable and can play most nifty games at qualities better than current consoles. But is this another hype 'bomb' remains to be seen. I am sure I got somethings wrong, just don't slam me too hard for that, I am typing this from the top of my head without looking at references.

[Alfanhui]

Of course we got to reserve opinions of what Valve's own steambox will be like. PISTON is defaintly going to be portable. I feel however it should pack its own controller, or Valve's controller as a matter of fact.


I think portability is becoming increasingly deadly market. Why would someone carry around a 4" mobile phone, with a 7-10" tablet, with a 5" gaming device? I think is all a phase to bring content on every device. I cannot stand a touch screen mobile phone, i've tried it (though I admit HTC Wildfire 3.2" screen was really too small) and stuck with Sony Cedar.

I don't really understand the design of Modular PC. Xi3's computers are just 3 boards fittered together. Surely this is completey backwards in 'upgradable options', and 'not filling up landfills.' As you probably have CPU + RAM + SSD board, I/O board and GPU board. But that would mean If I wanted to upgrade the CPU, I got to upgrade RAM AND SSD! how is this helpful?

This actually reminds me of this article of building a small powerful gaming PC for just over $1000:
http://gizmodo.com/5955172/how-to-build-a-small-gaming-pc

[BRA\\\]

I think it's ironic how they promote their products as being more scalable than others and yet they can't keep their own site running under the extra load that CES is generating. In one of their videos on YouTube they show off this rack and tell you that if you want more processing power you just hook up some extra cubes. here I haven't been able to read up on the specs of their current products to give a fair judgement because their site is broken. It just seems physically impossible that a box this size can run games at 1080p and with a decent amount of detail when you need a 2 slot PCI video card on a normal desktop to do just that.

I like the idea of a new form factor but I don't think they can execute it properly. Until they can show of one of these cubes actually playing a current generation game I won't believe this can be a gaming console.

These cubes aren't meant for portability. They might look small but don't forget you also need a power brick to feed them.

[Alfanhui]

Yeah, complete shame that they [Xi3] havern't solved their website issues. Your point regarding about showing off the hardware on video game tests is true. As for now its like "hey! it CAN play games, and its this SMALL!". But with out specs, its no news atm. That will tell what kinda of product we can expect. The Kickstater they had actually falled, so I wonder what reason Valve have with Xi3. And Ill be interested if other companys like Alienware would jump in with their own branded Steambox.

[FletchWazzle]

I like the Xi3, and am excited about the future for Steam boxes. Size is not my biggest sticking point, so I'm not this products target audience. I liked a lot of what Valve has said about the Steam boxes though, and this being one example is cool.

[bloodraven43]

the idea is very smart but can it really handle gaming for hours without getting hot and lagging bad...this is how all consoles should be built anyway with upgradable hardware...instead of buying a box every 3 years,you can upgrade each individual board...very smart idea but i still wonder what it can actually play when the consumers get it in there homes.

[Alfanhui]

Publicado originalmente por bloodraven43:

this is how all consoles should be built anyway with upgradable hardware...instead of buying a box every 3 years,

Please remember the current cycle is reaching its 8th year. Yeah, in the past it was around 3.5 years. I'm stil on the edge regarding Xi3's update factor from only 3 different boards. And also, the back plate would surely have to expansive to be able to swap and change new components slots.

Ultimately the PC has the biggest upgrade form factor. Instead replacing board, you can just swap the CPU like we all know. If intel and AMD could just stop changing the socket sizes, and motherboard manufactures start making less boards, with just newer firmware updates.

From what the Valve's steambox booth, it look like they are still keeping with a mini-ITX. I just hope they partner up with a motherboard manufacture to custom build it (so they have control over firmware updates).

[Noizzzmaker]

the piston is not the steambox

[Alfanhui]

False. Steambox is a platform which is going to be made by different companies. Xi3 making a Steambox, Valve is making their own flagship.

[Lily]

Steambox = HTPC running Steam in big picture mode. Yawn.

[rotNdude]

So, where is the video card for uber graphics on any of these cubes?

[bloodraven43]

hell valve/steam has 50 million or more users worldwide...ps3/xbox360 have 4 million a piece maybe on a good day...this little box may revolutionize gaming as we know it...but thats the key to it all...if it works and who makes the hardware.is it stable,etc...like asus for motherboards,nvidia for video cards,gskill for ram,etc etc etc

just think about it...not me but say your going to play in a tournament...put this thing in your pocket with the plug and a controller and your off to the races...this thing is compact enough to travel with anywhere in the world and steam is almost everywhere to be connected to

bravo valve...very smart move

[Alfanhui]

Xi3 is only for old/indie games, apprently it does play cysis 2, i guess its for people who just want to play games at medium graphics. I'm sure Valves 'Bigfoot' wil have an uber graphics card.

[BRA\\\]

Publicado originalmente por rotNdude:

So, where is the video card for uber graphics on any of these cubes?

There is no video card. Instead, one of the modules that you use to build these pc's has a socket for an APU (GPU+CPU).

[bloodraven43]

i saw somewhere,i think gamespot,it has an integrated card on it...like a console does but they were very avasive on the specs of this video board and the interface of it.which leaves me to believe there still trying to optimize this system for gaming and there not there yet