I Couldn’t Get A Steam Machine, So I built One Instead (BUILD GUIDE)

I didn’t get a press sample of the Steam Machine – I don’t know if Valve even has a UK PR presence anyway – and I didn’t win the postcode lottery to even be able to buy one. So I figured since Valve has opened up SteamOS to run on any PC you want, I’d use some of the parts I have already and build my own Steam Machine. Now I’m sure Steam Machine fans will be quick to point out a couple of things, namely that my PC won’t be as small, quiet or efficient, and they would be absolutely spot on. But as with all PC gaming, everything is a tradeoff. Valve opted to sacrifice performance for size and efficiency, whereas I’ve opted to take up slightly more space and power in order to have a better overall experience. Oh, and let’s also address the elephant in the room, price. As I have it built here, with 32GB of DDR5 and a 2TB SSD, you’d be looking at £1500 out of pocket. That’s £350 more than the 2TB Steam Machine, although we’ll come back to why that price difference might not be so big a deal. Also for context this build would have set you back more like £1200 a year ago before the RAMpocalypse. Ouch. 

 Let’s get to building this thing and I’ll talk through the parts as we go. First you’ll want to get the CPU in the motherboard. That would be a Ryzen 7600X – because I had it already – and an ASRock B650I Lightning I bought for £150. To install the CPU just unhook the arm and lift the retention bracket, gently place the CPU in aligning the golden triangle with the marking on the socket, then put the retention plate back down and hook the arm back in. This will pop the cover off. Next, RAM. That’s 32GB of HyperX DDR5-5600, and that just pushes into the two slots, making sure it’s fully seated on both sides. You’ll also want to install the M.2 SSD, which just means pulling the heatsink off, slotting the Sabrent Rocket 4 2TB Gen4x4 drive in, peeling the film off the thermal pad, then screwing the heatsink back down. Finally we’ll want to install the cooler. I went with a Noctua L9a-AM5, although I’m already itching to upgrade that, which needs the stock brackets removing, thermal paste applying to the CPU, then screw the cooler THROUGH the bolt holes in the backplate. A pretty weird design. Oh, and don’t forget to plug the fan in. That’s the motherboard built up and ready to go.

When it comes to the case I went with the very pretty Fractal Terra in ‘white’ (which is more silver really), a case that’s only about twice the size of the Steam Machine yet accommodates basically any GPU you could want. That’s pretty cool! The side panels fold up then come off with the pull of one tab, and the top panel just pulls back and off. Then you’ll want to get the power supply installed and ready – I went with a Corsair SF750 here – and attach any cables you’ll need. For me that’s just the 24 pin, 8 pin CPU, and one 6+2 pin GPU. Then stick the power supply in, screwing it down. Attach the passthrough power cable, and don’t forget to turn the PSU itself on. Installing the motherboard is equally simple, just four screws, plus the two power connectors of course. You’ll also need to plug the PCIe ribbon cable in, along with the power switch connector and the two USB connectors. I did a bit of cable management while I was in there too. The GPU just drops in and screws in, plus the power connector. The GPU I’ve gone with here is an RX 9060 XT, the 8GB version because that’s what I had on hand. That’s still a decent bit faster than the Steam Machine’s overclocked RX 7400. The 16GB version of this is generally only £50 more so if you are building this yourself you might want to splash out a tiny bit extra.

In theory that’s it, unless you want to get fancy. The L9a in particular actually has an optional ducting kit – it’s only like a tenner (the NA-FD1) – but I have a 3D printer and a problem. So I modelled a my own duct that uses the included longer screws to hold it on. I glued some foam over the top to create a nice seal on the side panel and initially I left it across the whole front as a bit of a filter, but it turned out to be too restrictive so I cut it to be just a rim after filming. The aim for this is to bring the cold air from outside the case instead of recycling the hot air from around the cooler. In practice people report a 5°C drop in temps, although as I quickly found out the L9a and 7600X aren’t exactly the best of matches. The L9a does list the 7600X as a ‘compatible’ CPU, but with the 7600X drawing up to 142 watts at full load while the L9a is rated for 95 watts, it isn’t a match made in heaven. I’m somewhat interested in trying out a different, larger, low profile cooler at some point soon. Anyway, that’s the system built, now to get Steam OS installed. It just so happens that installing Steam OS is super simple. Once you write the image to a USB stick with a tool like Rufus or Balena Etcher, you boot from it and it starts up as a basic live USB. Double click the “Install Steam OS” icon, click through the setup, and leave it for like ten minutes and that’s it. Sign in and you’re done. 

The usage experience on Steam OS is kinda interesting. Everything works – WiFi, sound, USB, the works – but there are definitely some quirks. Ironically the first game I tried, Portal 2, is the worst. It picks the keyboard as the first input device, and the “reorder controllers” feature straight up doesn’t work here. Some say you have to time it right to make it work, but there are some other issues. The whole system freezes whenever it’s loading, so it takes like five minutes to load into the game. Ironically every other game I’ve tried – which is mostly coop games with my wife – has been flawless. We’ve been playing Moving Out and Overcooked 2 a fair bit now, which is a lot of fun. These feel like perfect games for this, and the fact this runs flawlessly at 4K60 makes it even better. I also downloaded an old favourite, Castle Crashers, and again I’m loving playing this again. It plays nice and smooth as you’d expect, although interestingly we’re still looking at a pretty minimal amount of power usage. At least in Castle Crashers the Steam overlay reports something like 35 watts of GPU power usage, and I’m sure about the same on the CPU front. Not bad! This is a pretty great experience overall, with the only let-downs really just being a couple of bugs, and controller pairings. The controllers I have can be a little temperamental so I’ll have to work on a way to move the dongles to a better place so they can stay connected despite being six feet away. 

One thing I would say is just how good of an experience SteamOS can be. Putting the system to sleep, even with a game running, means you can turn your controller back on and you’re right back in the game. That’s pretty incredible, considering Windows would wake up every 30 seconds, break, and if a controller disconnects mid game you’d have to reboot the entire PC just to get it to work again! Ok the last one is a little facetious, but still. This is a genuinely pretty seamless experience, and the fact I can switch this to desktop mode to use it as a living room HTPC as well… Well that’s pretty sweet. 

The raw horsepower on tap here is a good bit faster than the Steam Machine itself, meaning especially with FSR running my 4K60 TV will be great for a variety of games, and the 32GB of RAM is a nice addition too. For the time being I might have to underclock the CPU so it doesn’t hit 90°C+ every time I download a game, but it’s genuinely pretty quiet while gaming, and while I’m sure the power consumption is between 30 and 100 percent higher than the Steam Machine, I’m also not all that bothered. The price difference is also fairly minimal considering you get a better GPU, a much better CPU, double the RAM and a 2TB SSD. You absolutely could save some money and get a cheaper case too. This Fractal Terra, while beautiful and super easy to build in, is hella expensive. It’s nearly £200! There are plenty of cheaper options if style isn’t as big a concern for you. Then there’s the obvious upgradability note too. This system can fit a wide variety of GPUs, I can upgrade the CPU, or just replace the whole board. This machine is wholly, entirely, mine to change, upgrade and tweak as much as I like. That’s pretty cool.

In short I think the Steam Machine is awesome, and for those that got one I’m sure you’re going to love it. For me, I’m pretty happy with my build here, giving most of the plug-and-play console experience you’d get, but at least to me anyway for like half the price of the Steam Machine. That’s pretty sweet. If you’re interested in the parts I’ve used I’ll leave some links in the description, and I’d love to hear what you’re doing about living room gaming in the comments below!