At Just $35, Now Is A Great Time To Try Out Valve's ARM-Linux-Powered Steam Link

[phoronix]

Phoronix: At Just $35, Now Is A Great Time To Try Out Valve's ARM-Linux-Powered Steam Link

Steam Link is Valve's game streaming solution where when paired with a controller makes for easy gaming from a living room TV. The Steam Link is Linux-based and it does support game streaming from Steam running on SteamOS or any Linux distribution...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Steam-Link-Controller-Sale

[rohcQaH]

A quote from valve, https://www.reddit.com/r/Steam/comme..._specs/crxhr6z

For legal purposes and to help with approvals from regulatory agencies, we have to lock it down pretty tight; we do not support any kind of modding or custom software/firmware.

If you're looking for a "fun little hacker device", why not buy a Raspberry Pi instead? Free choice of distribution, kodi already works, and I'm sure you can get the steam streaming client to run, too.

[CapnCook]

Of course I had to go and buy one last week

[Guest]

A quote from valve, https://www.reddit.com/r/Steam/comme..._specs/crxhr6z

If you're looking for a "fun little hacker device", why not buy a Raspberry Pi instead? Free choice of distribution, kodi already works, and I'm sure you can get the steam streaming client to run, too.

From my understanding, you can apparently use moonlight for Steam streaming on a Pi.

So that, paired with the much better hardware inside a Pi 2 or even Pi 3 for about the same price (more or less); basically doesn't make much sense to pick up a Steam Link unless you really just want a ready-to-use Steam streaming device.

[hangingwithsnoopy]

Steam controller is 34.99 also right now.

[ResponseWriter]

Steam controller is 34.99 also right now.

Almost wish I'd bought at this price instead of the Rocket League bundle. Because, well... What happened to Rocket League?

[computerquip]

Almost wish I'd bought at this price instead of the Rocket League bundle. Because, well... What happened to Rocket League?

Apparently, the blame is on Valve actually (who helped port the game and is the distributor for PC/Linux).

[rhysk]

I actually looked at the specs of the Steam Link, considering whether at this price it would be a neat little embedded system to work on the Etnaviv open source driver (it's a Vivante GC1000 GPU that powers the device, plus is more featureful as a development environment than a tablet with the same GPU).

Many of the device's specs are favourable, however there's a comment on the Steam Link SDK Github that the device will only boot with a kernel signed by a Valve private key. A bit sad unless a developer mode switch can be found.

[Ardje]

Almost wish I'd bought at this price instead of the Rocket League bundle. Because, well... What happened to Rocket League?

Rocket League is according to my library ready for download on a steam machine with original install steamos. I didn't try to install it though.
Hmmm, now it isn't installable again... what's up with that... Or was it just a dream... Oh well, it didn't look interesting to me though, but maybe it would have been fun with the controller.

[Passso]

A quote from valve, https://www.reddit.com/r/Steam/comme..._specs/crxhr6z

If you're looking for a "fun little hacker device", why not buy a Raspberry Pi instead? Free choice of distribution, kodi already works, and I'm sure you can get the steam streaming client to run, too.

Because it is plug and play, management, controller support and updates are automatic. 35$ is a good deal.

My main problem comes from the streaming from a Linux host anyway, I have sound only on the host since a few updates, and somes games are not working anymore (Metro 2033) or never did (Soma).