Valve is feeling the squeeze of the memory famine amid AI fever as it works to somehow, someway, get Steam Machines assembled and shipped in 2026. This was clear at a GDC talk hosted by Valve's Kaci Aitchison Boyle and Tom Giardino, who reaffirmed that Steam Machine is still targeting this year.
Per PC Gamer, writer Hayden Dingman highlighted this quote from the presentation: "If you have a line on a bunch of RAM, we are in the market and would like to buy it."
At this rate, with a pile of RAM that doesn't even exist yet reserved for a zillion data centers that also don't exist, it would practically take a newfound gold vein of RAM to solve, or even soften, Valve's manufacturing bottlenecks and pricing pressures.
Valve's ability to source components will affect the timing and stock of the Steam Machine launch, and the uncontrolled rise in memory prices also has a knock-on effect on Valve's own pricing.
The company said just last month that it is revisiting pricing and timing planning for Steam Machine due to RAM and accompanying storage shortages. The official word was this: "Our goal of shipping all three products in the first half of the year has not changed. But we have work to do to land on concrete pricing and launch dates."
"The limited availability and growing prices of these critical components mean we must revisit our exact shipping schedule and pricing," Valve added.
Valve has shared new Steam Machine Verified guidance at GDC, but I've no idea why hitting Steam Deck performance levels is part of the requirements list.
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