Rumor says that Valve already sold out of Controllers and Steam Links
Earlier this month, Valve Software introduced an “early bird” program that offered purchase of Steam Machine hardware due to be released on October 16. The catch was that customers needed to pre-order the hardware as soon as possible, as the number of units would be limited. Rumor has it that as of June 29, all Steam Controllers and Steam Link units are sold out. The Alienware and Syber Steam Machines are presumably sold out as well.
While that sounds incredibly positive, there is no reliable information regarding the number of units that were in the company’s stockpile, or how many Steam Machines were actually sold during such a small window. We reached out to Valve to clarify the news but as of this posting, the company has not responded.
Currently, only Alienware and Syber are still taking pre-orders. The Alienware model, sold through GameStop, has a starting price of $449 and four set configurations; there are three Syber Steam Machines with a starting price of $499. All machines listed here are bundled with Valve’s new Steam Controller.
Right now, customers can still pre-order all hardware, but the devices won't be delivered until November 10, 2015. An extra Steam Controller will set you back $50 and the Steam Link also costs $50. The Steam Link device is essentially a receiver that discovers PCs running Steam on the network and will stream games from that specific PC. Want both devices? That will cost you $100.
Steam Machines were originally slated to launch last year, but because there was a delay in the development of the Controller, OEMs began to launch their machines without the Steam Machine branding and Controller. Now with the Controller at hand, these OEMs are finally launching their Steam Machine solutions on November 10.
Will the Steam Machine initiative steal living room space away from the console giants? That’s the intention, but with game launches like Batman: Arkham Knight, consumers may be hesitant about dumping money into as new machine with games that could cause similar launch headaches. That said, Valve may have sold out of Controllers and Steam Link set-top-boxes, but sales of actual Steam Machines? Maybe.
What’s hard to believe is that the wait for Steam Machines is almost over. We've heard about this initiative for what seems like forever… remember Steam Boxes? And now, beginning in November, there will be 14 base models with several variants in tow.
With that said, customers who pre-ordered their hardware before now will likely get their purchases in October. Everyone else who pre-orders now and in the near future will see their hardware arrive in November. Happy shopping!
From maximumpc
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