Steam Machine Won't Get Cheaper - Valve Warns of Further RAM Price Increases

The company's engineers expect a further deterioration of the market situation.

Valve has warned that the Steam Machine is unlikely to get cheaper anytime soon. Company engineer Yazan Aldehayyat explained that the retail prices customers are currently seeing do not yet reflect what is happening in the wholesale market:

The reason remains the same: the crisis in the RAM market is caused by the artificial intelligence boom and the construction of data centers for AI. Large companies are buying up future batches of memory, storage, and other components in advance, and consumer electronics manufacturers have to compete with customers who are willing to pay more and book supplies years in advance.

Initially, Valve expected to price the Steam Machine at around $750, but rising component costs increased the production cost by approximately $300. As a result, the starting version of the device with a 512 GB drive now costs $1049. Valve emphasizes that they do not intend to sell the device at a loss, as Sony and Microsoft sometimes do with their consoles.