RAM and storage costs have pushed the Steam Machine price higher than anyone would like, prompting the question: Where’s the barebones model? Answering that very query, the company has highlighted challenges that meant there was no “viable way” to do so, but the option remains open should the right circumstances materialise.
Valve engineers Pierre-Loup Griffais and Yazan Aldehayyat provided insight into what led the firm to ultimately abandon a barebones Steam Machine, despite spending “a lot of time thinking about it.” In an interview with Digital Foundry, the pair highlight that offering the system without SSD and RAM presents new challenges to testing and shipping.
“To sell a barebones kit, we would have to change how it’s assembled and tested,” they comment. “We would have to figure out a way to ship it in this disassembled form so that it doesn’t get damaged in shipping – or if you put it back together, then the customer has to take it apart again.”
While the Steam Machine’s M.2 slot is relatively easy to access, getting to both its SODIMM slots required significant disassembly of the system, well beyond the realms of a normal desktop PC. It’s because of this difficulty that Valve ultimately dropped the idea of offering a barebones variant.
According to Griffais, “the idea came a little too late in the development process for it to work out, because we had ruled it out super early – it was only the memory situation that made us think about it.” As a reminder, Valve announced the Steam Machine back in November 2025, just before the ongoing DRAM crisis took hold, with the system’s design being naturally locked in much earlier.
It’s a shame that Valve didn’t mandate easier access to the SODIMM slots earlier in the Steam Machine’s design journey, regardless of current market conditions, as ease of repairability and upgradability is always welcome. Of course, there’s only so much room with which to play in a system of this petite size.
Aldehayyat says there remains some possibility of a barebones Steam Machine, but unfortunately doesn’t see a potential path for it yet. “Right now, we just don’t have a solution, and we don’t expect to have a solution.”
I’m sad to see that my calls for a barebones Steam Machine following the system’s announcement are unlikely to come to pass anytime soon. As such, the cheapest route to owning one of Valve’s black boxes will set you back £879 / $1,049, and that’s without a Steam Controller.
You can expect to read our Steam Machine review in the near future. In the meantime, check out Ben’s AWD-IT Kalona review, if you’re wondering what kind of PC you can get for a similar price to Valve’s offering.
