Steam Machine is latest victim of RAM market craziness – but is it actually delayed?

Take it from us – every time we're in a press huddle or Q&A with hardware companies right now, the first question is generally about whether the insane spikes in memory prices will affect consumer pricing for newly-announced products. Companies know to expect the question, but plenty of them still basically can't answer, since they're in the dark about what prices will do in the coming weeks.

This all makes it broadly less of a surprise to see a newly-uploaded blog post from Valve confirming that the spiking prices of RAM and SSD storage are going to affect the final pricing of its new wave of Steam hardware. In particular, the Steam Frame VR headset and Steam Machine mini-console are in the line of fire.

Back when these two were unveiled, alongside a new Steam Controller, Valve said it was aiming to ship all three devices in the first half of 2026, which means it still has a few months of wiggle room. In fact, it's worth underlining the fact that the blog post doesn't technically announce a delay – that release window "has not changed".

Steam Hardware Announcement - YouTube

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However, if that makes you feel all rosy and optimistic about the news, the silver linings probably end there. Valve goes on to say that it's currently hustling to "land on concrete pricing and launch dates that we can confidently announce".

That leaves open the possibility that the hardware will either come at the very end of that "first-half" window, or that it will indeed slip at some point – not that Valve is saying so at this stage.

For now, though, the more worrying element is really the question of pricing. Right from the start, we've predicted that the Steam Machine's price will either make it or break it, putting it in competition with consoles like the PS5 Pro or making it a far more niche proposition.

The RAM price hikes and SSD wars are now making it increasingly likely that its price will be one that appeals to enthusiasts rather than the masses, which would be a shame. Still, we can't know until Valve chooses to nail a price down.

More details on Steam Machine performance

The rest of the blog post is a series of short FAQs letting people know more about planned post-launch support for the Steam Frame, for example, and has at least one more juicy tidbit.

It claims that "the majority of Steam titles play great at 4K 60FPS with FSR on Steam Machine." That's quite the boast, when you consider how many games there are on Steam – albeit many, many of those are not the freshest releases in graphical terms, so shouldn't be a challenge.

Valve does immediately admit that "there are some titles that currently require more upscaling than others, and it may be preferable to play at a lower framerate with VRR to maintain a 1080p internal resolution". So, the jury remains out in terms of how the Steam Machine will cope with the latest releases once a year or two have passed.

Until then, though, we're still hugely looking forward to getting our hands on one, as and when it's out, and at whatever price Valve ultimately lands on.