TECH NEWS – After the Steam Controller, Valve’s other two machines are clearly still coming, and now the only real questions are when… and for how much.
Brad Lynch, who is widely seen as a reliable source when it comes to Valve-related information, commented on Twitter that Valve had confirmed the Steam Controller is launching first because, as hardware engineer Steve Cardinali told Polygon, the controller contains no RAM, making production much less complicated. While the Steam Controller managed to avoid the worst of the RAM sourcing problems, Lynch added that Valve’s other two products, the Steam Machine and the Steam Frame, both of which do include RAM, have internally seen price increases compared with the targets Valve had before the RAM shortage truly hit.
Valve confirmed to Polygon that they are releasing the Steam Controller earlier due to RAM sourcing issues for their other products
I’ve been told some Valve Internal pricing targets they had before AND after RAM skyrocketed
Machine is affected the most. Frame is not as bad pic.twitter.com/qQolGs0wZ6
— Brad Lynch (@SadlyItsBradley) April 27, 2026
Lynch says he was told about some internal pricing targets Valve had both before and after RAM prices exploded. The Steam Machine is said to be the one affected most heavily. The Steam Frame is reportedly not being hit quite as hard. When Valve confirmed that the Steam Controller had ended up costing more than originally planned, the company pointed to recently rising shipping costs, since RAM supply itself was not the issue there. With the Steam Machine and Steam Frame, however, both problems now have to be considered, and while we still can do little more than speculate about the price of the upcoming PC device and VR headset, it increasingly looks as though our worst-case estimates may still need a few more dollars added on top.
Other companies, such as EmuDeck, have also launched their own couch-gaming PC-style devices, with one Steam-focused machine priced at 1139 euros. At the moment, it seems we may only be dreaming if we expect the Steam Machine to land anywhere near that kind of range. Hopefully that will not be the case, and the GabeCube will arrive at a price point that does not instantly shut out the players who were hoping it would become their new all-in-one gaming system.
The longer this RAMpocalypse lasts, the longer the saga of overpriced RAM and SSDs will drag on, and the more systems like the PlayStation 6 and Xbox Project Helix will be hit by it as well…
Source: WCCFTech
