Steam in-home streaming released. (You can play any game on super low end PCs.)

[onething]

http://store.steampowered.com/streaming

What is it?

1. Your main gaming PC (or even home server with decent a video card) will do all the processing work.

2. It uploads a video stream to another PC within your home network. (which are usually gigabit speeds)

3. Any low-end client PC, or even non-windows PCs, can then play the game with just enough processing power to watch a video. (which nearly everything can do)

It eliminates any platform restrictions. All OSX/Linux games are available on Windows, but not vice versa. So this is great news for non-Windows users.

Some games can be played very well with touchscreen laptops/devices, but those touchscreen devices don't have a lot of processing power; no longer a problem.

For a smooth and high resolution experience, gigabit ethernet is required. Wireless AC seems like the bare minimum required for a decent experience, or very low settings on wireless N. Thanks DeathReborn.

It is streaming after all, so fast-paced games will be at a huge disadvantage. There is about a 0.5-1 second input lag.

 

[DeathReborn]

I did a quick test on HL2 over a wired 100Mbit network (77-89Mbit used) and got 0% packet loss, 0.13% dropped frames during first few minutes then 0% and the input was almost as good as native control.

I will run tests later today on a old laptop (oldest I have that supports hardware h264) Pentium T4500 using F1 2013 and a Driving Force GT over g54Mbit & n150Mbit.

 

[Tweak155]

Interesting... I just recently upped everything to gigabit in the last year or two, I'll have to check this out.

 

[frozentundra123456]

Looks really cool, except that unless I am misunderstanding, you have to have the game running on a high end PC locally. It is not like streaming from the cloud. So I am not sure why one would not just play from the initial gaming PC instead of streaming and having 2 PCs running the game at the same time. I mean, you could stream from a gaming PC to a laptop or living room HTPC I suppose, but it is not like you could take a low end laptop or mac on the road and play from it. So I see some uses, but it is not like you are eliminating the need for a competent PC to run the game.

If there were some way to play co-op or head to head on the two PCs, that would be great, but I assume one could not do this.

 

[frowertr]

So I am not sure why one would not just play from the initial gaming PC instead of streaming and having 2 PCs running the game at the same time. I mean, you could stream from a gaming PC to a laptop or living room HTPC I suppose, but it is not like you could take a low end laptop or mac on the road and play from it. So I see some uses, but it is not like you are eliminating the need for a competent PC to run the game.

To be able to stream around my house is pretty cool. Some of us have HTPCs in various places attached to large T.V.s. I can't wait to be able to stream games to my 60" Plasma in the living room whilst having the surround sound turned on!

 

[XiandreX]

This concept appeals to me a lot. I hate lugging my PC around especially to play games in the lounge. If I could setup a low form factor box and stream to it I would be very happy.

I will be sure to keep checking on this thread

 

[Topweasel]

This can be nice for a lot of reasons. My Main computer is a 6core i7 with 32GB of ram and 10.25TB of storage in an incredibly large case (even has wheels). It is basically my Data server, VM host, and gaming system. I like the idea of turning it into a gaming server and setting up a couple of $300 streamers around the house using some Pentiums or A4's. I wouldn't need to be at or move my computer to play elsewhere and I would be able to play games at full settings on all of these computers instead of being sad I didn't triple the price to make a halfway decent gaming computer.

Heck I could probably try to get esxi setup on that computer and try to get VT-D working in feeding my graphics card through and turn it completely into a server.

 

[spat55]

Nice idea but I don't know if many people will use it? I am always at my PC which is right next to my TV as I live in my bedroom, would be good for some people I am sure.

 

[Gunbuster]

Excited to try this gaming on my laptop streaming from my desktop rig.

 

[imaheadcase]

Nice idea, but most people don't have the setup to play games on TV. I got a leather couch and a wireless KB with touch mouse pad on it. I would suspect lots of games will have problems showing right on large TV as well streaming.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

Looks really cool, except that unless I am misunderstanding, you have to have the game running on a high end PC locally. It is not like streaming from the cloud. So I am not sure why one would not just play from the initial gaming PC instead of streaming and having 2 PCs running the game at the same time. I mean, you could stream from a gaming PC to a laptop or living room HTPC I suppose, but it is not like you could take a low end laptop or mac on the road and play from it. So I see some uses, but it is not like you are eliminating the need for a competent PC to run the game.

If there were some way to play co-op or head to head on the two PCs, that would be great, but I assume one could not do this.

Right. You need to actually run the game on a decent rig, then stream it to other devices close by, a laptop, TV, or whatever.

It's basically a much complex and convoluted way of streaming across a HDMI cable, fairly limited use quite frankly, it's only real purpose is to make up for the fact that steam machine cannot play most of the windows game in the living room and can stream them from your PC.

Most people who want to do that such as myself invested £20 in a HDMI cable and wireless controller like a decade ago.

 

[Topweasel]

Nice idea, but most people don't have the setup to play games on TV. I got a leather couch and a wireless KB with touch mouse pad on it. I would suspect lots of games will have problems showing right on large TV as well streaming.

But I think interest would grow. I know for me there is an interest to not be tied to my office with my large desktop and a key board and a mouse for SP and controller friendly games like 3rd party action and adventure games. It's probably reason number two for a lot of PC gamers also owning consoles. So setting up a $300 streamer that could also be used for HTPC uses (like downloaded video and audio libraries) and still get the benefit of using their 1k-3k gaming computer might cause interest to grow.

But this isn't a sales option. Valve isn't going to get more money from a streamer. So I am not sure what the point in "lack of interest" is. It's an option that Valve is rolling out so that if people can or want to they can. I guess you could say it's a measured attempt to give one more reason for people to focus on PC gaming. But that would be about it for Valve. Whether I or most people use it or not, I say kudos to Valve for developing it.

 

[lupi]

Can't wait for some Civ 5 on the 70".

 

[JimmyH]

This is a game changer. So excited about this bought a Dell Venue 8 Pro for $180 today just to stream my steam games. Gonna check out this streaming on my buddy's HTPC rig (A8 5600k) this weekend. He's says its pretty sweet single player (lag wise) and ditching plans to build a high end htpc. I'll probably do a low power 5350 kabini build for my 55" Panny plasma in living room thanks to steam streaming.

 

[pauldun170]

Haven't had a chance to test this out.
My current setup
Gaming PC in office\man cave (2700K + gtx780)
HTPC\Light gaming pc in living room hooked up to 46inch TV(i32100+HD7770)
Steam installed on both and connected gigabit network.
I have some titles installed on the game pc and some on the htpc.

How does this handle controllers and other peripherals?
Typically, the titles on the HTPC are played with an xbox controller (for the kids) and my titles on the gaming PC are keyboard and mouse, flight stick, trackir.

 

[Aikouka]

How does this handle controllers and other peripherals?

Controller information is supposed to be forwarded to the PC that's actually playing the game. Although, I've had some games that just don't work well with it. Even though I play the game with a controller on my desktop, I had to get my HTPC's wireless keyboard just to play them while streaming. However, this may have been fixed in a later version of the beta!

 

[CU]

This is a game changer. So excited about this bought a Dell Venue 8 Pro for $180 today just to stream my steam games.

That Dell tablet can stream games? I am curious how well it does that. I wouldn't mind finding a supper cheap steam streamer.

 

[frowertr]

I wouldn't mind finding a supper cheap steam streamer.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00FP4MWUW/.
Its i3 is plenty enough for watching HD movies so it should handle streaming just fine.

I have two of its bigger brothers (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00FNPCL36/) and I love them!

 

[DeathReborn]

Well it was a mixed bag with the T4500 laptop.

Using 54g wireless I found it struggled at 1080p and had 23% dropped frames and the latency was awful even for Warlock II (TBS). When I plugged in the 150Mbit Wireless N card it was much better but only 720p worked for HL2 while being acceptable with similar results to the 100Mbit wired setup.

I found balanced to offer a pretty good compromise between latency & quality, Fast introduced about 1-4% dropped frames & Beautiful probalby needs 300Mbit at least to be comfortable.

I will be using the streaming when I build a steam box, other than that I will stick to local gaming. It's a good concept and the execution is pretty good but I guess I will wait for the polish to take place.

 

[Imp]

Oh... I thought it was the game being processed by a server and sent to your home so you don't even need a gaming PC.

 

[frozentundra123456]

This is a game changer. So excited about this bought a Dell Venue 8 Pro for $180 today just to stream my steam games. Gonna check out this streaming on my buddy's HTPC rig (A8 5600k) this weekend. He's says its pretty sweet single player (lag wise) and ditching plans to build a high end htpc. I'll probably do a low power 5350 kabini build for my 55" Panny plasma in living room thanks to steam streaming.

Seriously, sorry to sound negative, but to be able to stream you have to have a fairly competent gaming PC to begin with, which I assume would include a nice mouse/keyboard/large monitor. Why on earth would you want to stream that to an 8 inch tablet?

Overall, it is a nice feature, since it costs nothing, but I just see limited applications. Bottom line is you are tying up 2 PCs to play one game. Why not just go sit in front of the gaming PC and play there, or run a long cable from the gaming PC to whatever other display you want to use. I actually could see a better purpose to this for a console, which has a lot of games that are family friendly and can be played with 2 or 4 players on the same screen.

 

[Modeps]

Where's my PS4 Steam app?

 

[pauldun170]

So far mixed results.
Batman Origins played ok after a laggy intro.
Controller worked flawlessly
Metro 2033 wouldn't launch properly

 

[ImpulsE69]

I would like to see this work on say...a Roku, or a PS3 etc. Something I actually have hooked to a TV, not a laptop which I would still need to run a cord to the TV to use.

Might be interesting for say..tablets or phones though.

 

[mmntech]

I've been in the beta for a while and only got mixed results. It works on WiFi but it's laggier than Sony's implementation than the PS4. Good enough for playing non-action games though.