Valve Publishes Steam Survey Numbers For April 2024

[mSparks]

you give me a list of Topseller LOL these top seller sales are clearly not the total number of steam accounts.

Indeed, but you can extrapolate from how many users they have, their steam sales revenue, their active steam numbers to get a solid estimate of how many steam accounts their are, result is around 300million.

You can also go the other way.
there are 3 million steam decks sold, steam decks account for 1% of steam accounts, therefore there are 300 million steam accounts.

and what exactly should i think about something is teased to investors ?

->Its probably going to have an nvidia chip in it, see the OP.

in this meaning its a wonder why a free and open platform like PC still has some marketshare without subsidies.

Mostly it was about piracy and cheating.......

[qarium]

Indeed, but you can extrapolate from how many users they have, their steam sales revenue, their active steam numbers to get a solid estimate of how many steam accounts their are, result is around 300million.
You can also go the other way.
there are 3 million steam decks sold, steam decks account for 1% of steam accounts, therefore there are 300 million steam accounts.

well thats for sure not an exact number but for sure better than nothing.

->Its probably going to have an nvidia chip in it, see the OP.

i clearly do not believe it because with a nvidia gpu chip it would mean it is ARM cpu...
then if they go with ARM cpu they could just put in a qualcomm elite X SOC but this clearly will not happen.

If i would be Valve i would put in a Strix Halo SOC but not the full ZEN5 16core version but only with 8core cpu means only 2 chiplets instead of 3.

going from 128bit ram interface to the 256-Bit LPDDR5X-8533 interface would solve their biggest problem

the old steam deck was limited in performance only because of this 128bit ram interface

on the GPU side they could choose between 2.560 and 2.048 and 1.536 shader units

the old steam deck OLED has 512 shader units this means it would be a big boost.

they could limit the cTPD to less than 45 watt

Mostly it was about piracy and cheating.......

right . you are right but this means all your sales numbers are meaningleass
its nonsense to count sales numbers if they all lose money on sales.
and compare it to sales who people make money with the sales.

it makes no sense at all.

in this meaning PC sales + valve steam store is much more profitable than any playstation 5 or xbox

because they make money on pc sales and valve makes money on steam store sales.

and outside of this free market sales all your playstation5 numbers are meaningless.

[mSparks]

well thats for sure not an exact number but for sure better than nothing.

well, its 300mil to 1sf. this time last year it was around 330mil, last 12 months have been "messy", there is a lot going on. one way or another the steam deck has stalled

i clearly do not believe it because with a nvidia gpu chip it would mean it is ARM cpu...

Why? AMD chiplets mean it is very easy for them to just not include the power hungry GPU parts, Valve is now in a position to and will be surely ordering them in the millions, they can pick whatever they want from whoever they want.
The AMD SoCs in the deck were already custom built for valve.

[qarium]

well, its 300mil to 1sf. this time last year it was around 330mil, last 12 months have been "messy", there is a lot going on. one way or another the steam deck has stalled
Why? AMD chiplets mean it is very easy for them to just not include the power hungry GPU parts, Valve is now in a position to and will be surely ordering them in the millions, they can pick whatever they want from whoever they want.
The AMD SoCs in the deck were already custom built for valve.

ok then tell me whats bad about this option:

Strix Halo SOC but not the full ZEN5 16core version but only with 8core cpu means only 2 chiplets instead of 3.
going from 128bit ram interface to the 256-Bit LPDDR5X-8533 interface would solve their biggest problem
the old steam deck was limited in performance only because of this 128bit ram interface
on the GPU side they could choose between 2.560 and 2.048 and 1.536 shader units
the old steam deck OLED has 512 shader units this means it would be a big boost.
they could limit the cTPD to less than 45 watt

i know the old steam deck had a cTPD of just 15watt but the first steam deck was 7nm node the second was 6nm node...

and this Strix Halo is 4nm... means much better.

keep in mind if they would use the Strix Halo SOC they could build much more powerfull laptop and also steambox with the same SOC just going from 1536 shaders and 8core cpu to the full 2560 shaders and 16core cpu.

a solution like that would have much better performance per watt than the old 7nm/6nm SOC and would have 3 times higher performance even with the smallest version. and could have 5times higher performance with the bigger options.

keep in mind many benchmarks show the old steam deck biggest bottle neck was the "128bit ram interface"

[mSparks]

ok then tell me whats bad about this option:

Strix Halo SOC but not the full ZEN5 16core version but only with 8core cpu means only 2 chiplets instead of 3.
going from 128bit ram interface to the 256-Bit LPDDR5X-8533 interface would solve their biggest problem
the old steam deck was limited in performance only because of this 128bit ram interface
on the GPU side they could choose between 2.560 and 2.048 and 1.536 shader units
the old steam deck OLED has 512 shader units this means it would be a big boost.
they could limit the cTPD to less than 45 watt

i know the old steam deck had a cTPD of just 15watt but the first steam deck was 7nm node the second was 6nm node...

and this Strix Halo is 4nm... means much better.

keep in mind if they would use the Strix Halo SOC they could build much more powerfull laptop and also steambox with the same SOC just going from 1536 shaders and 8core cpu to the full 2560 shaders and 16core cpu.

a solution like that would have much better performance per watt than the old 7nm/6nm SOC and would have 3 times higher performance even with the smallest version. and could have 5times higher performance with the bigger options.

keep in mind many benchmarks show the old steam deck biggest bottle neck was the "128bit ram interface"

AMD CPUs are simply unbeatable, all the sex of arm, all the best in class Intel had dominated the market with prior to ZEN.

But their GPUs were always a metoo, "good enough". They contributed hugely to the field, but never ran with it.

Nvidia went "best in class" for raytracing and AI. But so far have only commercialised the AI stuff, while raytracing has been gently maturing over the past few years for the software architecture needed to build games with it, and the silicon needed to actually run those games at acceptable performance.

I believe it was Alan Wake 2 that was first past the post to use RTX to build a AAA game with the budget of a small indie dev:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?si=g2yT-wyQ1NY_dNKn&v=wM7qMzGx7P0&feature=youtu.be

still expensive, 50 million euro, but a tiny fraction of the 450 million it took for cyberpunk.

let that sink in, it basically costs 400 million euro for a game dev to make their game look as good on AMD as it does on RTX...

What we are lacking now is a device people can afford and some lucky publisher can sell for a profit and actually ship product in volume.

[qarium]

AMD CPUs are simply unbeatable, all the sex of arm, all the best in class Intel had dominated the market with prior to ZEN.
But their GPUs were always a metoo, "good enough". They contributed hugely to the field, but never ran with it.
Nvidia went "best in class" for raytracing and AI. But so far have only commercialised the AI stuff, while raytracing has been gently maturing over the past few years for the software architecture needed to build games with it, and the silicon needed to actually run those games at acceptable performance.
I believe it was Alan Wake 2 that was first past the post to use RTX to build a AAA game with the budget of a small indie dev:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?si=g2yT-wyQ1NY_dNKn&v=wM7qMzGx7P0&feature=youtu.be

still expensive, 50 million euro, but a tiny fraction of the 450 million it took for cyberpunk.
let that sink in, it basically costs 400 million euro for a game dev to make their game look as good on AMD as it does on RTX...
What we are lacking now is a device people can afford and some lucky publisher can sell for a profit and actually ship product in volume.

ok you favor to buy a amd cpu for desktop/workstation and plug in a Nvidia PCIe card i get it.

but how in hell do you get this combination with a SOC ? for a steam deck like soc you right now have 3-4 options..

AMD, qualcomm elite x, apple m4 and this intel 155 10nm cpu+4nm ARC GPU that you can buy in a steam deck clone.

you always come up with the totally outdated technically worst example of the nintendo hardware who have a nvidia gpu inside who is not successfull because of nvidia hardware its only successfull because of nintendo explusives and the hardware is totally garbage.

now you say to develop a AAA game on AMD hardware costs 450 million dollars and on Nvidia RTX hardware it costs only 50 million dollars because of RTX but you can even run raytracing even the AMD based steam deck,

so its a clear lie. you can run all these 50 million dollars AAA games on RDNA3+ and RDNA4 hardware in the near future just fine.

keep in mind if valve use Strix Halo SOC for the steam deck 2.0 then it has 4 times higher raytracing performance than the steam deck OLED ...

you say this: "their GPUs were always a metoo, "good enough""

but if the steam deck 2.0 use Strix Halo SOC then good enough is well good enough

[mSparks]

right now have 3-4 options..

I'm not talking about now, I'm talking about what comes next.
What I've been trying to explain and failing miserably, is SO FAR Nvidia have not released a consumer RTX GPU, a switch is $300, a deck is $450+, a usable RTX card is gonna set you back a couple of thousand, good for "enthusiasts" and developers and no one else.

But that is because nvidia PC GPUs are a swiss army knife and need a lot of silicon for a raster pipeline (else no one would buy them).

However, they are perfectly capable of putting together right now an "APU" that targets "RTX on" exclusively (so RTX off is lower performance) for say $50, Then portal RTX, Alan Wake 2, Cyberpunk 2077 max graphics are the norm for $300 devices. They just haven't yet, but now PS5 and Quest 3 are competitive against their existing offerings it is almost certainly time for them to do so or similar.

[qarium]

I'm not talking about now, I'm talking about what comes next.
What I've been trying to explain and failing miserably, is SO FAR Nvidia have not released a consumer RTX GPU, a switch is $300, a deck is $450+, a usable RTX card is gonna set you back a couple of thousand, good for "enthusiasts" and developers and no one else.
But that is because nvidia PC GPUs are a swiss army knife and need a lot of silicon for a raster pipeline (else no one would buy them).
However, they are perfectly capable of putting together right now an "APU" that targets "RTX on" exclusively (so RTX off is lower performance) for say $50, Then portal RTX, Alan Wake 2, Cyberpunk 2077 max graphics are the norm for $300 devices. They just haven't yet, but now PS5 and Quest 3 are competitive against their existing offerings it is almost certainly time for them to do so or similar.

i have simple question for you if nvidia comes up with a magic RTX bulled for a switch/deck like device then why in hell do you believe that it does not come again under a Nintendo brand name like switch ?

i am pretty sure if Nvidia does such an ARM+RTX device it will not come as a valve steam deck and instead will come as a Nintendo console.

for everyone else outside this Nintendo+nvidia world i am pretty sure the next valve steam deck will be based on AMD Strix Halo SOC...

ok lets say Valve does a Nvidia-RTX steam deck and at the same time someone release a steam deck like device with AMD Strix Halo SOC i am pretty sure the amd device will be the better choice.

just because it is cheaper and "good enough" and the steam deck OLED is already more expensive than what most people want to pay.

[mSparks]

i have simple question for you if nvidia comes up with a magic RTX bulled for a switch/deck like device then why in hell do you believe that it does not come again under a Nintendo brand name like switch ?

i am pretty sure if Nvidia does such an ARM+RTX device it will not come as a valve steam deck and instead will come as a Nintendo console.

for everyone else outside this Nintendo+nvidia world i am pretty sure the next valve steam deck will be based on AMD Strix Halo SOC...

ok lets say Valve does a Nvidia-RTX steam deck and at the same time someone release a steam deck like device with AMD Strix Halo SOC i am pretty sure the amd device will be the better choice.

just because it is cheaper and "good enough" and the steam deck OLED is already more expensive than what most people want to pay.

simply because the future is VR, and valve have that experience in house, nintendo don't. I was VERY disappointed the deck had no VR support, even my ancient gtx1070 managed a better job of that than the quest 3 does.

Plus, I would expect nintendo values nvidias contribution to the switches success as much as you lot do. nvidia wont give them any charity, and they will expect it because they are nintendo, same as apple did.

[qarium]

simply because the future is VR, and valve have that experience in house, nintendo don't. I was VERY disappointed the deck had no VR support, even my ancient gtx1070 managed a better job of that than the quest 3 does.
Plus, I would expect nintendo values nvidias contribution to the switches success as much as you lot do. nvidia wont give them any charity, and they will expect it because they are nintendo, same as apple did.

VR support is a performance problem the steam deck already struggle to only display normal games at their 1280X800 resolution... VR more or less need to render 2 pictures for the same szene...

its no surprise that your 1070 does a better job there.

well... VR is maybe the future but valve already found out with halflife alix that they can make more money without VR with the steam deck for example.

"Plus, I would expect nintendo values nvidias contribution to the switches success as much as you lot do. nvidia wont give them any charity, and they will expect it because they are nintendo, same as apple did."

a steam deck based on AMD Strix Halo SOC would already cost like 1000€

do you think there is a market for even more expensive hardware with nvidia RTX chip ?