Even if you don’t use it that often, being able to buy a Steam Link for only $27 is an astronomically good deal.
That’s the current offer at EB Games right now, and while it’s been running for a while it’s worth pointing out for anyone interested in streaming games to their living room. The Steam Link works best if your streaming PC and the Link box are both connected via ethernet, although if you’re not playing twitch shooters, fighting games or something like Dark Souls, the wireless connection works well enough.
Owning a Steam Link is a vastly more cost-effective solution for living room gaming than setting up a PC in the living room or buying a console, and it works well enough with console controllers from all platforms.
One small tip: if you have got a Steam Link, or $27 is too good a deal to ignore, make sure you grab a USB 2.0 hub to go with it. The Steam Link only has 2x USB ports, and it’s helpful to expand that a bit so you can have a mouse and keyboard connected (or a receiver for a wireless mouse and keyboard) in case anything goes wrong.
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39 responses to “A Steam Link For $27 Is Ridiculously Good”
Here’s the direct link https://ebgames.com.au/pc-222649-Steam-Link-PC
*reads comment*
/thought I put the link in there
*dives into back end*
*sees old revision with link*
*sees latest version with no link*
/screams
Is the Steam controller good to get along with it? That’s on special right now as well is all, $99 for both
Just recently purchased the steam controller and I must say its a great controller once your use too it
Aaaaaaaaaah that depends on who you talk to.
I really like the Steam Controller; I think it’s a top replacement for m+kb if you just want to navigate the desktop, browse, do stuff like that. It’s fine as a gaming controller as well, especially if you put a lot more work into the configs for specific games.
But plenty of people have picked up my Steam controller and wanted to throw it in the bin. It’s not the nicest feeling controller; it’s a bit chunky, and it’s not super immediately intuitive.
You can get the Steam Controller cheaper from Amazon. But as it stands, you can use a PS4 controller or even a Wii U controller with the Steam Link just fine, and they’re much more natural to use for people when it comes to the thing that matters most – games.
only $4 cheaper with shipping 🙁
I like the idea of the steam controller, and tinkering with it is loads of fun, but there are a few big games where the touchpad just gave me the shits.
Dark Souls and GTA V are both super weird with the steam controller. I couldn’t ever really get comfortable with it.
If you already have something like an xbone controller, the steam controller is a good alternative for various games where you’d typically use a mouse. Otherwise I’d invest in a more traditional controller.
Yeah, ive been finding 3rd person games to be the most problematic for the controller at the moment.
I’ve been using both. Alot of people dont like the steam controller, it can be awkward at first, but the amount of customization is amazing.
I have been playing some games that require a few hotkeys, using the left trackpad to add an addiional 10 hotkeys through a on-screen context sensitive selection allowing to use it for control groups or spells is great.
Playing Vampire: The masquerade which has not natural controller settings is great and work really well with steam controller. Mapped menu items and conversation selections to on-screen context menu with the left track pad and bound everything else to buttons. Only small trade off is the computer and terminal segments are a little cumbersome, but still works.
Playing a game like the Witcher though is a little annoying and feels really awkward in fights, but this can be remedied with some tweaks, but for out of the box playing i would stick with a standard controller.
If you’re not interested in creating your own control schemes, you can download community created schemes through steam, which i do as a base control scheme and customize things more to my liking.
Great controller, but you only get the most out of it if you like playing with the settings/controls.
edit* additional game info
I have a wireless 360 adapter plugged into mine, supports multiple controllers, pretty sure ive had at least 4 running off the one adapter. Pushing the Xbox guide button on a controller that is linked to it also turns on the Steam Link, which is pretty cool
With that in mind, I havent seen the need to get a Steam Controller as well
Pretty sure I heard this worked elsewhere, but thank you kindly for re-confirming this. I have an adapter as well and 3 controllers! Just bought the Link yesterday and am picking it up this afternoon. 🙂
I really couldn’t stand it when I first started using it and I wanted to throw it out but everyone I knew who already had one kept telling me to just stick with it and I’ll eventually get used to it and love it.
Eventually after 50-60 hours I finally got used to it and now I honestly can’t ever use any other controller again.
Its great for modern games, but sucks for use on emulators or games you might want to use a d-pad. The track pads have a learning curve but they are way more accurate in the long run give it a few hours.
Just want to say thanks to @sonyorxbox_fanboy, @alexwalker, @cubits, @velathial, @si, @bigboss & Peckish for the responses, damn I wasn’t expecting that haha. It really does have its pros and cons it seems… might just stick to a 360 controller for now, until it’s cheap enough that it’s an impulse buy. Like the Steam Link I just bought! 😛
You will not regret the buy, this is coming from a father of 4 with a mortgage.thanks for the thanks.
For anyone with even a remotely decent Steam catalog, this is a steal. And I’m talking about a dozen games or more, not hundreds or thousands like some have.
In the classic war of console vs PC, one of the negatives thrown at the PC is that its hidden away most of the time, while a console works with the convenience of your main tele, and hence in the main living area.
For a mere $27, your PC can now enjoy that same status, and essentially turn your PC into a console. At least for your Steam games.
For me, when I saw it, it was a no brainer to buy. $27 is a steal, and 70% off the RRP.
You can run non-Steam games through a Link as well. Just add a shortcut for the game into Steam, or quit big picture mode and go to the desktop.
I’ve been running one for a while now and it’s thoroughly impressive. Hit the button on my controller, it boots my pc upstairs, and is up an running pretty quickly.
The one thing i did change a few months back was to swap from wireless to ethernet-over-power. My router is a bit old, and going wired made a good bit of difference.
Now if it had better youtube, plex, and netflix support i wouldn’t use my chromecast at all. The browser setup gets a bit weird.
I haven’t played around with remotely turning on my PC, is it just done from the Steam link interface? i thought you would need to keep it in sleep mode to power it on remotely.
As soon as my pc steam was paired to the link, it could be cold booted straight into big picture mode from the controller. Just turn on the link and it does the rest.
It must be using wake on lan.
oh ok nice, assuming you haven’t disabled that from your pc of course XD
I’m hoping to get this kind of setup going too, but since the upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10 my WoL hasn’t functioned properly. Still need to troubleshoot the issue, so I’m guessing this will motivate me into getting it working! 😀
Interesting: See a good deal I always look to see motivations. probably just Steam Sale + EB sale mark downs….
… but did see Samsung is partnered with Valve to deliver a Steam Link application for their Ultra HD TV sets with a beta at 1080p and plans to deliver native resolutions (to match the TV) up to and icluding 4K
I picked one up for $27 last week and it works exactly as advertised. Now I don’t have to cart my PC to the living room when I have friends come over to play some random party games, works well.
Well that price is too good to pass up. Will see how it works, hopefully not too bad over wireless as I’ll probably need to do that, at least for now
As a mate said last week after I bought one, at that price its worth the risk.
Nothing I’ve seen since has changed that opinion. Cant try it myself just yet, my PC blew and I need to get a few bits for a new machine, but at $27 it wasn’t a hard decision.
If you have 5GHz it should be fine. When I got a new modem router thanks to the NBN it came with 5GHz & I switched the Steam link to that and it worked smoothly, it was a bit choppy on the 2.4GHz.
With my crappy router the wireless was completely un-usable and that was when the Steam Link and router were in the same room.
Holy hell, my steam link was on my desk this morning, that is bloody fast turn around from EB, I am amazed
Been wanting to get the Link + Controller for a while but the price was a tad too much with both being $100.
Now that I can get them both for effectively 50% off I just called my local EB and got them to put aside one of each for me to pick up tomorrow 🙂
are the controller and link are only compatible with steam?
most of my games are on GOG and i could never tell how compatible they would be with it. from what i have read the controller doesn’t work as a standard controller and i am not sure about the steam link.
sorry if the question is a bit basic.
ta
You can actually launch any application from steam, you just need go to “Games”–> Add non steam game to library, doesn’t even need to be a game, just any application. From there you can launch it through steam library…..Regarding the controller, I haven’t experimented as much, but I believe it works, as a generic controller but that’s one of the things I’ve found annoying is trying to find a good control scheme in the community hub for games that didn’t have the steam controller in mind.
Does anyone know when the deal ends?
Is there a new one coming? Is that why they’re on sale?
You know steam is selling them for $15 right?
Oh, you mean the website that says $15USD (which is almost $20AUD anyway) and then the normal purchase button says “Availabe from EB Games, Visit the website”?
That steam?
$15 USD, which converts to $19 AUD. But Steam directs you to EB Games AU to buy one.. To get it for $15 USD ($19 AUD) you’d have to buy it from GameStop & they will only ship it to US postal addresses anyway. So paying an extra $8 for one locally isn’t exactly a bad deal. Plus you can walk into an EB Games and pay $27 for one anyway.
Actually got one the other day. Not too bad once it was set up but I could not work out why the sound was lagging by a second.
But I’m definitely gonna get back to it once work cools down.
Thanks for sharing this deal, going to go grab one today.
I have an wired xbox controller that I have been using for the PC, works a treat for all steam games.
I used to try to get the pc working on the tv via a HDMI cable but it was a pota to get the sound and proper resolution working.