Valve’s next Steam Machine has shown up in Geekbench, and the first numbers point to a CPU that lands well below AMD’s Ryzen Z1 Extreme while still leaving the Steam Deck’s chip in the dust. That fits the shape of the device Valve is building: a compact living-room box with a modest graphics setup, not a brute-force PC pretending to be a console.
The benchmark suggests the Steam Machine processor scores roughly 2,300 in single-core tests and around 7,100 to 7,400 in multi-core runs. That is respectable, but not headline-grabbing in a market where handhelds and mini PCs have pushed AMD’s mobile chips hard.
How the Steam Machine CPU compares
For reference, the Ryzen Z1 Extreme in the original Asus ROG Ally clears 11,000 points in multi-core testing, and the Ryzen Z2 Extreme gets close to 13,000. The Steam Deck’s APU sits much lower at about 1,200 in single-core and 4,000 in multi-core, so Valve’s new hardware still marks a noticeable jump over its handheld sibling.
- Steam Machine CPU: about 2,300 single-core, 7,100-7,400 multi-core
- Ryzen Z1 Extreme: more than 11,000 multi-core
- Ryzen Z2 Extreme: just under 13,000 multi-core
- Steam Deck APU: about 1,200 single-core, 4,000 multi-core
Valve’s chip reportedly uses six Zen 4 cores with SMT and can boost to 4.8 GHz, but the 30 W TDP cap keeps it on a short leash. That is the trade-off here: enough CPU muscle for a console-like box, but no real reason to chase desktop-class numbers when the GPU is described as roughly on the level of a Radeon RX 7600.
Valve’s summer deadline is getting real
Valve has already said the Steam Machine will arrive before the end of summer, so these leaks feel less like speculation and more like the usual pre-launch breadcrumb trail. If the hardware is already in reviewers’ hands, the next question is not whether the CPU is fast enough – it is whether the final price makes the compromise look clever instead of merely cautious.