Zotac NEN SN970 Steam Machine Overview
The Zotac NEN SN970 Steam Machine is not overly large with official dimensions of 210mm x 203mm x 62.2mm. This is smaller than the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Zotac has gone with a white and black color design with the Valve logo on the top of the unit. You will also notice many ventilation holes around the top of the unit.
At the front of the unit you will find a large power button, SD card slot / USB 3.0 port, headphone and microphone ports, and a USB 3.0 Type-C port.
On each side of the unit you will find ventilation slots. On the left side there is also a Kensington lock port.
Moving on to the back of the unit from left to right you have your power connection, two USB 2.0 ports, two USB 3.0 ports, four HDMI 2.0 ports, dual Gigabit Ethernet, and your antenna connection. The NEN SN970 Steam Machine supports displays up to 4K @ 60Hz.
At the bottom of the unit there are four rubber feet that will keep it in place. You will notice more ventilation holes around the bottom of the unit.
The unit is upgradeable so you can actually open it up. To do this just remove the two thumbscrews at the back of the unit then slide the bottom off. Once we have the unit open we can see that we can upgrade the SATA drive, add an M.2 solid state drive, and add another stick of memory.
Now it should be preinstalled on your unit, but make sure the Steam Controller dongle is installed in the internal USB port.
Considering the form factor, can you really build a comparable PC in the same price range (or even at all)? There are some folks – myself included – for whom the form factor is quite important, so I was willing to dish out some extra cash for the SN970. However, using this hardware as a Steam OS machine limits its capabilities dramatically, so if somebody is willing to buy it, you might as well add additional cost of XBox One controller and Win10 license – with those additions you’ll have a full blown gaming PC in the sexiest of the form factors.
Thanks for the review – I too now own 2 Steam Machines and still have mixed feelings. But I think the potential is there – I’m just wondering if Valve will bring that potential to realization. With that said – I’ve kept SteamOS on both my Steam Machines (one an Alienware, the other a CyberPower Syber). The Zotac looks like a nice upgrade from the Alienware.
My issues with SteamOS isn’t the lack of games, or even the performance of games. I think they perform fine. Not as good as the windows counterparts – but as good or better than the Console version. What is holding it back to me is it doesn’t replace my Xbox One fore media functions (Netflix, Vudu, etc.). I hardly game on the Xbox One anymore – except for Shape Up which is a kinect based exercise program. But I do still run a slew of media related apps. I have a very large collection on Vudu now. Without a Blue-ray/DVD Player coming with most steam machines – and the clunky browser interface, I’m afraid that it’s a huge hole that I’m not sure Valve can fix. They can’t write their own Netflix or Hulu App, and there isn’t critical mass yet for those companies to even consider it.
Hopefully that changes around – cause other than that, I have no issues with my Steam Machines.
I have nothing but issues with Windows as a living room device. There is ALWAYS something getting in the way – whether it’s a notification that won’t go away or a device driver that quits or games getting launched simultaneously (like my kids always seem to do). Windows 10 has made it even worse as Microsoft keeps going more an more towards touchbased GUI’s. It’s clunky at best… At least SteamOS addresses those issues – which is why I’ve decided to stick with it on the Steam Machines and keep windows on my gaming PC’s. Kids are happy with it so far – so no reason to put Windows on it. Xbox 360 Wireless Controller works great with it as well. I know there are a few developers now working on getting the Xbox One Controller to work wirelessly (right now it works only wired).
sure, Win 10 is far from perfect OS, but for a hardcore gamer it’s still far better option than Steam OS, the benefits (bigger selection of Steam games, better performance, access to non-Steam games) outweigh the problems. then again, if one doesn’t require their hardware to be utilized to its fullest potential, Steam OS might be a viable choice – but if that’s the case, this particular machine seems to be an overkill for this purpose.