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EmuDeck team announce Linux-powered EmuDeck Machines

Dirk Benedict

Gold Member
The team behind EmuDeck, a project that started off to provide easy emulation on Steam Deck / SteamOS have announced their own hardware with the Bazzite Linux powered EmuDeck Machines. They're basically Steam Machines tailored more towards retro enthusiasts.

With a case that's very obviously inspired by the SEGA Dreamcast, the idea is to provide a great out of the box experience for modern emulation. Not just that though, since it's powered by Linux (specifically Bazzite), they have a platform for running other more modern games too. And a lot, thanks to Valve's Proton.

20284749081724945544gol1.jpg


As you can see on the front there's four USB ports, plus a power and reset switch. There's one USB-C port on the back and it also has 2.5Gbps Ethernet too. Naturally EmuDeck comes pre-installed, so you'll get really easy access to emulation.

Shipping in two different versions with a low-powered and a much more capable unit.

EM1:

  • Intel N97
  • 8GB RAM
  • 512GB SSD
EM2:

  • Ryzen 8600G Overclocked
  • 16GB RAM
  • 512GB SSD
You can also get them bundled with the Nova Lite Controller.

12819733091724946361gol1.jpg


Pricing starts around £277 for the EM1 and £512 for the EM2, although these are "Early Bird" prices so they will be higher at about £302 for the EM1 and £588 for the EM2 normally.

They're currently crowdfunding the effort on IndieGoGo. It's using a Flexible Goal, so they'll receive whatever funds are pledged rather than needing to hit a specific goal. This means they can produce as many as people pledge for.

On top of that, they're also planning a Docking Station, which you can use to bump up the power that will house an AMD Radeon 7600 Desktop card. They say the Dock will begin development once the campaign is finished.

Going by their timeline they provided the manufacturing would begin November with shipping planned for December 2024. While rather exciting and really fun to see more proper Linux-based hardware, it's worth noting this is still in the concept stage, and they have yet to prove themselves on hardware so it's on the pretty risky side.

Check it out on their new IndieGoGo page.



US prices:
Intel: $498, currently marked down to $443
AMD: $775, currently marked down to $676
Curious how much the "docking station" will be and how it connects.
Linux is the future!
Thanks for the thread, Topher Topher
 

StereoVsn

Gold Member
these prices are way too much. a retail price of 8600G is 180$ ( I am sure they can get it for much lower too ). include a none high end expensive board / ram / psu and smaller fan cooler, you are still way below 450$. asking 670$ or whatever price not including the OEM prices they get. they are basically making 300 to 350$ profit on each system ( depending on how much marketing or platform they sell on take money out of them like amazon etc.

TLDR: build your own its much much cheaper.

I do like the dreamcast retro look of it though.
They aren’t getting IEM prices in anything as they don’t have the volume.

You are not counting custom case design, manufacturing, salaries, and more. Basically they won’t make jack shit on these units even with high prices.

Pick up a used Z1 Extreme Ally X, install Bazzite and you’re good to go. Or dock a Steamdeck and hook up to your TV.

The value just isn’t there
Ir pick up used vanilla Ally, it will be like $400. Just don’t use the SD card.
 

DrakeMandirez

Neo Member
This is pretty neat, but for that price point I'd probably just get one of the FPGA based units like MiSTer DIY kits or a pre-configured. Hardware based emulation seems way cooler.

 
Last edited:

Mattyp

Gold Member
in 90% of cases... no.

there are really good emulators now, some that can even reduce input latency compared to original hardware. the only systems that are still better on og hardware are N64, some PS2 gamss, and hard to emulate stuff like PS3 and later systems.

Everything 8 bit and 16 bit can be emulated with near perfect accuracy. and can be enhanced with romhacks like the SA1 hacks of SNES games that allow Contra 3 or Super Gradius (among others) to run without slowdown but still with perfect emulation.
Yeah, nah. Native -> Emulation every day of the week. I don’t care if a game runs a bit smoother compared to the original controller & CRT.

Cancelled, but the improvements in tech at low cost we’ll see someone like Retroid do something like this soon enough I figure.
 

kevboard

Member
Yeah, nah. Native -> Emulation every day of the week. I don’t care if a game runs a bit smoother compared to the original controller & CRT.

that is a subjective thing that everyone will see differently. I was purely arguing from an objective perspective. and objectively speaking, emulation of basically anything from Gen1 to Gen5 is near perfect, except for N64, but it is getting there too.
 

HogIsland

Member
Cancelled

We've reached the Smach-Z milestone on the road to a Steam/Linux console. Respect to Emudeck for acting ethically rather than defrauding a bunch of crowdfunders:

 
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