Here’s Zotac’s SN970, part of the first batch of Steam Machines

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Yesterday Valve announced that the first series of third-party Steam Machine PCs would arrive this November. And here’s one of them: the Zotac SN970.

Hong Kong-based Zotac is one of over a dozen manufacturers building living room-friendly gaming computers that will run on Valve’s SteamOS platform. In order to better slot under your telly, the SN970 is compact and thin (the company has released specific measurements, but it looks a lot smaller than any current-gen games console to us).

Little wonder

But don’t let its dinky dimensions fool you, because this is an incredibly powerful machine. With an Intel Maxwell 6th generation processor, 8GB of RAM and a 3GB Nvidia GeForce 6TX 970M graphics, it’s capable of handling any game you can throw at it. Zotac CEO Tony Wong claims that users “can keep the graphics sliders on ultra and enjoy smooth 4K gaming”.

There are no fewer than four HDMI outputs, too, so the box can power four screens simultaneously. Storage comes courtesy of a dual setup: a fast 64GB SSD paired with a cavernous 1TB 2.5in hard drive. For networking, there’s a choice between Ethernet and speedy 802.11ac Wi-Fi.

Zotac has yet to reveal the price or specific release date for the Steam Machine SN970, but given that it’s a good few months off launch we’ll probably hear more before then.

Now read this › Valve announces SteamVR hardware system, will be shown next week at GDC

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Tech journalism's answer to The Littlest Hobo, I've written for a host of titles and lived in three different countries in my 15 years-plus as a freelancer. But I've always come back home to Stuff eventually, where I specialise in writing about cameras, streaming services and being tragically addicted to Destiny.