Relatable

The Steam Machine will not be $700 I'm certain. I'm betting around the $300-400 mark. I think most are assuming around $400 based on the fairly weak hardware (8GB of VRAM i+is of particular note), but they make money from sales on the market. I wouldn't be surprised if they sell it as a loss, because anyone they move off of console to PC is an even larger profit in the long term than any profit they could make from hardware sales.

Consoles used to be sold at a loss when they were competing more on hardware rather than peer pressure and brand loyalty. Now they're sold at a profit and they require a subscription to use the internet you're already paying for, and they get a cut of sales. Valve would be stupid not to try to undercut them.