Little Black Boxes

There are more video games than ever. There are more ways to play video games than ever. Why not be a good little consumer and buying a little more, as a treat? You deserve it, don't you? Don't we all?

At what point do you stop, stock of what you're accumulating, and try to figure out a better path forward? This problem is only greater if you're also into movies and music, which each have their own considerations for maximizing your time with them. (Of course, "maximizing your time with them" does not mean "better"!)

With Steam Machines delayed but Microsoft having announced their new console, dubbed Project Helix, it got Patrick looking at his entertainment center, turning to Rob, and wondering if there's a better path forward than more little black boxes. The answer?

Well...

Patrick: The moment RAM prices started skyrocketing because of AI bullshit, I have to selfishly admit one of the first reactions I had was “I hope it doesn't impact Valve’s plans for Steam Machines.” Naturally, weeks later, Valve announced it was pushing all of its new hardware outside of early 2026. Now, we’re in the “sometime in 2026” window, which feels like it wouldn’t take more than a nudge to press us back into “early 2027” and lord knows when from there.

I’ve always owned every console for obvious reasons: I want (the chance) to play every video game that comes out. Yeah, sure, it’s also part of my job and at times shaves pennies off my taxes, but games are my primary hobby and passion that does not involve the Chicago Bears, so buckets of my work and disposable income are going to be funneled into expanding it, too.

Enter “Project Helix,” the destination that’s been obvious for the Xbox platform for a minute now, a world where the line between “PC” and “console” is not blurred, it’s removed entirely. Microsoft has already said their next console will be expensive as fuck, which, on one hand, sounds like the company further conceding defeat when it comes to being a major console player and conceding to my own gaming PC. 

On the other, if we’re headed towards a world of little black boxes that are miniature PCs slightly subsidized by the companies producing them, does the existence of a Project Helix actually mean I’m suddenly not that interested in a Steam Machine? 

What I mean to say is that my primary interest with video game min maxing is making it more convenient to play video games. I don’t want to switch rooms. I don’t want to switch displays. I don’t even want to switch seating positions. Just let me play the video games I’m playing or want to play, you know? Now, you might say, “Patrick, just buy a tiny PC and shove that in your entertainment center,” but I’ve looked at those prices and already said no thanks. What the Steam Machine and Project Helix seem to promise are cheaper versions of “effective budget gaming PC” and “effective budget high-end gaming PC,” and the latter sounds really promising.

Right now, my entertainment center is home to:

• Sound bar (that's on top, I guess)
• Switch 2 dock (mine)
• Switch 1 dock (my nine-year-old’s)
• Steam Deck dock (mine)
• Apple TV (family)
• 4K/Blu-ray player (mine, but broadly unused except as a conversation piece and justification for me continuing to buy discs that are slowly stacking in the corner)
• PlayStation 5 (mine)

If I could wave a magic wand, all those games are coming out of the same little black box. But my pursuit of “anything at any time” has resulted in more and more little black boxes in there.

The 4K player will, at some point, make its way downstairs as part of a refresh for that area. The PS5 can never leave because the dream of day one PlayStation exclusives on PC is never happening. If my nine-year-old’s Fortnite habit holds, she might get a monitor in her room.

Am I really gonna put a Steam Machine and a Project Helix thing down there? Pretty unlikely!

Honestly, the problem is that I can see all the boxes. I need an entertainment center where they’re hidden. Then, I can keep getting more little black boxes and no one has to know it.

What’s in your entertainment center, Rob, and what little black boxes do you want to get rid of?

Rob: So it’s interesting timing you bringing this up because we are getting a new electronics console this weekend. We’d had our eye on BDI storage units for a while, because a lot of AV and home theater outlets we follow rate them really highly for managing the chaos and ventilation needs of a fully equipped entertainment center. There was a ton of stuff that we weren’t comfortable putting in our current console because effectively it’s made of a series of wood cubbies, and once you’ve lost one piece of gear to overheating, you’ll go to serious effort to stop it happening again. Their stuff is expensive but, look, sometimes a well-regarded furniture chain nearby goes out of business and you can start snagging things absurdly cheap at auction.

And God do we need to be able to put this stuff out of sight because here are the boxes currently arrayed on my console below my TV.

• Anthem MRX 740 receiver
• NAD 2200 Stereo Amplifier
• Falcon Northwest RAK PC
• PlayStation 5
• Xbox Series X
• Panasonic DP-UB820 4K Player
• Synology NAS
• Philips Hue Syncbox 8k
• AppleTV 4K
• Aerial Acoustics CC3 center speaker (it BIG)
• Schiit Audio SYS RCA switcher
• Dynasty Audio WSA-5RP transmitter (for rear channels)
• Bluesound Node Icon Music Streamer

If you could promise that all the games could run perfectly on one machine, then I’d probably get rid of the consoles and just have the PC. But I’m less sanguine about the frictionless experience you describe being a possibility for me, because no matter what happens with gaming hardware, my gaming habits also involve a keyboard and mouse, game controllers, a racing wheel and pedals, and occasionally a HOTAS flight controller setup. And let me tell you, wireless transmitters to PCs are so dodgy that even with little USB extenders for the USB-A receivers, I frequently find I just need to run a huge cable across the room to make sure I don’t get little drops from the mouse or keyboard signal.