Featured Image Credit: Valve
The console community has been dashing to its panic stations, with worrying reports that Valve's newly released Steam Machine has been hit by a so-called 'Red Line of Death'. Having your $1,000 console bricked into being little more than a very expensive paperweight would be bad enough, but occurring just days after Valve put the Steam Machine on general sale, it's not a good look for the company.
The gaming industry is no stranger to potentially device-breaking glitches, with Nintendo being hit by a $46 million fine over Joy-Con drift, Sony facing the Yellow Light of Death on the PS3, and the Xbox One's Black Screen of Death.
Of course, the most infamous is the Xbox 360's Red Ring of Death that tarnished Microsoft’s legacy in the mid-noughties. The Steam Machine has us worried about the price of PlayStation 6 and Xbox's Project Helix, but more than this, the idea that it could already be facing its own Red Line of Death is a depressing reminder that some things never change in terms of console woes.
Over on Reddit, user u/me_hill was one of the first to get their hands on a Steam Machine and was pretty smug with their win. That was short-lived after they installed the latest firmware update, and their console was quickly struck down by a red line on the light bar. Whispers about the Red Line of Death soon started to spread, with the OP explaining: "Got five minutes of No Man's Sky in, then I installed the update the machine had available and it bricked itself."
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For those who are disappointed that they didn't get a Steam Machine pre-order, they added: "If you're still in the queue, look on the bright side: they're presumably going to iron this crap out."
As angry gamers prepared to demand refunds or throw their bricked Steam Machines out of the window, me_hill delivered an "anticlimactic and somewhat embarrassing update."
Following the advice of others, they unplugged their Steam Machine for half an hour and were vexed to find it was still afflicted by the Red Line of Death.
They then tried for a couple of hours with no luck, but after leaving it unplugged overnight and trying some BIOS 'stuff', it booted up without issue.
Left red-faced over a red line, they concluded: "I feel stupid about even posting this now, especially since it blew up a bit, but I was tired and irritable after a long day of work, and an ominous GPU error code wasn't exactly the seamless plug-and-play experience I had hoped for."
Saying that others who get the same error need not panic, they thanked everyone for their advice and told other potential victims to let their console sit unplugged for a few hours.
We've got to admit that the whole "have you tried turning it off and on?" line is a pretty hilarious resolution to what could've been a much bigger issue.
Others speculated that entering the Steam Machine's BIOS might have forced it into a full reset and rid itself of whatever was causing the Red Line of Death.
The Red Line of Death could've been a big deal, but apparently, Valve is already on it. Valve's support page suggests this is linked to a GPU error, also listing a continuous red light across the entire LED strip and an indication that the CPU is overheating, a pulsating red light in the right quarter of the LED strip pointing to no RAM being detected, a pulsating red light in the second quarter suggesting an SSD error, and a pulsating red light in the left quarter being a sign of a failed memory test.
Replying to u/me_hill, Valve Support gave its professional diagnosis, where it listed its own steps to tackle the Red Line of Death.
By all accounts, it's a relatively simple case of clearing the console's CMOS (Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor) setting.
Even though the Steam Machine could be hit by similar issues during upcoming updates, at least we know there are steps to hopefully eliminate the Red Line of Death before we have another Xbox 360 situation on our hands.
