Before the age of connectivity, gamers needed to place consoles near a TV in order to play video games. With Steam Link, however, players can move to different rooms if they need to relocate for whatever reason.
Steam Link is a small, plug-and-play device that wirelessly connects your PC to any TV you have in your home.
To run Steam Link, all you need is a computer (Windows, Mac OS, or Ubuntu) where Steam is installed, a Wi-Fi connection, wired or wireless keyboard and a mouse, and a TV.
Steam Link works like this: data is transmitted from your PC to the Steam Link via Wi-Fi, allowing you to stream from your gaming PC to your TV. Audio data is also sent simultaneously from your computer to the Steam Link, while your controller input is sent back in real time. The delay in controller response is so little that you won’t be able to notice the difference between playing a game using a PC and via Steam Link.
There are three stream qualities available on the Steam Link: fast, balanced, and beautiful. Fast renders the least fps on your PC, balanced optimizes the game resolution based on your PC’s current setup, and beautiful maximizes everything your PC has in order to showcase the best graphics on your TV. If you want the best gaming performance, choose beautiful to play the games as the developers intended it to be played. If you get “ghosting” on your screen when playing using the beautiful stream quality, it might be best to choose balanced. Beautiful requires a top of the line graphics card and processor, as well as a fast internet connection for Steam Link to properly render images.
Modern games have a way to benchmark your PC. For example, Resident Evil 5 has a benchmarking option that users can choose to allow the game to properly optimize a computer’s specs. Make sure to perform a benchmark test first before playing any game in order to have the best experience possible.
What’s great about the Steam Link is that it can stream anything that your PC can run. Even games that don’t currently work on consoles such as traditional casino games can be effectively streamed on the Steam Link.
If you want to stream pay-to-play games via the Steam Link, all you have to do is open the game via Steam’s browser. For example, if you want to play a traditional table game on the Slingo casino gaming channel, just open it using Steam’s UI. The game will then launch on your PC, and it will send back its audio and video to your TV. Your input will be sent back to the server so you can stream seamlessly. This feature is extremely useful because such games haven’t been accessible before on consoles, which makes Steam Link very unique in its approach. For gaming operators such as Slingo, this also opens up new avenues to bring in more players via the revolutionary Steam Link.
Find out more about the Steam Link by checking out the product’s official page.
