Steam Link for Away From Home Gaming?

[Blueobelisk]

Alright here's the deal, guys. I'll be away from my house for 2 weeks, visiting grandparents in Florida. I don't want to bring my desktop, and I don't have any high quality laptops, but it would be nice to be able to play games when I'm there, because their house is going to be fucking empty and boring.

Hardware I currently have: a couple of tablets, smartphones, my desktop in NYC, and three expendable old laptops. (And TVs at grandparent's house.)

At grandparents: I can bring my phone and tablets (and maybe a laptop) to Florida with me. And I guess a Steam Link.

At home: Desktop (with steam/games, and teamviewer to control it), a laptop acting as a VPN so that the Steam Link can be "on the same network" as my desktop.

And then, in Florida, I hook the Steam Link up to a TV (and I guess I buy a Steam Controller), the Steam Link goes through a VPN somehow to be "on my home network" in NY, and then I use the Steam Link to play Steam games at my grandparents house in FL via my desktop in NY.

Does that convoluted scheme make sense to anyone else? Not sure how the Steam Link connects to the VPN...and I guess this assumes the internet speed is going to be good...But could this work? Does anyone know of a better solution?

[mBaRrE]

Take a Look At shadow.tech/usen/ - Maybe this Could be Solution for You? You wouldnt have tot Deal Wirth the VPN Stuff. (Cant post a Link because im a newbie:P ).

[Puri]

You don't need a special steam link device, just using a laptop with steam connected to the VPN at home is more than enough and easier to configure.
If this will work depends very much on your internet connection at home and at your grandparents. You will need stable 5MB/s downstream at your grandparents and upstream at home for full HD gaming, but the client will adapt to the available speed (but make it look very ugly if it's too low).

[Blueobelisk]

You don't need a special steam link device, just using a laptop with steam connected to the VPN at home is more than enough and easier to configure.

The thing about my laptops are that they have bad graphics cards, which means they can't render a game's graphics well even if the games were direct installs. I'm assuming that Steam Link does some magic or has a graphics card good enough to not need to worry about that.

If this will work depends very much on your internet connection at home and at your grandparents. You will need stable 5MB/s downstream at your grandparents and upstream at home for full HD gaming, but the client will adapt to the available speed (but make it look very ugly if it's too low).

Ya I have like 75/75+ at home. Grandparents don't have that great of an internet speed but...I can call the ISP and pay more that month, I guess...

[Erous]

Probably best to try and get in a beta ASAP for like GeForce NOW. Geforce NOW is Nvidia's cloud gaming platform, which allows you to play all of your steam games virtually. Im in it, it works great, but I'm not inundated with steam games to give it the 'ole college try.

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce...ce-now/mac-pc/

[Blueobelisk]

Probably best to try and get in a beta ASAP for like GeForce NOW. Geforce NOW is Nvidia's cloud gaming platform, which allows you to play all of your steam games virtually. Im in it, it works great, but I'm not inundated with steam games to give it the 'ole college try.

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce...ce-now/mac-pc/

Hmmmmmmm well that's interesting.

I'm creating a VPN server today to test if this is going to work with the Steam Link App for Android phones. Will post results if I can get it set up.

[Blueobelisk]

Well. I set up the VPN server and tested it out using mobile data. It works. I could stream Steam games to the app even while not on the network. (I made a quick video if anyone wants to see...PM me though, it's Unlisted for now.)

I need to buy a Steam Controller during the sale tomorrow, so I can actually give some input though. I also need to test latency by going to some public place with good wifi. I might hit the library up over the weekend...

[Kagthul]

The thing about my laptops are that they have bad graphics cards, which means they can't render a game's graphics well even if the games were direct installs. I'm assuming that Steam Link does some magic or has a graphics card good enough to not need to worry about that.

Nope. In-Home Streaming does the same exact thing that a Steam Link does. The GPU in the target machine pretty much doesn't matter as long as it meets the requirements.

I need to buy a Steam Controller during the sale tomorrow, so I can actually give some input though. I also need to test latency by going to some public place with good wifi. I might hit the library up over the weekend...

Are we talking to use with the App or with an actual Steamlink?

'cause dear god, do not get the Steam Controller to use with a Steamlink. An Xbox 360, PS3, PS4, or Xbone controller all work out of the box.

[Blueobelisk]

Nope. In-Home Streaming does the same exact thing that a Steam Link does. The GPU in the target machine pretty much doesn't matter as long as it meets the requirements.

Oh. Interesting...I'll want to test that out some time.

Are we talking to use with the App or with an actual Steamlink?

'cause dear god, do not get the Steam Controller to use with a Steamlink. An Xbox 360, PS3, PS4, or Xbone controller all work out of the box.

Steam Link App on Android Phone. I would use my PS4 controller but it's incompatible with my phone (Samsung Galaxy S7). I could also use a bluetooth keyboard and mouse, but a controller seems the neatest to carry around. Are Steam Controllers bad lol?

[Kagthul]

Are Steam Controllers bad lol?

Have you even looked at the thing?

Does your phone not use Bluetooth? Thats how the Dual-Shock 4 connects. Or is it some Samsung TouchWhiz stupidity?

[Blueobelisk]

I sort of saw a picture of it, but it's the officially supported controller by Steam. I just hope it's compatible with my phone...

And yeah I tried bluetooth but it just doesn't work. It pairs but then it doesn't actually function as a controller for the phone in any app.

[the boar]

set up in-home streaming, set up your vpn. connect to vpn from your laptop, launch steam. steam thinks laptop is in-home, steam streams games to laptop.

as someone said, you don't need the link app thing, and i don't even know what is going on trying to link a dualshock4 or steam controller to a mobile phone, i'm sure it can be done but put your phone away and plug it into your laptop and play on your laptop.

if your laptop can watch a twitch stream, it can do the steam in-home streaming.

idk what internet your grandparents have, or what mobile data you have (unlimited super speed hopefully!) but as long as you set the quality to a reasonable number (again think like a twitch stream bitrate because you are literally playing via stream) and it should be fine.

[Blueobelisk]

I uhhh. I did my experiments, and made a thread here explaining it. It works with the Steam Link App, which is good enough. I don't think the Steam Link can inherently connect to a VPN, which sucks.

Using the Steam Link away from home with a TV is probably superior to playing on a phone...

[henry paul]

Well. I set up the VPN server and tested it out using mobile data. It works. I could stream Steam games to the app even while not on the network. (I made a quick video if anyone wants to see...PM me though, it's Unlisted for now.)

Infracted for spam - Cilraaz