I'll keep this short. I bought this when it was on super sale ($15). I actually got two of them. I couldn't believe how well it actually works. I was able to play Borderlands 2 with no noticeable latency. It pairs well with the Steam Controllers but remember to go to the controller settings and enable XBOX, PS, Gamepad, etc. support. It's not obvious that you have to do this, but until you do you'll have all kinds of wonky behavior... But that's for my steam controller review...

The latency on this thing is awesome. It did a speed test on itself and determined in my case that the latency was around like 2ms or something. You won't notice... Controller input seems equally low latency. Being able to play games from my bed, or in the living room, instead of sitting at a computer is really cool. I hope to use it when entertaining guests.

If you see this go down to $15 bucks again and you like to play games on Steam at all, get it. As a person who used to work in manufacturing, that price is probably component cost, WITHOUT overhead. I can't even understand how they sold it at such a low price. They must have lost money on it.

Oh, and yes you can use a mouse and keyboard with it if you prefer. I haven't tried it, but it's possible. I use steam controllers for mine.

I have actually had a Steam Link and Controller since they first hit the market at $50 each. At $15 shipped, it was an easy decision to get a second Link for the pure convenience of being able to access my Steam games from 3 different rooms without taking anything with me but the controller. Yes, with a Steam Controller you don't even need to use the dongle if you pair it correctly with two separate Links. You can basically just stash the Link somewhere out of the way behind your TV and if your 5G WiFi band is fast and reliable enough, you will be able to play 60fps at 1080p with no problems. Valve will tell you that only using the wired NIC will pretty much guarantee that there are no dropped frames between your desktop PC and the Link, though. It is simply much more convenient to connect it via WiFi and not run network cables all over the place. Depending how far apart your different rooms are from your router, going the wired route may be a viable option, for me it really was not. I would not recommend using this device for something like playing a multiplayer FPS/MMO/MOBA, but it is great for single player platformers and puzzle games where sometimes you'd rather just be in a more relaxed position like in bed or the recliner. One other thing that goes underappreciated about the Link is that you can just use it as a remote desktop client for your main PC to access any browser-based content as well (think Netflix or Prime Video). Your mileage may vary on how smoothly the video plays back. Select models of Samsung smart TVs have already started to offer the software that is provided on the Link in a beta Samsung App format this summer; if that's applicable to you, look into it before you purchase this as well.

I bought this so I can occasionally play Steam PC games on my TV.

"” CONNECTING "”
Connecting things together is relatively easy. Plug it in for power, and attach the HDMI cable from the Steam Link to your TV. However, once it powers on, there are two things you need to control the Steam Link: a compatible Steam controller, or a keyboard/mouse. I had to find a spare mouse just for this machine. I have an Xbox One wireless controller, but, I couldn't use it to navigate the interface until *after* I connected a mouse/or keyboard and told it to start streaming from my computer. This is why I have reduced it one star, because I can't control the box immediately.

However, you can wake up and control the Link if you use a Steam controller or a Steam wireless receiver (with a compatible controller). Because of course they want you to use their ecosystem; it's just good business.

UPDATE: After some further research, there is an app you can buy, "VirtualHere For Steam Link," for twelve dollars, which allows you to use your Xbox One Wireless Controller (PS3 controllers, bluetooth adapters, etc) directly on your Steam Link. Honestly, I don't know why this isn't built in; it's one more add-on to buy.

"” STREAMING "”
You can choose three options for streaming quality: quick, balanced, or beautiful. Quick will ensure you get a clear image without stutter. Beautiful will give you a high-quality image, but if your connection isn't fast enough it may stutter. Balanced tries to give you a pretty picture without stutter. I chose balanced since I was on a wireless connection. The picture quality is perfectly fine.

"” SUMMARY "”
I happened to get a great deal for this so it was worth it. Given some of the bumps in using it, I am debating whether I should just run a long HDMI cable from my computer to the TV, but in the meantime this Steam Link is my wireless streaming solution for PC gaming. Recommended.

The steam link lets you play games on your living room pc. This comes with everything you need to get started: HDMI cable, flat Ethernet cable, and a US power adapter with international adapters. You only need to add input devices/controllers.

Officially supported controllers are
the Steam controller
Xbox 360 wired
Xbox 360 wireless with adapter
Xbox One wired
Logitech F710
Keyboard/mouse

If you have a wireless keyboard/mouse, you will probably need to connect a wireless adapter for your wireless KB/M gear. You can also connect Bluetooth devices like the PS3/PS4 and Xbox One wireless controllers, although they aren't "officially" supported. You can also attach flight sticks and stuff with VirtualHere from the Steam store.

Your gaming PC needs to be running Steam in order for this to work. The Steam Link can send a Wake On LAN request to your sleeping PC, but if there is a lock screen, you will need to go an unlock it. The Steam Link can also remotely suspend your PC when you're done gaming.

Setup is pretty painless. If you are gaming on your PC, you should have no problems setting this up. It took about five minutes to connect this thing to my network and tv (Ethernet, HDMI, and power), and then it automatically updated its software. Once that was done, I just needed to connect my Xbox 360 wireless adapter, select my PC running steam, enter a code on the PC, and I was ready to go. I was also able to connect a Bluetooth mouse by digging a few levels into the setup menu. This thing is really tiny and unobtrusive so should be easy to fit into your media center.

For the most part, there was no noticeable lag or delay. There was an occasional hiccup in frame rates, but nothing terrible. You probably don't want to play competitive FPS's on this thing since its networked nature introduces some lag, dependent upon your home's network latency. I have not tried this with wireless; unfortunately I have not heard good things about its wireless performance.

When the Link went on sale, it was all I could do not to buy it. Apparently, that wasn't enough. Now I am the proud owner of a Steam Link, because let's be real - if I can get this to stream my desktop, I'll have absolutely no reason to purchase any other type of streaming device.

Here's what I found inside the package:
Steam Link
Power adapter - maybe 2 meters?
HDMI cable - maybe 2 meters?
Ethernet cable - I used my own, so I can't say how long it is
Three different power adapters, which is pretty sweet since I can use these when I travel (not the Link though, that's silly)

Setting it up was obnoxiously easy. I wired it into the same network that my desktop is on. On connecting it to the TV and booting it up, it updated itself quickly and insisted I connect a controller. After connecting my PS4 controller, it immediately found my desktop and connected to it, pulling up Big Picture Mode. I tweaked some settings (unlimited bandwidth, beautiful quality, Nvidia NVENC recording) and was good to go. Fortunately, with a wired connection, the latency was very low. I had an average network latency of 2-4 ms, and with a controller, the latency was noticeable, but not particularly significant. I would honestly argue that the majority of the latency actually came from the TV, rather than the Link and the network connection.

In terms of gaming, the Link was successful. The latency was high enough that I wouldn't play a twitch shooter or a technical fighter, but again I believe this is more the result of the TV than the system. Picture quality was very high with the wired connection: before increasing bandwidth, the images looked slightly compressed, but with unlimited bandwidth and "beautiful" settings, it looked almost as if I had connected the desktop directly to the screen. Unfortunately, there was some slight compression which was noticeable, but overall if you want to play on the TV from your desktop, and can't be bothered to purchase a massive HDMI cable, the Link does a fantastic job.