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The biggest benefit as I see it, is that the users won't have the hassle of setting something up: just install the OS and login. No drivers ppa, no recovery console, no xorg.conf patches. If this is true, Valve will do something very big for the gaming community.

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I don't believe that they'll even focus on users installing the OS, just like 99% of Windows users don't install their own OS. Valve will provide the reference SteamBox and encourage other manufacturers to release their own SteamOS-preinstalled boxes, giving users hardware options.

This is the end goal - but for the time being, it does seem aimed at tinkerers - the kind of people who already have a PC hooked up as an HTPC...

Keep in mind that this is the first of three announcements that they've, err, announced: http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/

The second is in 48hrs, and almost definitely something related to the SteamBox. So it's too soon to speak of their intentions "for the time being".

I think it's going to be more like what Google did with Android.

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