# Steam Deck announced by Valve



## true_lies (Jul 16, 2021)

Steam Deck is here. Starting $399 for base 64 GB. Shipping December 2021.
Zen2 4C/8T CPU
RDNA 2 GPU
16 GB RAM
7" 1280x800 60 Hz Display


----------



## pkkumarcool (Jul 16, 2021)

true_lies said:


> Steam Deck is here. Starting $399 for base 64 GB. Shipping December 2021.
> Zen2 4C/8T CPU
> RDNA 2 GPU
> 16 GB RAM
> 7" 1280x800 60 Hz Display


64 gb is too low for games and its very costly imo


----------



## omega44-xt (Jul 16, 2021)

pkkumarcool said:


> 64 gb is too low for games and its very costly imo


Price is ok IMO, provided it performs close to AMD R3 4350G APU in games, like even 60-70% of its performance would be great as well. Not to forget, there are a lot of low requirement PC games which will run on it, surely not latest AAA titles.


----------



## pkkumarcool (Jul 16, 2021)

omega44-xt said:


> Price is ok IMO, provided it performs close to AMD R3 4350G APU in games, like even 60-70% of its performance would be great as well. Not to forget, there are a lot of low requirement PC games which will run on it, surely not latest AAA titles.


But dont you think 64gb storage is too low for atleast AAA games Yeah its good if you play indies.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

Its not meant for AAA games to be fair, control, fallen order and doom eternal is just a topping.. 

Yes 64 GB is too low but you can always expand with a micro SD. Get a 512 GB for peace of mind, im actually interested in this. If it has good enough battery life im considering it.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

omega44-xt said:


> Price is ok IMO, provided it performs close to AMD R3 4350G APU in games, like even 60-70% of its performance would be great as well. Not to forget, there are a lot of low requirement PC games which will run on it, surely not latest AAA titles.


R3 4350G has RDNA 1.0 gpu i think, steam deck has RDNA 2.0 ( the same arch as AMD RX 6xxx series).. I dont think even 5xxxG series processors have RDNA 2. Correct me if im wrong, AMD has been very dodgy with this


----------



## thetechfreak (Jul 16, 2021)

No reason to buy something underpowered like Nintendo Switch once this is available. Unless, you want to play their exclusives ofcourse.


----------



## Desmond (Jul 16, 2021)

Most people already have plenty of games on steam and getting this seems like a no brainer. Especially if they are planning on making all Windows games work like they claim.

If you have dark souls or skyrim on Steam, makes no sense to buy it again to play on Switch.

Only doubt I have is how they will manage anti-cheat. This runs SteamOS 3, which is based on Arch Linux. Steam on Linux uses Proton to run Windows games, but Proton does not support anti-cheat yet. Which means that games like PUBG, Apex, Rainbow Six might not run. But let's see if they have some solution by December.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

Desmond David said:


> Most people already have plenty of games on steam and getting this seems like a no brainer. Especially if they are planning on making all Windows games work like they claim.
> 
> If you have dark souls or skyrim on Steam, makes no sense to buy it again to play on Switch.
> 
> Only doubt I have is how they will manage anti-cheat. This runs SteamOS 3, which is based on Arch Linux. Steam on Linux uses Proton to run Windows games, but Proton does not support anti-cheat yet. Which means that games like PUBG, Apex, Rainbow Six might not run. But let's see if they have some solution by December.


I can see battlefield 3 picture in the video, which did have punk buster. But maybe it was just a promotional thing. Regardless I doubt this is a device meant for multiplayer


----------



## Desmond (Jul 16, 2021)

Last I checked Punk Buster runs on Wine, I tried it with Battlefield 4 (on Origin) and it runs without any problems. So I think Battlefield 3 should run too. But I don't know whether Battlefield 3 has the new server browser UI or it's still on the old web based UI.

I have doubts about EAC and BattleEye though.


----------



## RumbaMon19 (Jul 16, 2021)

The page says it can run AAA games as well. Is this due to small screen size?  It seems difficult for r3 to run all that. Also, is the GPU same as the one available with r3 ?


----------



## SaiyanGoku (Jul 16, 2021)

true_lies said:


> Steam Deck is here. Starting $399 for base 64 GB. Shipping December 2021.
> Zen2 4C/8T CPU
> RDNA 2 GPU
> 16 GB RAM
> 7" 1280x800 60 Hz Display


This should be in technology news. This is like Nintendo switch but 100 times better.

@whitestar_999 @Desmond David please move this to a new thread.


----------



## SaiyanGoku (Jul 16, 2021)

Nerevarine said:


> Yes 64 GB is too low but you can always expand with a micro SD.


Except that 64GB variant has eMMC storage unlike nvme for higher ones.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

RumbaMon19 said:


> The page says it can run AAA games as well. Is this due to small screen size?  It seems difficult for r3 to run all that. Also, is the GPU same as the one available with r3 ?


GPU is better than R3 for sure. It is running at 720p, must be targetting 30 fps


----------



## Desmond (Jul 16, 2021)

RumbaMon19 said:


> The page says it can run AAA games as well. Is this due to small screen size?  It seems difficult for r3 to run all that. Also, is the GPU same as the one available with r3 ?


Perhaps there will be graphical concessions but let's see once more objective reviews come up.


SaiyanGoku said:


> This should be in technology news. This is like Nintendo switch but 100 times better.
> 
> @whitestar_999 @Desmond David please move this to a new thread.


Done.


Nerevarine said:


> GPU is better than R3 for sure. It is running at 720p, must be targetting 30 fps


I don't think this is a huge issue when you have the ability to play your entire steam library on the go.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

Yeah i dont mind 720p 30fps for aaa titles, i m sure indies would run at 60. And thats where this will shine.


----------



## true_lies (Jul 16, 2021)

I think this would specially be great for gamers, new and old who've stacked up some old games in their library (like me) but not looking for the hassle to install and play them sitting in front of their PC. They can do that just on the move, and then play the more recent AAA games on their PC. Games few years old would not be taxing on the hardware either and play smoothly.


----------



## Cyberghost (Jul 16, 2021)

No mention about the battery whether it is removable or not


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

It won't be removable which means it's lifetime is a max 3 years. That's the thing about products like these. Also I doubt it will launch in india


----------



## omega44-xt (Jul 16, 2021)

Nerevarine said:


> R3 4350G has RDNA 1.0 gpu i think, steam deck has RDNA 2.0 ( the same arch as AMD RX 6xxx series).. I dont think even 5xxxG series processors have RDNA 2. Correct me if im wrong, AMD has been very dodgy with this


It will have a 5W SoC maybe, so let's see how it performs.


----------



## ico (Jul 16, 2021)

Nerevarine said:


> R3 4350G has RDNA 1.0 gpu


Does it? I think it has some refined Vega version.

I think AMD is yet to release any APU with RDNA architecture.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 16, 2021)

ico said:


> Does it? I think it has some refined Vega version.
> 
> I think AMD is yet to release any APU with RDNA architecture.


You are right its vega 7/8. This should be a massive increase in performance. The performance per wattage should be a good indicator how the GPU performance of the newest exynos would be. Because that too is built with a close collab with AMD featuring RDNA2.


----------



## 007 (Jul 16, 2021)




----------



## Zangetsu (Jul 16, 2021)

Lets see if makes it to the market or not. And this is not the Final Build.


----------



## Deleted member 345628 (Jul 16, 2021)

64 Gigs is too less and if you have to go for something like 512 GB , You might as well get a budget gaming laptop in that range . 
I don't see any reason why someone would buy it in that kinda price range when you can get a laptop(which also happens to be portable) . 
It makes sense to buy a PSP or a nintendo Console (games normally you can't play on windows ) .... But , why would anyone buy it?
IMO this seems like a waste of money . I might as well buy a XBOX Controller and a budget gaming PC with Big Screen .


----------



## Zangetsu (Jul 17, 2021)

Its a personal preference. I would not buy this instead I would stick to Switch or PSP console.
Portability is the major factor for this one.


----------



## Desmond (Jul 17, 2021)

Zangetsu said:


> Lets see if makes it to the market or not. And this is not the Final Build.


Typical Valve.


Pranay Mokida said:


> 64 Gigs is too less and if you have to go for something like 512 GB , You might as well get a budget gaming laptop in that range .
> I don't see any reason why someone would buy it in that kinda price range when you can get a laptop(which also happens to be portable) .
> It makes sense to buy a PSP or a nintendo Console (games normally you can't play on windows ) .... But , why would anyone buy it?
> IMO this seems like a waste of money . I might as well buy a XBOX Controller and a budget gaming PC with Big Screen .


A laptop is portable, but still not as portable as this. Also all models come with a microSD slot, so you can put a 1 TB card if you can and you are good to go.

Though there are a few things that might result in a bad experience, one being that many of the games on PC might not be optimized for such a small display and as such could result in much smaller UI which could be hard to read. But I think this largely depends on the games and the developers willingness to patch them. In either case I am not expecting many games to be suitable for this.

Edit:

2kliksphilip's video on this


----------



## Extreme Gamer (Jul 17, 2021)

pkkumarcool said:


> 64 gb is too low for games and its very costly imo


There are options with bigger storage.

SSD memory is definitely not cheap.


----------



## Desmond (Jul 17, 2021)

Apparently Gabe has confirmed that the SSDs will be replaceable.


----------



## TheSloth (Jul 17, 2021)

I just now read here in comments that the battery will be fixed. Isn't that a deal breaker for many at that price? Wouldn't the battery capacity reduce sooner since this has a powerful hardware and will be required to charge often before gaming on it?


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 17, 2021)

Desmond David said:


> Apparently Gabe has confirmed that the SSDs will be replaceable.


What wtf ?


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 17, 2021)

TheSloth said:


> I just now read here in comments that the battery will be fixed. Isn't that a deal breaker for many at that price? Wouldn't the battery capacity reduce sooner since this has a powerful hardware and will be required to charge often before gaming on it?


That's the one thing, I know it won't be user replacable.. but if after market replace would be possible, it would just extend the longevity so much.


----------



## thetechfreak (Jul 17, 2021)

SSD will be replacable btw. Someone from reddit mailed the Gabe.

*i.redd.it/ot54t097umb71.jpg


----------



## Vyom (Jul 17, 2021)

Portable? It's massive in size. Just LOOK at the big guy holding in IGN's video. Won't fit in your trouser pockets for sure! xD /s






I am more excited by the fact that it's a full blown PC, where theoretically we can wipe SteamOS to install any other OS like windows!
But surely, I am happy for the impact this shiny object could have on the Linux gaming.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 17, 2021)

thetechfreak said:


> SSD will be replacable btw. Someone from reddit mailed the Gabe.
> 
> *i.redd.it/ot54t097umb71.jpg


Kudos to GabeN for actually replying to these sort of things lol


----------



## TheSloth (Jul 17, 2021)

Nerevarine said:


> That's the one thing, I know it won't be user replacable.. but if after market replace would be possible, it would just extend the longevity so much.


Don't you think if they allowed this then it will make their product even more attractive to buyers? Compare to having a non-replaceable battery which will could be a main deterrent to buyers since no one wants to buy a new console every 3-4 years. Why this idea is not even on the deck here?


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 17, 2021)

TheSloth said:


> Don't you think if they allowed this then it will make their product even more attractive to buyers? Compare to having a non-replaceable battery which will could be a main deterrent to buyers since no one wants to buy a new console every 3-4 years. Why this idea is not even on the deck here?


Planned obsoleteness doesnt really apply to Valve because this is a brand new territory and they might not even have a successor to this product, which is why your point makes sense. but I dont know, maybe manufacturing costs is low for embedded battery etc.


----------



## pkkumarcool (Jul 17, 2021)

*uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20210717/79d49683ff38e4b90407bf11ad607fc5.jpg

If dota 2 will run smooth it’s a win win for me

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## Desmond (Jul 17, 2021)

IMO watching a Dota 2 match in the client is much better than watching a stream.

Playing though will be a problem I think since it's basically like playing Dota 2 using a trackpad.


----------



## true_lies (Jul 18, 2021)

Spec Analysis of the Steam Deck by Digital Foundry





Sent from my Nokia 6.1 Plus using Tapatalk


----------



## Desmond (Jul 19, 2021)

I think we will just have to wait and see when actual hands-on reviews come. All videos so far seem to be mostly speculation.


----------



## Extreme Gamer (Jul 20, 2021)

Vyom said:


> Portable? It's massive in size. Just LOOK at the big guy holding in IGN's video. Won't fit in your trouser pockets for sure! xD /s
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...


You may need new drivers if it's Windows that you want to run. IINM it uses custom AMD silicon, and the IO parts (controller stuff mostly) may not be  prepped for Windows. Not to mention power management, where tuned drivers are critical.

Also even though the SSD is replaceable, just how many manufacturers make high capacity units in the M2.2230 size? High density SSD chips are expensive, even if it's QLC.


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 20, 2021)

Highest capacity M2.2230 is 512, so it's better to buy it directly.


----------



## Extreme Gamer (Jul 20, 2021)

Nerevarine said:


> Highest capacity M2.2230 is 512, so it's better to buy it directly.


Buy the SSD directly or the highest capacity model from Valve?


----------



## Nerevarine (Jul 20, 2021)

highest capacity model from valve


----------



## setanjan123 (Aug 4, 2021)

true_lies said:


> I think this would specially be great for gamers, new and old who've stacked up some old games in their library (like me) but not looking for the hassle to install and play them sitting in front of their PC. They can do that just on the move, and then play the more recent AAA games on their PC. Games few years old would not be taxing on the hardware either and play smoothly.


Yep the exact issue I have. I have a bunch of indies that I never play. This thing will be pretty costly here in India most likely. I've been thinking about just streaming to my iPad from my PC. A lot of those games get ported to iOS/Android but are priced very high compared to Steam. Switch ports prices are another thing altogether.


----------



## true_lies (Aug 7, 2021)




----------



## Desmond (Aug 14, 2021)

Official Valve Steam Deck ad


----------



## true_lies (Sep 25, 2021)

Easy Anti-Cheat now supports the Steam Deck
BattleEye Anti-cheat confirms Steam Deck support


----------



## true_lies (Sep 25, 2021)

Also in the new FAQs for Steam deck



> What can you tell us about the BIOS and does it allow dual-boot?​Multi-boot is supported - you can have multiple OSes installed and choose which one to boot into. Users will have access to the BIOS menu.
> 
> Can you boot an OS off the SD card?​Yes, Steam Deck supports boot from microSD.


----------



## Desmond (Sep 25, 2021)

true_lies said:


> Easy Anti-Cheat now supports the Steam Deck
> BattleEye Anti-cheat confirms Steam Deck support


This is a big step forward for gaming on Linux (even on desktop). Though I personally prefer if it was not an opt-in option and be available universally.


true_lies said:


> Also in the new FAQs for Steam deck


This was confirmed long time ago. Though IMO running Windows on it would be a very bad idea because of the bloat that Windows has.


----------



## RumbaMon19 (Sep 25, 2021)

Desmond said:


> This was confirmed long time ago. Though IMO running Windows on it would be a very bad idea because of the bloat that Windows has



Yup, considering the hardware, they have certainly optimised steam os for that , windows with bloat like windows defender, updates and telemetry will slow it down.


----------



## Æsoteric Positron (Sep 26, 2021)

RumbaMon19 said:


> Yup, considering the hardware, they have certainly optimised steam os for that , windows with bloat like windows defender, updates and telemetry will slow it down.


I would like to interject for a moment,
What you are referring to as Windows, is in fact, Windows/bloat, or as I've recently taken to calling it Windows + bloat. Windows is not an product unto itself, but rather another paid component of a fully functioning M$ system made annoying by the bloat, ads and spyware comprising a full system as defined by Microsoft executives.


----------



## pkkumarcool (Oct 7, 2021)




----------



## Desmond (Oct 8, 2021)

pkkumarcool said:


>


Linus's reaction to this is awesome:


----------



## Nerevarine (Oct 8, 2021)

Yeah but constantly pausing to explain an obvious thing is too pedantic, I stopped watching and watched the original video. lol


----------



## true_lies (Oct 8, 2021)

Two points that really stood out for me and I'm sure for many:
1. Its your PC, you have every right to open it up and do what you want.
2. Source for replacement parts, SSDs, Thumbsticks and more in the future.

Taking shots at others and advocating for Right to Repair in a way.

Sent from my Nokia 6.1 Plus using Tapatalk


----------



## Æsoteric Positron (Oct 9, 2021)

Nerevarine said:


> Yeah but constantly pausing to explain an obvious thing is too pedantic, I stopped watching and watched the original video. lol


Same lol


----------



## Desmond (Oct 19, 2021)




----------



## Desmond (Feb 8, 2022)




----------



## true_lies (Feb 8, 2022)

I wouldn't call it "Valve has knocked it out of the park" just yet till full in depth review, but so far it's looking great. The cons he states seem subjective and would be based on personal use and taste.

Sent from my Nokia 6.1 Plus using Tapatalk


----------



## Desmond (Feb 15, 2022)

You can check what percent of your Steam library is compatible with the Steam Deck at this website - CheckMyDeck


----------



## Desmond (Feb 16, 2022)




----------

