The Valve Steam Deck handheld gaming PC is about to start transport later this month, and forward of that official launch, the primary real-world opinions are beginning to arrive. And for essentially the most half, they’re good. Excellent.
YouTuber’s The Phawx, Gamers Nexus, and Linus Tech Tips have been spending time with the Steam Deck, they usually’re beginning to share efficiency notes, impressions of the {hardware}, and another key particulars — though there are some things that they’re not speaking about but, as a result of Valve continues to be tweaking the software program.
For that motive, the video opinions don’t dig into the Steam Deck’s working system, which is a customized Linux distribution referred to as Steam OS. And Valve requested reviewers to solely take a look at 5 sure video games that are identified to run properly (together with some video games which are Home windows video games operating on Linux due to Valve’s Proton software program).
Inside these confines although, reviewers have been in a position to take a look at issues like real-world battery life (which appears to vary from 90 minutes to six hours, relying on the sport and graphics settings), sport play, thermal efficiency, and {hardware}.
In contrast with different latest handhelds just like the ONEXPLAYER Mini (with an Intel Core i7-1195G7), GPD Win 3 (Intel Core i7-1165G7) and AYA Neo Subsequent (AMD Ryzen 7 5825U processor), the Steam Deck seems to ship on its promise of upper body charges due to the higher-performance RDNA 2 GPU. It additionally will get longer battery life.
The show and controllers are mentioned to be excellent, however the Steam Deck is a pretty big system which may make it somewhat uncomfortable to succeed in some buttons. Haptic suggestions, however, is claimed to be underwhelming in the mean time (though Valve says that could possibly be improved with software program updates).
One of many issues I’m most inspired to see is that Valve’s promise that video games would load practically as rapidly from a microSD card as they do from built-in storage, appears to be true (at the very least for the titles reviewers have been aloud to check), which could possibly be excellent news for people who determined to go for the entry-level $399 Steam Deck, which has simply 64GB of eMMC storage (increased priced fashions have 256GB or 512GB PCIe NVMe SSDs).
Later this month we are able to in all probability count on to see extra Steam Deck opinions after one other embargo lifts and testers are allowed to speak concerning the software program, take a look at further video games, and possibly even set up Home windows or different software program.
| Valve Steam Deck Specs | |
| Show |
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| CPU | AMD Zen 2
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| GPU | AMD RDNA 2
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| RAM | 16GB LPDDR5-5500 |
| Storage |
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| Ports |
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| Sport controllers |
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| Different buttons & switches |
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| Keyboard | Digital |
| Battery & charging |
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| Wi-fi | |
| Audio |
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| Webcam & mic | Mic solely |
| OS | Steam OS (Arch Linux with KDE Plasma) |
| Dimensions | 298mm x 117mm x 49mm 11.7″ x 4.6″ x 1.9″ |
| Weight | 669 grams 1.5 kilos |
| Docking Station |
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| Value |
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