Steam Deck

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[News] Steam Deck OLED review: Includes specs on new screen and other improvements (www.polygon.com)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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This is the best coverage of the new Deck that I've seen yet.

Upgraded:

7.4" OLED HDR screen with a 90hz refresh rate and 600 nits brightness(with 1000 nits peak brightness), (old screen 7" LCD with 60hz refresh and 400 nits brightness). Touchscreen accuracy and responsiveness is reportedly improved.
Longer battery life. Improvements to software and hardware are supposed to increase the battery life by 30-50%. New battery is 50wh vs original 40. Original decks will see some of this improvement thanks to software/bios updates, but not as much as the new Decks. The new Deck charges faster as well, charge from 20 to 80% battery in 45 min.
6E wifi module for improved wifi speed.
Dedicated bluetooth module, allowing better audio quality over bluetooth and the option to wake the steam deck from a bluetooth controller. Will also support more controllers at once for multiplayer.
Faster RAM, 6400 MT/s vs 5500 MT/s on original.
More repairable. The screws are now torx, and all thread into metal screw holes. Should prevent stripped screws that were the most common issues with SSD replacements.
New carrying case, for the 1TB model, there's an insert case inside the full size case. The insert can be pulled out and used as a slim carrying case when you don't need full protection.
Weighs 5% less.

Prices:

$649 - 1TB OLED

$529 - 512GB OLED

$399 - 256GB LCD

For a limited time, Valve will sell a special edition 1TB OLED with a translucent shell for $679, only in the US and Canada. Expected to sell out quickly.

Note: I'm updating this as I get more information, so the written out info will change as I learn more.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (3 children)

That's the whole point. They had to walk a thin line between making an attractive upgrade and pissing off the existing users. If they had made the deck more powerful, the old ones would suddenly have been obsolete. I think they did a good job of that. And no, I'm not buying the new one either.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

If they had made the deck more powerful, the old ones would suddenly have been obsolete.

I'm pretty sure it has more to do with current chip technology not actually changing that much in the, what, 2 years since the deck first released?

Also obsolete is a pretty strong word for what - if it had stronger internals - would likely end up being more expensive than current models.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I think it's two things.

Firstly, the landscape hasn't changed that much as you said. People will say the Z1 Extreme/7840U is available and while that's a lot more powerful, the difference isn't night and day to what the Deck's APU offers at lower wattages. I wouldn't be surprised to see another custom APU made in cooperation with AMD. The Z1 Extreme is basically an 7840U, a chip made for notebooks, and usually not gaming notebooks. Sure, even the GPU it comes with is faster than what's in the Deck, but I don't think CPU/GPU power is balanced well for gaming. With a custom chip design, they'd be able to strip away unnecessary pieces of the silicon, like excess PCIe lanes and probably some other stuff, resulting in a smaller die, which then results in less power draw.

Secondly, there's compatibility. Developers often include a graphics preset specifically for Steam Deck in their games nowadays, and having two hardware configurations with a huge gap in performance would mean they'd have to include two. Sure, people in this community are mostly fine with setting their own graphics preferences, but I'd imagine there are many people out there who just want to start playing as soon as the game has downloaded.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Yeah, it's just a big enough upgrade to be a little envious, but not feeling like I got ripped off.

The way I'm looking at it, I'm still very satisfied with my current deck and this upgrade shouldn't change that. But still, damn, OLED...

[–] lemming741 1 points 1 year ago

Also keeping pricing and margins on line.