WYP
News Guru
Is this the "Switch Pro" alternative for PC gamers?
Read more about Valve's Steam Deck handheld console.
Read more about Valve's Steam Deck handheld console.
Valve announced their Steam Deck Handheld console
- Thread starter WYP
- Start date
AngryGoldfish
Old N Gold
They already have planned higher storage capacity models at higher prices. The maximum is 512GB, which is plenty for most gamers in my opinion. I can imagine this PC being great for smaller indie games.
NeverBackDown
AMD Enthusiast
Not only that but at a 1280x800 resolution you don't need 4k textures or anything. So the game sizes will be smaller as graphics won't be as important.
64GB emmc storage is awful though. Emmc is slow. Not even as fast as Sata 3 ssd. You'll definitely want the higher end ssd storage.
AngryGoldfish
Old N Gold
Yeah, I can imagine they are offering the 64GB model so they can say they hit the $400 price tag to compete with other consoles. There's an interview with Gabe on how "painful" it was to hit that price target. The 64GB model with slower storage might be just a PR move to ensure gamers jump aboard, when in reality he will want users to buy the 256GB or 521GB models with much greater storage capacity and speed.
64GB model is very useful for all the people just wanting this for Steam in-home streaming or 2D indie games or a lot of emulators or any arrangement of that tbf
AngryGoldfish
Old N Gold
Yeah, you're right, but based on the interviews with Gabe, I still think Steam is banking on the sale of the higher tiered models for the unit to be universally successful.
AlienALX
Well-known member
From what I have read they won't be making bugger all in sales on this. Just trying to get more people on Steam to buy games, given the massive prices they charge developers. Sell two games? there's your profit.
I do want one, but I will wait until it's not only available but I have seen reviews. The Steam Controller was an atrocity on gaming.
I will wait and see how it is before I throw money at it. Perfectly happy with the 64gb model, given that I would probably use it in bed and thus would not need to physically install games. Plus the main game I would get it for (Fallout 3) is only about 4gb odd any way.
I do want one, but I will wait until it's not only available but I have seen reviews. The Steam Controller was an atrocity on gaming.
I will wait and see how it is before I throw money at it. Perfectly happy with the 64gb model, given that I would probably use it in bed and thus would not need to physically install games. Plus the main game I would get it for (Fallout 3) is only about 4gb odd any way.
WYP
News Guru
I liked the Steam controller, but mostly for the back buttons. I use an Xbox Gamepad now as mouse/keyboard is my usual port of call.
I got a pre-order in for one of these. Whether or not I will actually pay for it at the end is another matter. It's an interesting product and I like the idea of it.
I got a pre-order in for one of these. Whether or not I will actually pay for it at the end is another matter. It's an interesting product and I like the idea of it.
It will indeed be interesting to see how eMMC will affect loading times. Hardware Unboxed investigated loading times last year, and found that a sub-500MB/s SATA SSD was only about 15% slower at loading games than a 5000MB/s NVMe drive under most circumstances. While the eMMC will likely be half the speed of a SATA drive, it could still work out reasonably well.
Will be interesting to see how microSD, which is even slower, will work. Valve did tell IGN that they worked on optimising loading times from SD.
I'll be waiting for reviewers to test this, but up front it doesn't look like a deal breaker to me.
As for the 64GB size, yes, that's limited. It means you'll likely play one game at a time on the device (if you're not using an SD card), or a couple at most. Though I can also see the benefit of that.
Personally I'm more worried about game compatibility of the Steam Deck than the storage size or performance. If I buy the device at all I'll likely buy the 64GB version, and try to catch up on some of the backlog, rather than playing the latest and greatest.
NeverBackDown
AMD Enthusiast
I'm not sure why you're poking fun at the resolution? It's the same as the switch when that's not docked. And that's sold a ton still.
AngryGoldfish
Old N Gold
The screen resolution sounds fine to me. You can't expect to cram a high resolution panel into such a small device. That's an unreasonable expectation for an affordable handheld device.
Dicehunter
Resident Newb
Having a high res screen on something small like this wouldn't make sense, 720P gives a nice image quality at this size, Any higher and that means 2 things -
1. More GPU power is needed so the battery drains much faster.
2. Much higher price.
It's why I also find high res screens on smartphones a little silly, Beyond around 700P-900P the difference starts becoming a placebo at that small screen size and your battery is draining much faster due to your hardware needing to work a lot more.
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Greenback
Active member
The steam blurb says for all your steam library, it's false advertising my steam library is 4TB's and that's not everything installed
I do wonder how comfy it will be with the placement of the thumb sticks, bumper buttons and the buttons underneath looks a bit of a stretch
I do wonder how comfy it will be with the placement of the thumb sticks, bumper buttons and the buttons underneath looks a bit of a stretch
Dicehunter
Resident Newb
Do they specifically say you can install your entire Steam library or you can play your entire Steam library ? As the 2 are quite different.
Greenback
Active member
your entire Steam Library shows up, is what it says so it's close
