They don’t want to compromise battery in favor of performance and I agree. With smaller games like Hades or cult of the lamb my steam deck battery will last and last. On more demanding games like cyberpunk or Armored Core I get a little over an hour out of it best case scenario.
Beefier graphics hardware will only make that issue worse.
I so often use mine plugged in as I’m not walking or in a park, I’m on a bus or train which can often have a plug, so not much of an issue there, however I’m not playing high-end games, it’s so good for stuff like Hades and whatnot.
Personally I don’t plan on playing big games like these on the go anyway, so battery life isn’t going to be a problem.
I was thinking of getting a docking station with an m.2 slot for those bigger games to play when I’m home.
Only waiting for new generations of GPUs and CPUs can help there I guess, those usually push things a lot in a performance per wat comparison!
They don’t want to compromise battery in favor of performance and I agree
The battery life is already 5 seconds. No need to make the problem worse.
Probably for the best. The Deck certification process on games would probably be annoying if they had a whole bunch of revisions with only like 10% difference in performance.
Wait a few years and make the next one a meaningful jump.
Exactly. I’d like to see a few significant improvements for the next gen - namely in screen and performance to match, but my dream would be to see Valve license Framework’s module system (or build something similar of their own) and integrate one of those somewhere on the deck.
It’d be great for the obvious, like adding high-speed storage, but just imagine the possibilities for a handheld gaming console of attachments people could build with a module system that locks in place like that.
Obviously the module thing is a pipe dream and unlikely to happen, but I just feel like there’s a ton of additional potential for that form factor that’s unexplored, and I’d like to see longer generations not only for support, but also so that larger iterative work like designing a module system or whatever can be prioritized over rushing out regular performance upgrades.
I’m not in a rush, and stable specs makes it easier for devs to get their games to work and Valve to improve Proton.
The next version is definitely on my radar, but for now my desktop works well enough.
The thing that made me reconsider buying one is the screen. Make an OLED version and I‘m gonna get one. I‘m not worried about the performance, I‘d get a deck for stuff like Dead Cells and Spelunky, not for stuff like Cyberpunk.
If they made an OLED version and offered replacement screens for burn-in cases in x years, that‘d be absolutely amazing.
I think you can upgrade the screen
Fine by me, just keep supporting the Steam Deck and being awesome. Love you Valve!
I just hope they can bring the weight down in the next version. It’s a little too heavy for me to use, and I was so sad when I realized it.
Hold it with one hand
Do curls with it
Change hand
Repeat
Couple of weeks later it will feel light as fuck holding it with two hands!
This guy’s trying to trick us into working out - Get them!
Hey wait a minute, this guy is trying to trick us into getting out of our chairs! Get them!!
Hey wait a minute, this guy is trying to trick us into getting out of our chairs too! Get a steam deck in each hand and write mean things about him on both.
Playing on the Steam Deck for a few weeks and then picking up a Nintendo Switch, it felt like I was holding air.
It’s lighter than I expected for its size. What problems are you having with it?
I have a genetic disorder that causes my tendons and ligaments to be weak, so I get sprains and dislocations easily. I’ve sprained a finger pushing an elevator button before, and dislocated a knee standing up and taking a step. My hands are so stupid weak I couldn’t even get a Switch, I had to get a Switch Lite. I can’t use Xbox controllers because the D-pad and left stick being switched caused me to accidentally dislocate my thumb once.
The Steam Deck is just slightly too heavy for me to hold for long, because you carry some of the weight on your middle fingers when you’re holding it. When I was trying it, a middle finger joint started to go out of place.
The ergonomics of the Steam Deck were great; so I was so upset when I felt my finger starting to give. I had only played for about 10, 15 minutes before I started having problems, and I had to tape my finger after I got home from trying it.
I’m a rare case, I know, but usually new versions of electronics tend to be slimmer and lighter, so I’m hopeful.
Oh shit. I’m sorry about that.
If there’s one thing the Deck is good for is customisation. It’s not ideal but I wonder if it’s possible to design handles that don’t put so much pressure on your middle fingers or grips that wrap around your palms.
As you can tell, I’m not someone who specialises in ergonomic design.
On the plus side, you can use any Bluetooth or USB compatible controller that you find comfortable and a cheap stand to make your experience more comfortable. Steam’s controller support is fantastic.
Yeah, but that’s not going to be very easy to do on the train, or laying down in bed, and having to carry around a controller kills a lot of the portability, which would be the whole point of a Stream Deck for me. And if I’m going to play at home, I’ve already got a gaming PC.
Fair enough, it seems like we’re starting to see smaller performance gains per generation especially in battery devices. Makes sense to not force an update until real iterative performance is available. Asus’s ROG Ally was 1.5-2 years after Steamdeck and seems mostly on par.
Kinda wonder what kind of effect a more powerful nintendo device will have on the whole ecosystem. Nintendo devices are automatically probably going to run smoother watt for watt just because developers will likely prioritize optimisation for that device, so it’s all a bit of an uphill battle for the steam deck there
Nintendo never makes anyhow powerful devices, they juat rely wntirely on developer optimization and only certain dwvelopers are willing to put in the time well and money to publiah for their propriatary and expensive frameworks in the first place.
- famicom: very competitive at the time, advanced in some areas
- snes: very competitive, more powerful in many regards
- n64: widely accepted as the most powerful of that generation
- gamecube: more powerful than ps2
- wii: this one is the least powerful you have that.
- wiiu: widely accepted as more powerful than x360/ps3
- switch: powerful hardware for a handheld of the time.
- rumoured switch successor: rumored to basically be a portable ps4.
Your theory does not hold water. And it is full of typos. You need a better mobile keyboard.
I can’t really comment on the earlier consoles, but those are some pretty biased comparisons.
The GameCube is more powerful than the PS2, but then the Xbox was more powerful than the GameCube. Then you have the Wii. But then WiiU being more powerful than a console coming out 6 years prior? What kind of argument is that?
The argument for the Switch doesn’t prove anything when there’s very little investment in the handheld console market when the Switch came out. And also, who cares if the Switch’s successor can beat a decade old console? I swear, my phone probably can run a PS4 game based purely on its processing power.
Not only that but the processor it had was like a 2 year old design when switch was released
The WiiU wasn’t more powerful than the competition but the old ones where, they gave up on compeating in terms of specs with the Wii and the Swit h uses a mobile processor that was old and slow even when it came out and can easily be surpassed by most phones if it wasn’t for the insane optimisation. They continue to proof that games matter more than specs and that’s a very profitable and well working strategy so idk where you got those rumors from but I am 99% sure the next switch will have a relatively slow ARM processor again and there is nothing wromg with that if it’s enough fun, it just requires a lot of work from the game developers that not all of them are willing to put in. About the typos, no keyboard in the world can fix my drunken typing and I am fairly happy with mine but thanks for the suggestion I guess…
The switch 2 is rumored to be more powerful than the ps4 an old console at this point in time that also had relatively seeker hardware than it could or should of at the time (same with Xbox the and jaguar cores were not that good)
I’m holding off until a new version. Doesn’t necessarily need to be faster, but I’m sure they’ve learned a ton with this release. Interested to see their 2.0 release.
Only thing I would ever want more is battery, but I’ve never even drained it and I carry my power brick with me everywhere for my phone/ laptop anyway so. I’d just get this version on the next discount (if I did not have a similar device).
I just want a slightly higher res screen. Not by much just a bit more. Thats all
I would upgrade for a slightly smaller, more battery efficient Steamdeck with an OLED screen. I know that’s a lot to ask for, but definitely performance is the least of my concerns.
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I have absolutely no idea what you’re ranting about and why this has to do with the steam deck but I appreciate the enthusiasm I guess
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And if they are is it any of your buisnesss
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There’s a lot of rambling here but your points are centred around battery life so I’ll hit that.
The Steam Deck’s battery life isn’t amazing.
The most I’ve seen is Stardew Valley running for 5 hours.There’s two sides to this; the Steam Deck’s power consumption settings and how long you actually want to spend playing.
The Deck allows you to control how much power a game is allowed to consume. I’m playing Fallen Order atm and that game would probably run for 2-3 hours of continuous play. I’m playing on mostly medium settings with textures on high.
There are certain other games that will utterly drink battery life, like Baldur’s Gate 3. I would personally argue that you shouldn’t be attempting it as a regular mode of playbut I tried it myself and it doesn’t look terrible. But you have to go in understanding that BG3 is a graphically intensive game and the Steam Deck isn’t exactly built for it.
On the second point, I personally can’t spend more than 2 hours of continuous play. After a while, I get tired of holding the device. I live in the UK so our travel times aren’t long. I also don’t travel very often either. My time on the Deck is usually just before going to sleep. The way the device is, I’m not sure that you could be playing one game for that long. Sure, you can play Titanfall 2 but that’s a very fast-paced game and it’s probably not going to translate well to the Deck. It’s better if you plug in KBM but then you’re having to carry those around as well. At that point, you may as well be on a laptop or PC.
There are certain games I’ve decided that I’ll play on the Deck like Fallen Order or No Man’s Sky. I’ve also got emulators loaded if I ever want to play those games. If you want a Steam Deck, you should be getting it because it allows you to play a huge breadth of games, not the latest ones at high graphical settings. If you want that, get a PC, you’ll be happier with that than the sacrifices you’ll have to make on the Deck just to get the game to run well.
Thanks for writing out how your experience is. It’s how I imagined it. I would need to have more battery life to make it worth it to me to buy it. For example, a long trip without any way to plug it in. I definitely wouldn’t expect it to run AAA titles.
As someone else mentioned, you can use external batteries to keep the Deck going. It’s still not ideal but that’s the way it is.
It is possible to get a USB power station. The Deck can charge at up to 45W.
I wish that power stations acted more like “external batteries” (would automtically be flipped on by devices when their internal batteries get low, will be charged after their internal batteries are charged), but even as things are, they do let one extend battery life on portable devices dramatically.
