Valve has today announced the brand new Steam Deck OLED model with some great sounding upgrades inside so here's the details.
This is the same basics as the original Steam Deck models but comes with an HDR OLED screen, a longer lasting 50Whr battery, faster WiFi, and a slew of tweaks and improvements across the board. Valve say the HDR OLED was "designed from the ground up for gaming", gives you "30-50% longer battery life", has WiFi 6E and gives improved thermals with a bigger fan while being 5% lighter than the original models. Oh, the OLED screen is also bigger at 7.4" (from 7.0") and goes up to 90Hz!
It will also come with a brand new carrying case for the 1TB models that has a removable liner, better touch-screen, easier repairs with Torx type screws that go into metal threads, so no messing up the structural integrity and Valve say the internal components are "now easier to access, and Steam Deck OLED replacement parts will be coming to iFixit soon". Even the APU was upgraded to 6nm for better efficiency, and the memory was updated to 6400 MT/s, improving latency and power management.
Not just that, you're also getting lower-priced models with the original LCD screen.
- Steam Deck 256GB LCD: Now $399 / £349 (effective immediately)
- Steam Deck 512GB OLED: $549 / £479
- Steam Deck 1TB OLED: $649 / £569
- Steam Deck 1TB OLED Limited Edition (translucent colorway): $679 (US/Canada only)
Steam Deck OLED will be available November 16th at 10 AM Pacific / 6PM UTC in USA, Canada, United Kingdom, and European Union, as well as Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong via KOMODO.
However, the 64GB and 512GB LCD models are now being phased-out so they have a permanent discount until they are gone so while supplies last (prices effective immediately):
- Steam Deck 64GB LCD: Now $349 / £309
- Steam Deck 512GB LCD: Now $449 / £389
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In their tech specs, it even mentions it has "support for wake from Bluetooth controllers", which I'm sure will be exciting to anyone who plans to regularly dock it.
The Docking Station is now priced at $79 / £69.
See more on the Steam Deck Store and the refreshed Steam Deck Website.
I do have a review unit on the way, which is supposed to arrive today. So stay tuned for my thoughts and comparisons on it. Exciting times to be a Linux gaming fan!
Quoting: DerpFoxI really don't know if I should feel happy that the deck is getting upgraded, showing how well it is doing. Or really angry that it is getting upgraded so soon. I got the "bigger and better" more expensive Deck thinking about the future, thinking the deck won't get any significant upgrade for the next 5 years (like everything else) and if we needed, we could always go to third parties for bigger SSD, batteries etc. And here I am 1 year later looking at this ... that really doesn't sit right with me. And the thing I think I hate the most is the limited edition translucent case. Not that I don't like translucent case, I love them, always loved them since I was a kid. If this was available when the deck first got out, I would have bought it. No, what I hate the most is the "limited edition", I really despise that kind of thing. It's really the first time I'm disappointed at valve.
Yeah did the same thing and feeling salty too.
Can't just whip out anothwr 700 bucks on a whim forna version I'd have been down for in the forst place.
Be nice if early adopters got a deal here for their loyalty but eh if it's gonna be like this maybe I'll skip this and a deck 2 as well.
The price to pay when jumping in early I suppose.
I think it woulda been fair if they just waited till next year and announced it now so we could all plan for it and have a chance to resell our current ones before a price drop.
Quoting: PenglingI hope that they keep LCD as an option when the Steam Deck 2 eventually comes along. OLEDs hurt my eyes no matter how much you can change the brightness, and I also don't want to waste money on hardware that's guaranteed to die due to the organic components, so they're always a dealbreaker for me, unfortunately!Isn't everything guaranteed to die? Ha, after buying a 77" OLED TV, I definitely get annoyed by light bleed. Never bothered me before...
But for sure, OLED screens can be obnoxiously bright, especially for someone who has gotten lasik surgery.
Quoting: slaapliedjeIsn't everything guaranteed to die?To a degree, but not like this - being organic is a major downside of Organic-LEDs.
Though they're not quite as short-lived today, the first ones to market were dying off within months to a year, and often not fully, with huge chunks or lines suddenly going missing.
Anyone remember the original PS Vita? The OLED was such a problem that the "Lite" revision replaced it with a standard LCD.
Quoting: slaapliedjeHa, after buying a 77" OLED TV, I definitely get annoyed by light bleed. Never bothered me before...I haven't had any eye-surgery, but I just can't look at those bloody things. They're completely unusable for me.
But for sure, OLED screens can be obnoxiously bright, especially for someone who has gotten lasik surgery.
Quoting: PenglingQuoting: slaapliedjeIsn't everything guaranteed to die?To a degree, but not like this - being organic is a major downside of Organic-LEDs.
Though they're not quite as short-lived today, the first ones to market were dying off within months to a year, and often not fully, with huge chunks or lines suddenly going missing.
Anyone remember the original PS Vita? The OLED was such a problem that the "Lite" revision replaced it with a standard LCD.
Quoting: slaapliedjeHa, after buying a 77" OLED TV, I definitely get annoyed by light bleed. Never bothered me before...I haven't had any eye-surgery, but I just can't look at those bloody things. They're completely unusable for me.
But for sure, OLED screens can be obnoxiously bright, especially for someone who has gotten lasik surgery.
Now this is hard for us consumers to reliably test without simply waiting and see but LG announced already back in 2016 that their panels had a life expectancy of 100k hours (which is more than double that of LED and LCD) so it sounds like nothing to worry about anymore.
And the ongoing Rtings test shows that burn-in worries is mostly overblown (yes they experience burn-in but they do run their tv:s on for 24x7 with static images), with LED:s actually performing worse when it comes to uniformity.
https://www.rtings.com/tv/tests/longevity-burn-in-test-updates-and-results
Based off my experience with the OLED displays on my Pixel phones, having one on my Steam Deck would be pretty nice. I like original IPS LCD screen fine though.
I guess, in short, this newer Deck is a "maybe" for me right now.
Quoting: BlackBloodRumYeah, looks plausible.Quoting: Purple Library GuyI wonder how that works, actually. Is the whole thing just 0.4" bigger overall, or was there space around the edge of the existing screen that could be moved into so the device is the same size just with a bigger hole for the screen, or somewhere in between? Did they need to shift the controls any?The screen had a large border:
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/HwNrva8kmRp6DvT5pzYbBY.jpg
My guess is they just used some of that space.
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