Valve: don’t expect a faster Steam Deck ‘in the next couple of years’
Valve: don’t expect a faster Steam Deck ‘in the next couple of years’
Deck Pro might be years away.
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.
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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.
Fine by me, just keep supporting the Steam Deck and being awesome. Love you Valve!
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
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!
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.
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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 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.
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'm waiting for the Steam Deck to be better before I buy it. Or any other handheld linked to a gaming account. Sure, you can play Titan Fall 2 on the Steam Deck. For maybe an hour or two? Not sure, as I don't have a Steam Deck and haven't tried it out for myself, but my understanding is that the battery life depends on how the user wishes to "abuse" it with games at this point. Same probably goes for the other PC gaming handhelds that run on Windows. I think the Steam Deck is fantastic, and is probably useful to people who travel a lot or who love their PC games and don't want to invest in a whole computer because that would be a waste of money to them. It's the same for all the other portable PC game handhelds. Would I love to have a Steam Deck? Yes. Do I need one? No. I don't travel much. I have a gaming laptop and a new gaming PC I built. I'm sure the Steam Deck is great on battery life for low-power games, as are most other handhelds for PC games now. I don't have a Nintendo Switch, but what I understand about it is that it sacrifices what we have on PC for battery longevity. Do I hate my gaming laptop? Yes. When, on the rare occasion, I have to travel, can I use it to play games? Yes. Does its battery last better than the Steam Deck on some graphics intensive games? Yes. In the future, it will be really cool to travel around and have your PC games with you on an extra small device that weighs less than a gaming laptop. Maybe that future won't come because of corporate enshittification, though. Maybe in the future, the games you play will be tied to a specific small mobile device and if you like particular games, you'll have to buy various small devices to play all the games you like, whether you're more stationary or need to travel a lot for work or whatever. So, whatever. I mean, right now, the Steam Deck is really nice, and affordable for a lot of people. This news announcement kind of looks like a warning to game developers for PC. Want your game to work on Steam Deck and not drain the battery in less than an hour or two? Make it low intensity graphics wise. Right now, a big seller on Steam is how to discern between games you might like to buy depending on if they work on Steam Deck with Proton. The Steam App even allows you to toggle the setting for whether or not it's compatible with Steam Deck or not. Game publishers right now want their games to work on Steam Deck because they know that setting is there for users. For now. Some PC gamers want outrageous graphics they can't get on console. That's why there are games released as "enhanced." So... yadda yadda blah blah. We can't predict the future. It's all about the game publishers versus the PC gaming console manufacturers. The only people who lose money are the gamers who buy their shit.
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
Because people are discussing the battery life of the Steam Deck versus the games they play in the thread and how low-power games affect the battery life less. I'm addressing this: battery life versus how you choose to use the battery, depending on the games you choose to play on the device. Am I clearer now? If I'm not, please feel free to complain about how I took the time to explain myself in the first place so you could understand what I was talking about.
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.
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.