f13.net

https://www.steamdeck.com/en/

Holy shit that control layout looks uncomfortable as fuck.

Edit: snapshot from one of the videos showing front control layout (back has a bunch of buttons too)

(https://i.imgur.com/7IzgLM5.jpg)

It looks almost like they designed a device, then remembered to add controls. The B button is falling off the edge.

As possibly the only human on earth who liked the steam controller, I feel qualified to say that looks bad.

RIP thumbs.

edited to add: also, it's SteamOS/linux, so emulation and compatibility issues will be a thing.

Yer a wizard now, Gaben (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FXgDAF6QpM)

We all love Richie Led B: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2021-valve-steam-deck-spec-analysis

You can just install Windows on it if you want. However it’s unclear how much functionality you would lose by doing that. I,e, how much of the hardware compatibility / UI functionality is Linux-only?

Also not mentioned is whether or not one of my biggest pet peeves with Steam is addressed which is you can’t have multiple copies of the launcher logged in to the same account running at once, and it logs you out of the older one when you do. As somebody who has multiple computers that can run Steam games at home this is hugely annoying, I understand having DRM to prevent running the same game simultaneously on multiple computers from the same account but at least let me run different games at once on different computers. With Steam Deck, however, even the first scenario is going to be an issue as who wants to have to constantly log in just to be able to switch playing the same game on the Steam Deck and your main gaming PC?

There was a mention somewhere about there being a goal to be able to sleep a game on one device and wake it on another, so clearly they've been thinking about it...but just as clearly it's not ready for prime-time.

I was talking to a couple guys about Rocksmith on it, since it has a USB port. With RS+ being non-Steam, it's maybe a no-go with the native linux OS...but apparently there is a linux version of RS+, and also a desktop mode for the device, so...

Overall I'd be concerned about the performance hit of Windows, as well as losing any device-specific optimizations. Sure, Cyberpunk was running at a locked 30 @720p on my GTX 970, but that is a 4 teraflop card (vs 1.1-1.6 per Ledbetter). Though I was running ultra settings (no RT, obviously, but also no DLSS...but how much lower can you scale something when target is already down to 720p?).

Also also, one of my use scenarios would be playing something like Madden...which launches Origin to authenticate through their DRM...my guess is that would be no bueno on this device, since I don't think EA is happy about having to make a PC version in the first place (I believe due to their deal with MS for the Xbox and MS's commitment to all games on Xbox also running on Windows). But 2k golf would be a great mobile game that I think would work great here.

It’s possible to run Origin through Proton by jumping through a lot of hoops. And Madden 21 is listed as compatible (sans multiplayer) in the Proton DB.

https://www.toptensoftware.com/blog/running-ea-origin-games-under-linux-via-steam-and-proton/

https://www.protondb.com/app/1239520

Unsurprisingly the Steam Store is FUBAR'd.

Yup I got locked out for trying to make too many purchases 'in the last hour', because I was timing out at payment and re-trying.  :oh_i_see:

"It looks like you've been attempting a lot of purchases in the last few hours. Please wait a while before trying again."

A while is apparently 30m-2h, so...guess I keep my $5?

By the time it went through it's a Q2 2022 reservation  :why_so_serious:

On the upside, now at least I can cancel if needed based on folks who get theirs this year?

Yeah I got throttled too. I finally got my reservation in at 10:41 AM Pacific Time. Given Valve's track record on delivering hardware I fully expect to not be able to purchase one until 2023 at the earliest, even ignoring all the current chip shortages, at which point it'll be completely obsolete.

That's only the 512 GB model, at the moment. The lower two models are Q1 2022. Not really surprising people are skipping the lowest end $400 eMMC model. Is interesting people seem to be willing to spend the extra $120 for 512 GB SSD one compared to the middle 256 GB model. Makes you wonder if console hardware these days is underpriced -- i.e. demand would be just as high if the prices were ~$50 - $100 higher.

I'm not sure any speed differences between nvme drives will be tangible, but it does come with a matte screen and reflections drive me batty  :uhrr:

That said, it's $5 either way, so....I refer back to my being in the 2nd wave. If it doesn't review out well, then I'm out $0 earth dollars. If it does, cool.

Yup and if demand is still high by the time it's your turn you can also just scalp it :awesome_for_real:

i reserved a 512mb one obviously but like I dunno, whatever, there will be reviews by the time i can buy it

I wonder how repairable the device will be, given the beating controllers take. In this scenario, a broken controller is a literal game stopper.

The preproduction units IGN tried out have screws on the back so assuming those are still there on the production units it should be relatively easy to open it up. However we haven’t seen the internals so it’s unknown how hard it might be to get at the joystick pots and whatnot but presumably things are crammed in there and layered so it’ll be difficult to get at most things inside. E.g. somebody emailed Gabe asking if the SSD is replaceable and he replied that it’s in an M.2 2230 slot and Valve updated the specs to reflect that but also added that it’s “not intended for end-user replacement” implying the slot will not be easy to access.

im so getting this.

ok

How to replace the SSD and thumb sticks. Don’t try it unless you are willing to risk killing yourself, according to Valve, jokingly, sort of. More importantly if you don’t reassemble things exactly how they were you could mess up your Deck.

https://youtu.be/Dxnr2FAADAs

Delayed two months. Now shipping starting February 2022: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675180/view/3084396982306430712

I’m still not expecting to be able to purchase mine until 2023 so an extra two months doesn’t really matter to me. Those few who did manage to get a reservation in for the original December 2021 start date for Christmas are however probably not very pleased right now.

Now has a date (feb 25): https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675180/view/3117055056380003048

My reservation still says Q2 2022 but I'll believe it when I get the email. I'm still expecting things to trickle out slowly. Still no dock yet either.

mine says after Q2 and i wanna die

Valve is going to do replacement parts through ifixit: https://steamcommunity.com/games/1675180/announcements/detail/4347665658888576969

Last week they posted the CAD files for the shell if you're a printing nerd: https://steamcommunity.com/games/1675180/announcements/detail/3106923225208810471

The first batch of Steam Deck emails go out tomorrow (February 25). If you were able to reserve one for what was originally December 2021 or Q1 2022 make sure you check your emails since you'll only have 72 hours to complete the purchase.

Edit: Also you can go here to check which games in your library are verified (so far):

https://store.steampowered.com/steamdeck/mygames

For some reason that link is not available from the actual https://store.steampowered.com/steamdeck/ page so you can't do this from the launcher, you have to use a (real) browser and log in again.

I'm never gonna get my steam deck and it's all I want lol

i'm currently at:

26 verified - Several of them games I wanted to play specifically on the Deck so that's cool.

37 playable - Some of the ones I'm really hoping work are in this valley, I think text size and external launchers are going to be a make-or-break for the Deck honestly. The meat of my games are in here.

6 unsupported - Heroes V would be nice, but this isn't too bad overall

286 untested - So.....

Still, for a portable gaming device there's a solid value out of the box on day 1 already. More games in 'verified' than I had for the Sega Game Gear heh

If you're into emulation, there's good news: https://www.pcgamer.com/steam-deck-emulation-installation/

Digital Foundry benchmarks:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44TRzEGPbfE

tl;dw At high(er) settings and 720P, 30 FPS locked is possible for most of the games tested, 60 FPS is not.

Elden Ring on the Steam Deck (sorry) :awesome_for_real:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh8kcKDR7A4

FUCK

I'm never gonna get over the stupid goddamn cell connection crapping out that morning

Some encouraging news:


https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/steam-deck-interview-valve-devs-on-prioritising-performance-future-features-and-the-boon-of-a-bigger-screen

Valve firmed up expected dates ever so slightly (still queue-based by order time). I'm now in Q3 2022 (from 'after Q2').

https://www.ign.com/articles/steam-deck-preorders-delayed

URL not indicative of article, oddly (as there is no new delays announced, just clarification about the change).

Q3

get fucked sigh

Based on the deck subreddit I'm guessing some of these delays are due to fine tuning - quite a few controller drift issues and other oddball bugs. It looks pretty awesome though, once the kinks are worked out.

Yeah, I ordered mine today after waiting how it turns out. Planning this to become my new retro emulator console, right now it looks like this even works out of the box.

Windows 10 drivers now available. Windows 11 requires a BIOS update so that's not working yet. Still no dual-boot support for Windows + SteamOS yet, though, so right now it's one or the other.

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675200/view/3131696199122435099

SIGH

Sometimes the negative articles make me chuckle: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2022/03/steam-deck-verified-has-issues-grand-theft-auto-v-edition/

Honestly, when I read 'playable (launcher issues) this dude's experience is exactly what I expected to see, except I apparently understood that a bit better than he admitted to. I had almost exactly the same experience with the wonky launcher bullshit on my (then) new Windows 10 PC, to the point where I cannot use Steam to launch it, I have to just launch the Rockstar launcher, which launches Steam, which launches the game. Had every other thing he mentions come up in that process.

So honestly it sounds like it works better on Deck than on my top end gaming pc (except for performance obv). Which I'm pretty stoked about, launchers are going to be interesting, so I'm glad to hear that Rockstar's is at least workable. Speaking of which, just seeing this as a reality blows my old gamer mind (RDR2 gameplay on Deck): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENyvDp18eAg

Yeah software and UI issues like in the article will be fixed over time. More worrisome are the hardware issues like the sticking "B" button and the noisy ass fan.

Looks like email batches are going out on Mondays now. Today and March 7 were batches 3 and 2.

Lawrence Yang, one of the Steam Deck designers, has been tweeting email batches if you want to follow him:

https://twitter.com/lawrenceyang

Edit: Mondays not Tuesdays I blame Daylight Savings

No I don't wanna fuckin follow

Don't sigh too loud, Valve fixed Elden Ring for Deck (in Proton, not Windows): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1HuX2_Hhss

:thinkicide:

Some weeks will have two batches, so emails Monday and Thursday:

https://twitter.com/lawrenceyang/status/1511045220493787136

Here are the approximate order times for the first batch of US Q2 emails:

https://old.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/twe3fd/us_only_here_are_the_latest_fulfilled_reserve/

64GB
[rtReserveTime missing]
10:25 - 10:30 PDT (couldn't find many commenters with the US 64GB)

256GB
rtReserveTime: 1626455705
Translated: 10:14:43 PDT

512GB
rtReserveTime: 1626455255
Translated: 10:07:35 PDT

I'm 10:41 AM for the 512GB so it's still going to be a while for mine.

yeesh
no wonder I ended up in Q3 a minute after launch

11:24am, I guess I get mine for xmas?  :why_so_serious:

512 GB US now up to ~10:10:31 AM PDT (+00:10:31 launch).

https://old.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/tyhfo3/if_you_got_an_email_today_time_ordered_model/i3s7zio/

So fulfillment is about a day per minute of sale time. Woah! I wonder how many people are backing out of the reservation, and along which skus.

So if that pace continues, maybe May 31st for mine?  :grin:

Knowing very little about the Steam deck, is 512GB enough to have more than 6-7 games on the console? I'm just thinking that some of the games in my library can use up to 80+ gig per game

Probably not but you can't get more

so

Does it not have a MicroSD card slot?

MicroSDs are about 150 read / 100 write.

So, yes, but also no. I'd barely call it expansion. Use it for indie sub 5gb bullshit.

You answered your own question, pretty much. It looks like the OS plus Steam Deck UI takes up around 18 GB so that'll leave about 494 GB on the 512 GB model for game installs, shader caches, saved game files, etc.

It does and the Steam (Deck) UI has a feature for setting up Libraries, which can be on different drives, and moving games between them, so you could use that to shuffle currently "active" games to the SSD and "backburner" games to the MicroSD, analogous to how Xbox and PS have UI for shuffling games to and from USB storage.

Edit: typos

You can get more, in theory. I.e. any single-sided M.2 2230 SSD should fit, though it may cause other problems (EMI, power draw, etc.). And Micron announced in January the world's first single-sided 2 TB M.2 2230 SSD (https://www.micron.com/products/ssd/product-lines/2400) and will presumably be the go to model for Steam Deck users with fat wallets wanting maximum space once it becomes available (assuming it works without issues).

I feel like this one isn't worth fucking with. That said, if Valve updates it in a few years, they absolutely should add a nearly external m.2 slot on the back that's easily accessible.

You've probably seen the DF look at ray tracing on the Deck. Gamingonlinux has clarified a few things. Pretty cool what the Deck is doing to promote linux gaming, I don't know that I've ever read a linux gaming site, let alone fairly regularly.

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2022/04/yes-the-steam-deck-will-eventually-get-ray-tracing-once-the-amd-gpu-driver-matures/

I share the same takeaway, that basically it will be supported but it doesn't matter much. I'm seriously in love with ray-tracing, it's brought out a lot more immersiveness in Cyberpunk...but I'm don't really care about it on the Deck. It's been weird seeing pc master race doing its thing but so often forgetting the small screen/portable nature that makes much of that normal graphics whoring take on different parameters for success.

Ray tracing stopped being a #pcmasterrace thing after the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X came out. Though Team Green still has much better ray tracing hardware (and drivers) compared to Team Red.

Sorry, I was as usual unclear in my post. I was kinda lumping all kinds of pcmr stuff into that comment, the whole gamut of stuff I've heard complained about: lower resolutions, stripping down settings, etc. I get how people push against that kind of stuff for desktops but for the Deck? That's not the point, the games will look good enough for handheld use on that screen at a lower res with reduced settings. Ray-tracing goes from a huge improvement to barely noticeable on the small screen imo (and more importantly perhaps, besides the point of the device, which is having the game library on the couch while the wife watches tv or of course in the can).

As a side note, I've been pulling for team red since I had a 9700 Pro that was awesome for its time...but also had shit drivers. It's weird that they've never been able to shake the driver issues, 20 years later. Team green's complete surrender to wattage is appalling (I've been running mine capped at 300W) and looks to continue worsening.

When I was messing around with OpenGL programming at work about... oh, twenty years ago, ATI's shitty-ass drivers were the bane of my existence.  Every single app crash was because someone had an ATI card and their driver would shit the bed if you asked it to draw a line on the screen.  I ended up going to a huge amount of effort to add in a "compatibility mode" OpenGL emulator, solely so I wouldn't have to keep explaining the concept of "driver problems" to non-gamers whose PCs had come bundled with ATI cards because they didn't know any better.  Fuck ATI in the ear.

Gotcha. I would imagine that Steam Deck early adopters have PC builds more powerful than the average Steam user and therefore aren't used to having to twiddle with graphics settings much to get acceptable frame rates while most PC gamers do need to do that. I.e. the "average" Steam user has a 1060-class GPU and a 4 core < 3 GHz CPU. Even at 1080p that setup will struggle to hit stable 60 fps at even "High" settings in 3D games. But most of the people complaining about the Steam Deck's performance presumably have >=2060 class GPUs and Intel Comet Lake (10xxx) or AMD Zen 2 CPUs or better.

I've had my Switch for a while now so I'm used to that style of portable gaming and the Steam Deck is way more powerful than that (roughly 3x) so that's plenty powerful for me for a next-gen portable gaming device.

One of my favorite quotes is 'happiness is a function of realistic expectations'.

Here's a look at a control setup for Civ V. I haven't seen footage of strategy games like this, so it's nice to see.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSEsFB_30R4

The steam estimate calculator has my "Q3 delivery" window as July 4th - July 25th depending on which estimation method I use. They're definitely increasing shipping pace.

Both of those dates sound very optimistic but we'll see. The order time delta has increased by about 4 minutes in 2 weeks -- which would put me at 12 weeks from now or way past Q2. April 7th it was +00:10:31 for US 512 GB, today it's at +00:16:00, and I'm at +00:41:00 so at ~2 minutes a week that's 12.5 weeks from today.

Obviously the orders are "front loaded" so the deltas per week should continue to increase as things progress but I don't know how anybody can make an estimate more than, say, a month in the future given the uncertainty.

https://old.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/u8sa7f/order_email_megathread_april_21_2022

Edit: 7th not 8th (I posted on 8th)

They should've sorted the deposits by account age  :grin:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/udz36r/order_email_megathread_april_28_2022/i6jvlo6/

It's movin, I guess (this is apparently a mostly Q2 batch, so that's good)

My boy wants one of these. He's got a pretty solid laptop, so I'm kind of at a loss as to why he'd need this. Am I missing some aspect here, besides being able to play from the couch?

Have you used a switch?

To pour some salt in schild's wounds, my (pretty late) preorder is already shipping, it's in a GLS depot in Germany somewhere.  :grin:

It looks like EU orders are moving way faster, or there were just fewer orders over here idk. I put in my order for a 256gb deck at 6:30 CEST on the 17th (almost 12 hours after they opened up), and got the email last Thurs. This basically matches the prediction from this site (https://steam-deck-calculator.web.app/). That same site tells me that if I placed the same order in the US at the same time I'd be getting the confirmation at the end of June, and in the middle-end of July if I was in the UK (rip).

You can also see the progress here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/ulv219/comment/i7xqt0e?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=usertext&utm_name=SteamDeck&utm_content=t1_i7y85w7

The EU models are going by hours every batch while the US and UK are going up by minutes*, except for the UK 64 GB which is also going up by hours.

Oh and for US orders there's a good chance FedEx will steal it because it comes in a box plastered with Valve logos on the outside, so there's that to look forward to as well.

https://www.pcgamer.com/steam-deck-update-adds-per-game-performance-settings/

Nice! Get those details worked out before autumn  :grin:

On the emulation front, this EmuDeck thing is pretty sweet (https://www.emudeck.com/), it integrates games into steam and everything. Currently in the process of moving all my emulator shit off the Vita (yeah yeah, lol, lmao, etc).

edit - a few minor gripes so far: the onscreen keyboard is a bit shit in desktop mode with no clickthrough (can get better ones from the KDE 'Discover' app store), and FPS locking to 30 doesn't help too much when emulating stuff (emulators don't play nice with it). Also, transferring files to the deck requires some minimal hacking (such as setting up ssh and using winscp, though I just did the super lazy option of starting a local webserver on my PC to share files with the deck whenever I need, and then download them via browser)

Don't fuckin gripe here fella

one week goes by

Watched pots, my friend.

In other news, do you want to see someone take a knife to a Deck? You know you do. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66xbBtnxb5k)

But will it blend?

So now with Deck parts available on ifixit, who wants to jump the queue and build one out of parts?  :why_so_serious:

No motherboard.

https://www.ifixit.com/Device/Steam_Deck

The 512 GB screen, which has an anti-glare etching, is only $99 (kit), though. So if you don't like the glare on your 64 GB/256 GB model you could replace that.

https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Miscellanous/Steam-Deck-512GB-Screen/IF260-003?o=2

Edit: all the parts with the 512 GB screen, and only the 512 GB screen as a kit (with tools) since that one seems to be a subset superset of all of the other kits comes out to $409.82.

The 512 GB model lists for $649. A 512 GB NVMe SSD that fits in the Steam Deck is around $130. So assuming you could find a "broken" Steam Deck (with working motherboard) for $239 with working 512 GB SSD or $109 without the SSD you could build yourself one for the same price as a new one.

Edit 2: this of course assumes all the other components on the broken Steam deck are damaged enough that you would want to replace them with new parts. Obviously if more of the parts can be salvaged than just the motherboard that reduces what you would need to get from iFixit.

Never stop being Trippy, I love it  :Love_Letters:

one week goes by


another week

For some reason the jornalits at this crappy site pulled out a 1991 military handbook to make a controversial post about a generally well-loved and amazing OS update to the Deck: https://kotku.com/steam-deck-os-update-3-2-valve-fan-noise-lifespan-1889

TLDR your deck is now either going to catch fire, only last for six months, or generate clickbait oops did I truncate the URL of course I did fuck them

Haven't read the Kotaku article but Digital Foundry tested this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GF8NzlBiaOM

So new fan profile does quiet down things but obviously temperatures have gone up. Impossible to say right now if that's shortening the lifespan of any of the electronic components.

Edit: note DF tested the beta version, not sure if today's release has any significant changes from what was tested

The fan noise problem also doesn't affect all decks -- the decks being shipped can have two different fan types, and one of them was quiet even before the fan profile change (my fan was always quiet, guess I lucked out). And even if you get the deck variant with the 'bad' fan, you can buy a replacement kit from ifixit for like $30, which is not ideal, but IMO it's not the end of the world...

Really, that kotaku author should've just griped about the virtual keyboard in desktop mode for ~usefully cynical commentary~ :grin:

one week goes by


another week


dj khaled

whoa, a 10% jump

I hadn't considered this, but reading the steamdeck subreddit really puts on display the quality of hobbyist aftermarket stuff is going to get made for this thing.

(https://i.imgur.com/llUqo2R.png)

(https://i.imgur.com/Rhcyo9u.gif)

I keep clicking the 'complete your purchase' button, but it doesn't seem to be working  :why_so_serious:

On a related note the real UI is seriously fucked up. The buttons you are supposed to click, like the "Complete your purchase" "button" above are greyed out unless you hover over them. There's another one of the follow up screen that I can't remember that's the same -- shows as "disabled" unless you hover over it.

Presumably to make it more difficult for scalpers' bots to buy them.

Ah, yeah, good point.

Since I still can't get a PS5 (not that I want one anymore, nice)... thank god for Valve's system. Can you imagine trying to score one of these if they were selling them traditionally?

Fuck the scourge of 3rd party sellers. I don't even shop at any site that won't let me filter them out now.

one week goes by


another week


dj khaled

whoa, a 10% jump

*crickets*

Nice, looks like the initial clog is loosening up. Almost halved your remaining time in a week.

Two weeks but yeah.

And the ball rolls faster: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/valve-more-than-doubles-steam-deck-production


But also is putting in some lower spec nvme drives into the 2 nvme models: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ssd-bandwidth-cut-in-half-on-some-steam-decks

Ouch. Hopefully there will be an easy way to figure out which one you get without opening up the back.

Q3 emails have started.

https://twitter.com/OnDeck/status/1542546382946308097

yup and you've got a pm

I've got a golden ticket!

Forget what I said about the Steam sale lol

Nice!

Niiice...I'm not too likely to play many shooters on the Deck, but I really really liked the gyro aiming in Days Gone on PS4. Even playing RDR2 now, I keep wanting to pull the controller up when I lock on, to get a headshot (sure, I can flick the stick and do, but it doesn't feel as natural).

https://www.theverge.com/2022/6/30/23188574/steam-deck-button-customization-software

First impressions. Ran through a bunch of titles to see how it handles various genres and control schemes. Not too bad, given the restrictions and the games I'm throwing at it (I mean...Civ V on a controller?).

First off I streamed Madden off the PC, a bit too much latency, the run game in particular got pretty loose. I also streamed Wreckfest and it felt a bit loose, too. I may have missed some settings for that as it was also a wonky low res. Put on Dead Cells and while I haven't played in a while and the button layout was a bit unfamiliar, I had last played in the room just before Conjunctivitis and was able to kill him in one try (for the first time on the pc version, I played on PS). So I had to clearly call that one a win (though I had my OP loadout, lightning whip/frost blast and traps/turret). I put Wreckfest directly on the Deck and it performed much better and looks really nice (if a bit aliased) and got rid of most of the looseness (have to get used to the new sticks). Speaking of sticks, I really want to through PGA 2k21 on it but RIP right stick if I did.

The weight of the device isn't bad except that having it in my lap makes it hard to see detail in the screen, forget small text at that distance, I'm over goddamned 50, kids. I have microscopic close vision, so 18"ish from the eyes is great (so this whole paragraph is a ymmv thing). The weight is enough at that angle that adjustments to grip are awkward to make, definitely 'I'm going to die if this happens during a game', something I've never thought while using a traditional controller. Due to the screen in the middle of the controller, that angle is also very different from how I hold a controller (thumbs almost parallel to ground), so L1/R1 a bit tough to reach consistently. The thumbsticks also seem to have a lot of dead zone in games I can't adjust for that (State of Decay), but I haven't dug into the various system settings very deeply yet. And still I was able to play the game just fine and it looked great, well worth the trade-offs.

While I'm bummed it's not perfect...that's exactly what that con list is: a wishlist for perfection. In reality, it's exactly what it says on the tin. My primary pc gaming library in a handheld. Fucking amazing.

It's probably the single best piece of tech I've ever used.

I'm basically gaming exclusively on it except for D2R at this point.

Update your firmware, if there's an update pending. There was a firmware issue with the right stick dead zone on release. Otherwise you can try calibrating:

https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/How+to+Calibrate+Steam+Deck+Thumbsticks/150415

I found the setting and removed the deadzones from both sticks and it was a bit better but I was also doing it while playing GTA 4 which was pretty aggressive about re-engaging the follow cam :D

edit: TIL where the per-game config is hiding: https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/how-to-customize-controls-on-the-steam-deck/

The deadzone adjustment in the main settings menu is universal.

Do we have anybody here still waiting on their reservation? If so check your (hopefully) updated availability window.

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675200/view/3413183219974913051

Mine's still showing Q4, but I was really late to the party. At least now I can hope that's real.

I've decided I have almost no use case scenario for this device. The short gaming sessions I thought would be perfect just don't happen. I'd rather just play games on the big screen.

 :cry:

Have you tried throwing out your back so playing games on the big screen is less comfortable?

Finally got mine, and with Emudeck it is the perfect console emulation machine I always wanted. I don't know how they did it, but it feels lighter in the hand than my Switch despite being way more heavy. It eats power like mad though, so i don't know how one can use this on the road.

This will defintely be my couch console from now on and my Desktop PC will still get all the mouse/keyboard action.

I last used a pc on a desktop in 2002. Also, not sure how laying near prone in my recliner could be more comfortable  :grin: I only tend to game when the old lady's not around, I thought maybe I would use it a bit while she was there (single screen, if she's using the big tv I could game on the Deck), but it turns out when she's there I don't like tuning her out like that.

Re; eating power: this is actually a problem. I was keeping it next to my bed and every time I picked it up the battery was run down too far to game on it. Turning it off meant more time from impulse-to-game. I guess I could leave it with wifi off?

Just not a device for me, considering selling it (as much as I hate dealing with selling shit online).

Unlike the Switch, the Steam Deck is way too big and heavy to hold and play on while lying on your back for any reasonable length of time.

And I'm in the f13 geriatrics club. When I play it in my recliner, it's too far to see with unaided vision, but sits too low to be in the focal length of my transitional lenses  :why_so_serious: :geezer: Ironically, playing while lying on my back in bed is the best way I've enjoyed it...until one of my hands falls asleep.

Not bagging much on the actual device itself, it's amazing. It's a me thing.

I got mine this week. Came down with some kind of sickness that isn't Covid and have otherwise been busy with work, so I haven't really had time to use it much. Feels good though.

Where/how do you get things other than Steam games on it? Emulators, etc.

this is how i play all the time

For emulators the starting place is EmuDeck (https://www.emudeck.com). You'll need to switch to Desktop mode, download the installer through a browser (Firefox is installed by default) and run through the installation steps.

This site has a more detailed install guide than the EmuDeck site though I can't vouch for the accuracy: https://www.gamersdirector.com/steam/how-to-install-emulators-on-steam-deck/

I find Desktop mode a bit tricky to use in handheld mode because controlling the mouse and clicking on buttons in the UI is very "twitchy" with the trackpad so hooking up a mouse and keyboard, at minimum, would be very helpful. If you have a USB-C multi-function hub and can hook it up to a m&k and monitor that would be ideal.

How do you get into Desktop mode?

There a multiple ways but the way I normally do it is:

Steam button (lower left button) -> Power -> Switch to Desktop

Make sure you've saved or are out of any game you are playing before switching.

You'll see the Firefox icon in the bottom task bar after you've switched to Desktop mode.

Official Dock is finally available for $89 (1-2 weeks delivery in US, currently): https://store.steampowered.com/steamdeckdock

Also no more reservations anymore (for now) in US and presumably Europe.

Steam Deck giveaways (one every minute) during The Game Awards this year:

https://store.steampowered.com/sale/thegameawardssteamdeckdrop2022

It's not worth a steam deck to have to watch their stream chat to find out if I won. That's cruel but unfortunately not unusual.

Or arguably having to watch The Game Awards may be the 'cruel' part. OTOH, if you're in an EU timezone, watching a stream between 2 am and 4:30 am probably counts as 'unusual' unless you have an IV drip with doritos + mtn dew ready to go. :awesome_for_real:

Best Steam Deck peripheral: https://www.vice.com/en/article/5d9g9z/ukraine-is-now-using-steam-decks-to-control-machine-gun-turrets