Valve introduces Steam Deck

[Stasi]

So, I've recently found my ability to sit down at my computer and actively play games cut down significantly. Is a Steam Deck worth getting? I mostly just want to play New Vegas in the comfort of my bed after a long ass day, but all my steam games being available in portable form sounds pretty tight.

I'd say yes if you have the money and don't need it for anything else. Since getting it, I've spent way more time playing games on deck in bed than at my desktop PC.

 

[Tepes Thot]

So, I've recently found my ability to sit down at my computer and actively play games cut down significantly. Is a Steam Deck worth getting? I mostly just want to play New Vegas in the comfort of my bed after a long ass day, but all my steam games being available in portable form sounds pretty tight.

Yes. I’ve been completing games like crazy in between daily life stuff, because it’s so convenient now. I can’t find a reason to regret this purchase if I wanted to.

FNV is next up for me, and I haven’t heard anything bad about its playability.

 

[Toolbox]

I've had a deck for months and really hadn't used it for much - was really a desktop gamer. It was a unique device to me and seemed quite capable, I just had little use for it. Just got it cause I reserved it forever ago. Recently got the official steam dock and started using the deck essentially as a semi portable desktop, and wow. Even at high resolutions Valve's Arch branch that is SteamOS 3 is fucking capable with this hardware. Now, I haven't actually done workstation tasks or gaming yet with this setup, but at 2560x1440 this thing is pushing a lag free linux experience. Jumping from emulating shittier linux branches on windows this is great. Well, it's better than Windows so far in general too. The only gripe is the forced updated because of the "immutable OS" every restart. Giving the option to disable that shit would make this perfect.

 

[Alaric the Visigoth]

I've experienced some games have trouble starting up that are verified like Eldenring.

 

[Toolbox]

I've experienced some games have trouble starting up that are verified like Eldenring.

Some games certainly do seem to take longer to start than they tend to on a full desktop running win10, but it's understandable when the hardware is a minipc running on a battery. It's certanly not an extended amount of time that makes it much of an issue. When even EA titles can launch even with the shoehorned launcher drm, it's working almost as well as it can.

 

[ShitLurker]

Yes. I’ve been completing games like crazy in between daily life stuff, because it’s so convenient now. I can’t find a reason to regret this purchase if I wanted to.

FNV is next up for me, and I haven’t heard anything bad about its playability.

Same boat. I'm getting some very good use out of it. Only emulation for the moment except for Inscryption, but once a few jrpgs I care about come out I'll definitely go hard through the deck for the most part. More action stuff like Elden Ring I rather keep on the desktop though.

 

[Toolbox]

Does the steam dock actually overclock the system or allow it to reach some predetermined normal level of processing power, whatever like the switch dock does? Yes I'm technically illiterate on this bit, I'm guessing on battery the system is actually throttled like a laptop and being plugged in allows something like this to reach some baseline. Not sure if it actually does though.

 

[Product Placement]

Does the steam dock actually overclock the system or allow it to reach some predetermined normal level of processing power, whatever like the switch dock does? Yes I'm technically illiterate on this bit, I'm guessing on battery the system is actually throttled like a laptop and being plugged in allows something like this to reach some baseline. Not sure if it actually does though.

The dock doesn't overclock the steam deck, but you can play at a higher res or at 120fps if you wish depending on the dock. Mean it is a PC so if you wish to overclock it you could, but not sure if it would be worth the trade offs.

 

[The Ghost of Kviv]

Does the steam dock actually overclock the system or allow it to reach some predetermined normal level of processing power, whatever like the switch dock does? Yes I'm technically illiterate on this bit, I'm guessing on battery the system is actually throttled like a laptop and being plugged in allows something like this to reach some baseline. Not sure if it actually does though.

The Steam Deck does not limit performance depending on if it's charging or not. As a user you can choose to turn on power saving measures in software.

The dock doesn't overclock the steam deck, but you can play at a higher res or at 120fps if you wish depending on the dock. Mean it is a PC so if you wish to overclock it you could, but not sure if it would be worth the trade offs.

IIRC, the deck's UEFI doesn't have any options for PBO or PPT/VDO/etc. control. Can't overclock in current year without those.

 

[ShitLurker]

Pretty much. 3 houses in general goes smooth for the most part, kirby I just assume has a solid variety of shit happening so shaders are less of a onean done.

But even then it can be very hit and miss. Metroid Dread went like a dream from start to finish on my desktop, Live A live had some graphical oopsies once in a while but fine outside of that, yet 3 houses had constant slowdown and music breakup while triangle strategy was stuttery till a newer version of the emulator came out and I suddenly didn't have those issues.

I also have to clarify I haven't setup power tools on my switch to fuck around. I have heard fiddling with those settings helps performance but I have a certain respect at the prospect of fucking with the cores. I also haven't fiddled with the Yuzu settings outside of the defaults from Emudeck.

A bit of an update from what I posted here. Finally decided to install Power Tools. Disabling the SMT toggle (the first one) and leaving at 4 threads I got a good performance boost on the switch. Kirby is now a lot more fluid, when loading there is a heavy stutteeing sometimes like of it was buffering, but that's the extent of it. Fire emblem is also more fluid, though some graphical oopsidoodles still pop up here and there. Pokemon Scarlet which was unplayable a month ago is now performing pretty god though emulator updates I pressumer are a much bigger factor for this.

 

[Dr. Geronimo]

https://twitter.com/gamingonlinux/status/1617955545981538304

lmao

 

[WaveCruising]

Perhaps I'm misinformed, but from what I can tell the Steam Deck's controls do not work without the steam client running. If so, is there some kind of third party, open source workaround?

 

[Belvedere]

Perhaps I'm misinformed, but from what I can tell the Steam Deck's controls do not work without the steam client running. If so, is there some kind of third party, open source workaround?

By "without the Steam Client" running, do you mean quitting to the desktop environment? If that is the case I don't see why that would cause the controls to cease to function. I can't imagine that would be the case for the Deck specially when the controls are hardwired.

Speaking from experience as a Linux desktop user, even without Steam running in the background an Xinput controller will be recognized by the system. I have played Linux native GOG games with an Xbox 360 controller.

As for an Open Source solution there is an application similar to Xpadder for Linux called AntiMicroX which allows you to map mouse and keyboard inputs to a gamepad.

Again, I can't imagine Valve making the Deck's controls non-functional even without Steam running in the background.

 

[The Ghost of Kviv]

Perhaps I'm misinformed, but from what I can tell the Steam Deck's controls do not work without the steam client running. If so, is there some kind of third party, open source workaround?

Out of the box, that's true. I haven't looked into why that's the case. I suspect it's because the Deck is clobbered together from varied discontinued products, and drivers don't exist in the kernel for all of them.

As for an Open Source solution there is an application similar to Xpadder for Linux called AntiMicroX which allows you to map mouse and keyboard inputs to a gamepad.

This should work.

 

[The Ghost of Kviv]

Technically a double-post, but it's been long enough, so I'm hoping this will pass.

Perhaps I'm misinformed, but from what I can tell the Steam Deck's controls do not work without the steam client running. If so, is there some kind of third party, open source workaround?

Kernel 6.3 added initial support for the Deck's controls. SteamOS tracks the LTS release, however, so I would expect another 6 months for support to land out-of-the-box.

Steam Deck Controller Interface Seeing Initial Support With Linux 6.3 - Phoronix

www.phoronix.com

 

[Blue Miaplacidus]

got xenia working on the deck, and red dead has so far been playing very smooth and without issue. I'm unsure of any other games as I have no other 360 roms.

 

[Dr. Geronimo]

To all the owners of the Deck: What are your thoughts on it since we've hit the year anniversary?

 

[The Ghost of Kviv]

View attachment 4632612
To all the owners of the Deck: What are your thoughts on it since we've hit the year anniversary?

The B button is flimsy, and too far to the edge. It's a good start, and I'm looking forward to a new one with DDR6.

 

[Stasi]

View attachment 4632612
To all the owners of the Deck: What are your thoughts on it since we've hit the year anniversary?

Great for what I use it for which is mostly emulation, its the best value device as far as I'm aware that will comfortably handle PS2/Gamecube and I've played through a bunch of PS2 games that I never would have got around to otherwise.

For purely PC gaming its a little bit hit and miss for me, I don't have many Steam games and I find Heroic for Epic/GOG to be extremely janky and annoying to use. If you have a big steam library its probably better and more user friendly for the verified games.

 

[Dojima's Dragon]

Great for what I use it for which is mostly emulation, its the best value device as far as I'm aware that will comfortably handle PS2/Gamecube and I've played through a bunch of PS2 games that I never would have got around to otherwise.

For purely PC gaming its a little bit hit and miss for me, I don't have many Steam games and I find Heroic for Epic/GOG to be extremely janky and annoying to use. If you have a big steam library its probably better and more user friendly for the verified games.

Is it possible to install windows 11 since as someone who wants to switch to pc but is a poorfag.