Valve’s Steam Deck has undoubtedly rattled some cages in the PC gaming world, and it caught the world by surprise. It is a device designed to provide PC gamers with a handheld console alternative to the usual experience, which adds quite a lot of flexibility and variations in how we will play PC games in the future. Furthermore, just like the Nintendo Switch, it is possible to connect the Steam Deck to an external display, such as the television, or a computer monitor, closing the gap between PC and console gaming. On top of that, the Steam Deck got designed with portable gaming in mind, with enough battery power to play simple 2D games or browse the web for up to six hours.
What About Steam Deck’s Operating System?
The Steam Deck is not running on Windows operating system, instead of a Linux-based SteamOS version 3.0. It is a modified variation of the Arch Linux platform. Before the Steam Deck, Valve used Debian based Linux platform to develop Steam Machines, but this system was missing a key feature for Steam Deck, which would allow it to have rolling updates down the line. With this in mind, one could argue about compatibility between games designed for the Windows platform and Linux representing an issue. However, Valve is working with developers to accelerate a solution to this issue by supporting Proton. This platform makes it possible for nearly the entire Steam library to run on a Linux-based machine.
Hopefully, the Proton support comes entirely into fruition as Steam does have a vast library of games, from advanced shooters to simple card-based games. We would imagine that the Steam Deck would be the perfect platform for simpler 2D games that have excellent visuals and gameplay mechanics, such as Slay the Spire, Tabletop Simulator, or Royal Casino: Video Poker. Playing these casino-based games on a device such as the Steam Deck would genuinely be a fantastic experience. In addition, steam Deck will feature a capable web browser that will allow players to access online gaming websites and enhance the experience with portable gaming benefits.
Steam Deck Hardware Specifications
Valve has partnered with AMD to design a custom-made accelerated processing unit to power the console. It uses the Zen 2 platform, featuring RDNA 2, and it has a four-core eight-thread processor. The processor is to have frequencies of up to 3.5 GHz, putting it somewhere in the range of the Ryzen 3000 CPU. In terms of graphics processing, the unit installed into the Steam Deck is comparable to the Radeon RX 6000 graphics cards. In terms of RAM, the Steam Deck will have 16GB of LPDDR5 memory. Storage might be a big deal as already there are price ranges based on the storage capacity. The most affordable option will come with 64GB of eMMC storage, costing US$399. The 256GB NVMe SSD one will cost US$529, while the most expensive one at US$649 comes with a 512GB NVMe SSD. Steam Deck will be upgradeable in terms of storage through the microSD card slot, the guys over at EsportsHeadlines.com compiled a list of them, including the biggest SD card for Steam Deck, so do check them out.