At some point, Valve quietly tweaked the specifications for the upcoming official Steam Deck Dock and it's actually better than what they said originally. We still don't even know exactly when it will be out, and they likely want to improve the overall docked experience first as there's quite a few quirks (especially in desktop mode).
Originally, the Steam Deck Dock listed it had 1 x USB-A 3.1 Port and 2 x USB-A 2.0 Ports along with Ethernet. Now though, it states it has 3 x USB-A 3.1 Ports and Gigabit Ethernet.
Seems this was updated in February, when checking the Wayback Machine it shows the text specifications with the original on February 12 but then the text was updated sometime around February 22 to note the newer ports. Later around February 25 the actual image of the Dock was updated to also note it has Gigabit Ethernet too.
Seems Valve are also now calling it a "Docking Station", which was noted around February 22 too.
At least for now, this USB-C Hub has been working well enough for me, as noted in my original review.
Quoting: M@GOidGaming performance would be bottlenecked by the quadcore CPU. Youtube Channel ETA Prime kept their promise of testing a external GPU via the m.2 slot. While there were gains in most games, it is clear that the CPU cannot keep up with something much more powerful than the iGPU.
This actually demonstrates that the components of the Steam Deck APU were carefully chosen, to make the best use of its 15W power limit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WEGY6aY8lM
I didn't watch the video yet but yeah, of course the CPU is a bottleneck, games can't run at extremely high fps, but a GPU will help to run games at higher resolution on same fps.
Quoting: japzoneNot possible since the Steam Deck only has USB 3.2 Gen 2 which, not only doesn't have enough bandwidth for an eGPU, it doesn't have the needed PCIe access. You'd need USB4/Thunderbolt 3+ if you want an eGPU over USB-C.
Currently the only viable eGPU method on the Steam Deck involves using an adapter to plug a GPU into the M.2 SSD slot inside the device.
Oh true, I forgot about this "little" detail.
That's really nice that they upgraded the specs. I'll admit, I think I expected a physical docking station, like laptop or the Switch, where the Deck would Dock on the Deck Dock.
Last edited by TheRiddick on 24 April 2022 at 4:31 am UTC
The whole world is moving towards USB Type-C, albeit slowly... It would have made waaay more sense to include multiple USB Type-C ports, and just one or two USB Type-A 3.1 ports (it's just silly to use superseded standards).
I really don't understand the logic here... Not that it matters, because Australians can't get the Steam Deck anyway, and by the time we will be able to, USB4 (the latest standard, released in 2019) will probably be commonplace. 🙄
Quoting: GuestNo acknowledgement for the news tip, Liam? cries in LinuxI've been aware of this for a while just hadn't gotten around to it until now. We often get lots of duplicate tips, and plenty I just know myself from looking around.
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