Valve reveals Steam Deck OLED for November 16th

Great news for those of us waiting to grab one used for cheaper. Go on everyone, sell your older models to fund your upgrade


Last edited by Salvatos on 10 November 2023 at 2:02 am UTC

I love my 55" LG G1 OLED TV. It damn near brings tear to my eye (in a good way) watching stuff on it. The G3s are even better too apparently. I might upgrade to what comes next depending on my bonus/tax refund if I can manage to do so. Cause I really wish I'd have sprang for the 65". I'll either move my G1 into the bedroom, or just sell it. lol

Greatly looking forward to your YouTube review!! Super happy you got a review unit.

I'm very surprised not refreshing the cpu/gpu so this is more of a basic refresh. they might be holding off to all the new apu's get released though and get bugs and thermals sorted before a major upgrade though.

I also wonder why it takes them longer than to AMD in laptops to refresh the APU. AMD are already shipping Zen 4 / RDNA 3 laptop APUs.

The "best" handheld PCs right now use the Ryzen 7840U which is at best 20% better performance at 30W. Deck targets 15W, and Valve worked closely with AMD to dial in a spec for their RDNA2 chipset used in the Deck. It's part of the secret sauce behind the Deck's continued performance.
The other reason is there simply isn't anything to upgrade to right now. AMD probably has something coming down the pipe, but Valve have gone on record saying they want devs to know the hardware spec to aim for for several years in advance. Hence we won't see SD 2.0 until 2026, at my guess.
I'm not a writer, and I'm not in the know as much as Liam and the wider tech community, but we really need someone to write an article explaining to people why Valve "doesn't just ship a real upgrade". There's myriad reasons.

Well, this may not be a Steam Deck 2, but it seems at any rate something around Steam Deck 1.2 or so.

valve will think twice before they launch the deck 2, after all , tey dont know how to count to 3

https://www.pcgamer.com/steam-deck-oled-battery-life-improvements-coming-to-lcd-versions/

At least they're bringing battery life and other optimizations to the LCD models as well.

Fun fact:
I just realised how much fun it is to say "Deck OLED" out loud. Much better than Switch OLED.

Now back to pondering if I´m gonna take this upgrade or not...


Last edited by RavenWings on 10 November 2023 at 8:06 am UTC

I hope that they keep LCD as an option when the Steam Deck 2 eventually comes along. OLEDs hurt my eyes no matter how much you can change the brightness, and I also don't want to waste money on hardware that's guaranteed to die due to the organic components, so they're always a dealbreaker for me, unfortunately!

Also, I prefer to have a LCD option as long as its cheaper. I went for the cheapest option with my current Steam Deck since SD storage is all I need.

Well, this may not be a Steam Deck 2, but it seems at any rate something around Steam Deck 1.2 or so.

valve will think twice before they launch the deck 2, after all , tey dont know how to count to 3

Relax, they will simply release a Steam Deck 2: Episode 2 😛

Well, this may not be a Steam Deck 2, but it seems at any rate something around Steam Deck 1.2 or so.

valve will think twice before they launch the deck 2, after all , tey dont know how to count to 3

Relax, they will simply release a Steam Deck 2: Episode 2 😛

lol

Isn't everything guaranteed to die?

To a degree, but not like this - being organic is a major downside of Organic-LEDs.

Though they're not quite as short-lived today, the first ones to market were dying off within months to a year, and often not fully, with huge chunks or lines suddenly going missing.

Anyone remember the original PS Vita? The OLED was such a problem that the "Lite" revision replaced it with a standard LCD.

Ha, after buying a 77" OLED TV, I definitely get annoyed by light bleed. Never bothered me before...

But for sure, OLED screens can be obnoxiously bright, especially for someone who has gotten lasik surgery.

I haven't had any eye-surgery, but I just can't look at those bloody things. They're completely unusable for me.

My original Vitas screen still looks fine. No idea about the probabilities, though.

Personally, I think this is good for all of us, as this update should help keep our Decks relevant. These updates will keep the Deck competetive against ROG, Legion, etc. and the stable baseline and resolution should ensure every SteamDeck out in the wild will still be a viable target for developers. I understand some people buying a Deck recently feel bad about this, as they would have waited had they known, yet if Valve hadn't improved on the platform, we would all have been of a lot worse.

I'm not sure what I would do. Since I got my standalone VR headset, my Deck usage has reduced significantly. I feel tempted to gift my old Deck to my sister and get it, but I'm just not sure.

Also, I prefer to have a LCD option as long as its cheaper. I went for the cheapest option with my current Steam Deck since SD storage is all I need.

I must admit, I've yet to see an LCD option that isn't cheaper. Which is good, of course.

Personally, I think this is good for all of us, as this update should help keep our Decks relevant. These updates will keep the Deck competetive against ROG, Legion, etc. and the stable baseline and resolution should ensure every SteamDeck out in the wild will still be a viable target for developers.

Totally agreed.

A year or two before minor revisions like this is about the norm in the handheld space, and folks often worry about it, but they're generally a sign of a system that's doing well enough for particular parts to have been superseded by similar-but-slightly-better drop-in replacements; See, for example, the Nintendo DSi, New Nintendo 3DS, etc., versus the original models - nobody ever really targets the revised models, and they just publicise the revisions for folks who feel that bigger numbers are better. It usually means that the device is here to stay for a while yet.

I understand some people buying a Deck recently feel bad about this, as they would have waited had they known, yet if Valve hadn't improved on the platform, we would all have been of a lot worse.

I must be one of the only ones who's glad I already got one, so that I got a display I can actually look at!

Also, I prefer to have a LCD option as long as its cheaper. I went for the cheapest option with my current Steam Deck since SD storage is all I need.

I must admit, I've yet to see an LCD option that isn't cheaper. Which is good, of course.

Personally, I think this is good for all of us, as this update should help keep our Decks relevant. These updates will keep the Deck competetive against ROG, Legion, etc. and the stable baseline and resolution should ensure every SteamDeck out in the wild will still be a viable target for developers.

Totally agreed.

A year or two before minor revisions like this is about the norm in the handheld space, and folks often worry about it, but they're generally a sign of a system that's doing well enough for particular parts to have been superseded by similar-but-slightly-better drop-in replacements; See, for example, the Nintendo DSi, New Nintendo 3DS, etc., versus the original models - nobody ever really targets the revised models, and they just publicise the revisions for folks who feel that bigger numbers are better. It usually means that the device is here to stay for a while yet.

I understand some people buying a Deck recently feel bad about this, as they would have waited had they known, yet if Valve hadn't improved on the platform, we would all have been of a lot worse.

I must be one of the only ones who's glad I already got one, so that I got a display I can actually look at!

Other examples are the GBA/SP and the DS lineages.

The question becomes, will they continue to support the now old, obsolete Steam Decks?

The 256GB model is staying as LCD so yes, and the software behind them is largely the same remember (minus the extras for the new OLED ofc).

Official Steam Deck (OLED) page already exist and it have FAQ. Majority questions and speculations have answers there.
Atleast OLED crowd will be bit muted... ofc now 4K, 144Hz and others will scream louder...

Atleast OLED crowd will be bit muted... ofc now 4K, 144Hz and others will scream louder...

There will always be a group of people who aren't satisfied with a product, and want another version to fit some ideal they came up with.

Atleast OLED crowd will be bit muted... ofc now 4K, 144Hz and others will scream louder...

There will always be a group of people who aren't satisfied with a product, and want another version to fit some ideal they came up with.

Every gaming display in this (and all coming) decades should use variable refresh rate ("Gsync" and such).

You're welcome. ;)

Atleast OLED crowd will be bit muted... ofc now 4K, 144Hz and others will scream louder...

There will always be a group of people who aren't satisfied with a product, and want another version to fit some ideal they came up with.

Every gaming display in this (and all coming) decades should use variable refresh rate ("Gsync" and such).

You're welcome. ;)

Yea? There could be dozens of reasons Valve didn't include it in the announcement. Maybe the specific configuration they want isn't ready yet, maybe it still has too many bugs to work out. Maybe it actually is compatible and will be enabled by default at a later date.

It's easy to make that claim looking at it from the outside, but we're just not privy to all the internal details.

Aaaah! Wake from bluetooth controller... Missed that one. Even better.
Valve is positionning the Steam Deck as a console, when docked. For my part, all that's missing is USB4 support and an egpu docking station. Who knows, it might be possible to do something with an RX7600m or similar portable chip inside? Steam Deck 2, maybe? For VR and the Deckard?

Neat. I was always on the fence about getting one, and now I'm even more so!

Atleast OLED crowd will be bit muted... ofc now 4K, 144Hz and others will scream louder...

There will always be a group of people who aren't satisfied with a product, and want another version to fit some ideal they came up with.

Every gaming display in this (and all coming) decades should use variable refresh rate ("Gsync" and such).

You're welcome. ;)

Yea? There could be dozens of reasons Valve didn't include it in the announcement. Maybe the specific configuration they want isn't ready yet, maybe it still has too many bugs to work out. Maybe it actually is compatible and will be enabled by default at a later date.

It's easy to make that claim looking at it from the outside, but we're just not privy to all the internal details.

This was a joke regarding expectations of gamers always wanting more. Should be clear from the quoted context, IMHO. (But I seriously wouldn't buy a full blown monitor without it anymore.)