Valve Steam Deck • Hacker News Board

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#641

Post by paulpan » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:49 PM UTC

shadilay wrote: post #218

tyingq wrote: post #80

Pretty nice specs for a handheld battery powered device... Processor AMD APU CPU: Zen 2 4c/8t, 2.4-3.5GHz (up to 448 GFlops FP32) GPU: 8 RDNA 2 CUs, 1.0-1.6GHz (up to 1.6 TFlops FP32) APU power: 4-15W RAM 16 GB LPDDR5 RAM (5500 MT/s) Storage 64 GB eMMC (PCIe Gen 2 x1) 256 GB NVMe SSD (PCIe Gen 3 x4) 512 GB high-speed NVMe SSD (PCIe Gen 3 x4) All models include high-speed microSD card slot Though it does weigh 669 gra…

I was thinking AMD Renoir but Zen 2 and RDNA 2 is an odd combination. Is it custom?

This seems like the rumored AMD Van Gogh for low power configurations: Zen2 CPU + Navi2 GPU. Essentially it's AMD's stop-gap solution before the launch of Rembrandt (Zen3 + Navi2). https://www.tweaktown.com/news/78815/amd-van-gogh-apus-zen-2...

Also agreed that this looks very price competitive. Given storage is SSD-expandable, $399 gives you a fairly powerful mobile gaming platform and PC.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#642

Post by christophilus » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:50 PM UTC

Honestly, those specs are pretty decent[0]. I could see myself using that as a workstation, since it's already preinstalled with Arch.

[0] https://www.steamdeck.com/en/tech

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#643

Post by YouCanDoBetter » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:53 PM UTC

metalliqaz wrote: post #434

minimaxir wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Valve engineers explicitly frame the Steam Deck as a PC with an integrated controller rather than a game console: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLtiRGTZvGM

This allows them to proceed without having to obtain new platform rights from every single publisher on Steam.

It is still a PC though. You can plug it into a monitor, attach a mouse and keyboard, and write a book with it.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#644

Post by yellowapple » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:55 PM UTC

lostmsu wrote: post #572

caconym_ wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing about Valve's record with hardware is that the products aren't bad , just extremely niche. If this thing really can play most of most people's Steam games in a Switch-like form factor with a standard gamepad layout, I think it stands to be a hit in a way their past hardware attempts weren't. It's also an interesting counterpoint to all the streaming services popping up these days. PC game streaming to mobil…

One of the major reasons people play PC games is mouse and keyboard are way better than joystick. I don't see myself playing PC games on a handheld.

Depends on the game. Flight and driving games are vastly better with a gamepad (let alone proper joysticks or steering wheels) than with a keyboard and mouse IMO.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#645

Post by mywittyname » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:55 PM UTC

mattbrewsbytes wrote: post #430

ketzo wrote: post #44

There’s obviously a lot of people who like playing games in a more mobile format, as evidenced by the huge popularity of the Switch Lite / mobile gaming. Giving the PC games market access to that form factor seems, on its face, like an extremely good move. But we’ve seen products like this before — the NVIDIA Shield, for one. Pretty cool piece of tech, but didn’t exactly start a revolution. I guess the question becom…

I think a better question is will games traditionally built for PC's hold up on a mobile device? Mostly I'm thinking about controller vs keyboard+mouse. Typically you have more controls available on PC and when I play the same game on PC I am complete garbage at it because I'm used to controller, maybe I'm too old though.

The videos on the site show people playing Doom Eternal (FPS), Crusader Kings III (4x strategy game), Balder's Gate (top down RPG), and Disco Elysium (point-and-click adventure game). It looks playable to me.

Plus it natively supports "mouse" controls via a few input methods: thumb touch screens and tilt-o-whorl. And if neither of those work, you can use a bluetooth mouse/keyboard.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#646

Post by wly_cdgr » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:57 PM UTC

Amazing. If the hardware is good, this will leave no gaming use case that is not best covered by PC

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#647

Post by tristor » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:58 PM UTC

jonny_eh wrote: post #634

pqdbr wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Mac user, I'm very interested as well. I don't play any games nowadays because I cant justify spending all that money for a latest generation PC, let alone the space it takes. If I can have a dockable PC that can churn decent frame rates, It's just a matter of switching the input on my monitor and switching the bluetooth mouse/keyboard to it. For me, the fact it's portable is just icing on the cake to be honest.…

I recommend checking out Geforce Now, it lets you play many games from your Steam library via cloud streaming.

Unfortunately my experience with Geforce Now was deeply deeply underwhelming when played from a current-gen maxed out Macbook Pro w/ a wired Gigabit connection and 1050Mbps/75Mbps Internet service. It was a horrible lag-fest and felt like the game I was playing was being rendered as a flip-book.

Coming from previously having a top-of-the-line ($6k+) gaming PC a decade ago that still does "okay" on most titles at 1080P to trying to game via GeForce Now from my Macbook was a shockingly bad experience. I'm very interested in the SteamDeck specifically because it allows me to use local hardware to run the game without requiring me to build another $6k+ gaming PC which I might get to use one day a month.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#648

Post by jgerrish » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:59 PM UTC

Man, imagine you were a kid getting one of these for the first time, like a Nintendo or Apple. I can't imagine the magical feeling. I really can't.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#649

Post by yellowapple » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 8:59 PM UTC

baby wrote: post #584

capeterson wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair though, Valve does make the best consumer VR headset available (Valve Index).

What? That’s false. Oculus quest 2 is hands down the best consumer VR headset available. It’s not even comparable.

Having tried both, my preference is definitely for the Index. The controllers alone are a substantial step up, not to mention the graphics, tracking, and pretty much everything else.

The Quest is nice because it's cheaper and self-contained, but that's about all it has going for it.

Re: Valve Steam Deck

#650

Post by pqdbr » Thu, Jul 15, 2021, 9:00 PM UTC

jonny_eh wrote: post #634

pqdbr wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Mac user, I'm very interested as well. I don't play any games nowadays because I cant justify spending all that money for a latest generation PC, let alone the space it takes. If I can have a dockable PC that can churn decent frame rates, It's just a matter of switching the input on my monitor and switching the bluetooth mouse/keyboard to it. For me, the fact it's portable is just icing on the cake to be honest.…

I recommend checking out Geforce Now, it lets you play many games from your Steam library via cloud streaming.

I'm in Brazil, and the latency is a deal breaker.