Honest question. Is there a gaming platform where I can play only free games? Or atleast where I don't have to put a credit card number before giving it to my kids?
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Valve Steam Deck
651–660 of 1001 posts
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#652I am so excited about this
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#653Earlier quoted context omitted.
One negative: With all that hardware it’s almost 3 times heavier than the Nintendo Switch, which is already near the upper limit for holding comfortable for longer play sessions. edit: On closer look that's comparing the Switch without controllers (297g) to the Steam Deck with controllers (669g). The Switch with controllers is 398g, so the Steam Deck is only ~1.7x times as heavy - though that's still a lot of extra w…
I've been thoroughly unimpressed with the build quality of the Switch, I'd probably have paid more for a sturdier 'pro' version, to be honest.
Hopefully I can save up the downvotes for a third pair of replacement joycons.
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#654From the FAQ [0]: - What OS is Steam Deck running? SteamOS 3.0, a new version of SteamOS based on Arch Linux. - Will people be able to install Windows, or other 3rd party content? Yes. Steam Deck is a PC, and players will be able to install whatever they like, including other OSes. [0]: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/steamdeck/faq
Isnt using Windows on this thing going to be an awful experience, though?
That's the beauty of a device that respects the fact that it is indeed your hardware. It'll allow you to shoot yourself in the foot however you like.
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#655Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Why is any company having more USB-2 slots than USB-3 these days? Almost certainly has to do with cost and PCI-E bandwidth. Mobile chips like this only have so much bandwidth, and USB3 requires more dedicated bandwidth than USB2, not to mention more complicated circuitry that drives up price. And when your expected use case is attaching keyboards and mice, which generally are USB2 only anyways, it reduces the cost…
It's not really a mobile chip, it's a full laptop-grade Zen 2 processor.
"laptop-grade" is mobile, in CPU terms. That's why Intel marks their laptop chips with an "M" at the end.
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#656Earlier quoted context omitted.
Arch Linux is amazing. The biggest surprise for me was that it's more stable than so-called stable distros, probably because the various packages don't end up drifting several months from each other when keeping up to date. Hopefully this eventually results in more user friendly Arch Linux installers. The learning curve is an absolute wall when installing, even after several years on Linux, but after that it's pretty…
I share your feelings about Arch, but I'm still running Fedora mostly out of laziness. Still, I think Arch is an interesting choice for a console. I'd think you'd want stability (in the sense of very controlled changes / not requiring updates every day).
The problem with Arch is that Arch needs to be tinkered with when Arch wants to be tinkered with, not when you want to spend an evening messing with your OS configuration. "This evening I want to learn about X," becomes "this evening I am learning about the linux userspace ecosystem," for every value of X.
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#657Is this APU good enough to do significant AI/ML workloads that you’d normally have to use Colab for?
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#658Storage seems like it'll be an issue unless you only want to play indie games. It says it's got the hardware to play AAA games, but even last gen AAA games like Doom Eternal won't fit on the base model, and the next step up with more sufficient storage is more expensive than the next gen consoles.
You'll probably be able to hack it and add your own NVME drive. Everything is standard and won't be locked down like Apple's hardware.
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#659Earlier quoted context omitted.
> All models of Steam Deck support expanding your storage via microSD cards. Games stored on a microSD card will appear in your library instantly. This makes buying the model with limited storage a bit of a no-brainer. I'm glad Valve supports external storage.
Eh, UHS-1 is pretty slow compared to an SSD. I think for the types of games I’d want to play on it (emulation) that’d be just fine, but for some it could be a bit annoying. I think they should have gone with a faster interface though.
You could do a small USB-c storage dongle as well.
Re: Valve Steam Deck
#660Earlier 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.
But not all games are "PC" games. Plenty of games that are released on PC are best/better played with a conroller and thanks to the PC being a open platform you have many more choices than console. Hell you can use your console's controllers if you like.