isn’t the Deck also just like… better than those devices? like obviously they have more compute power and whatnot but everything i read about the ASUS one was that the extra hardware power meant nothing when everything was bogged down by Windows and other issues
this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2023
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Steam Deck
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The main problem with any sort of discussion like this is that "better" is going to mean different things to different people.
Is the one with longer battery life better?
Is the one with more powerful hardware better?
Is the one with trackpads better?
Is the one that can play non-Steam games with less hassle better, even if its UX is overall clunkier?
Is the one with a smoother UX better, even if you might not be able to play every single game you own on it?
Deck is going to be better in some ways for some people, and the Ally (et al.) will be better in some ways for other people. At the end of the day, the entire market segment is better for all of us because competing devices exist. Trying to turn this into a zero-sum turf war is only going to be detrimental to everyone. (Not saying that that's what you are doing, just speaking in general about what tends to happen when comparisons like this get brought up.)
Yeah, honestly I pre-ordered the Deck and felt like it was a real gamble at the time. Like, "no way it's going to be able to play many major titles - especially given the dearth of AAA games on Linux - but I want to support the idea and am willing to give it a shot".
Then I got it and frankly I was amazed, not just at what portable hardware can do but also at the amount of work Valve has contributed towards the software side, Proton in particular. A year since I got it and award-winning AAA games run nicely. Not always out-the-gate but that's an issue for many systems.
Even if the Ally is better hardware (and I can't say one way or the other) Valve was the first to make a real investment in a hardware ecosystem for real portable PC gaming (no, I'm not counting cheap Chinese systems running dodgy software).
Also, kudos to AMD for the chip powering the thing, as it's a pretty damn good balance between power output and consumption.
Same, I saw it as a gamble. I set my preorder, and saved up for the following months until the device released.
I had been looking into this space for years wishing it would get better and cheaper. It's the only thing that I have been willing to preorder and be a "beta" tester for in several years
The OS makes the steam deck better than any other handheld since all the others just ship with windows and I cannot imagine using windows on a gaming handheld like this. Yes I would love it if my deck had USB4 andother fun up to date hardware, but the OS is the best part about it for now anyway.
The OS makes the steam deck better than any other handheld
Agreed, but with the addition of "for me" at the end there. What makes it better for you and me is going to be a drawback for someone who only plays, say, Destiny 2, Fortnite, or things that are on Game Pass Ultimate.
Yeah, that theoretical person is going to have an absolute garbage time navigating the OS itself, but that's what they have to put up with to be able to play the games they want on a handheld PC. They might very well find that trade-off worthwhile, and it's not for us to tell them they're wrong.
Thats what remote play is for. If you wanna play those games seriously then maybe just keep using your computer.
The Ally is better at all the things that don't really matter, in my opinion.
in my opinion.
That being the key phrase.
My opinion pretty much aligns with yours, but the point is that no one can make sweeping objective statements about which is better (like this article and so many others try to do) since different things matter to different people. A variety of different options in the market is only a good thing.
Sure I understand and agree with you. I was just elaborating.
Performance on the Ally is incredible. I benchmarked the CPU against my 5900X desktop and the Ally won (single threaded)!
It's all down to the awful software experience. Every time I pick it up, there's something annoying about it. Armoury crate has crashed, the battery died while it was sleeping, it doesn't recognize controller input, it hasn't detected a game is running and is still in power saving mode, it's being finicky about the USB-C adapter and throttling (only the included adapter seems to work, anything else, including 100W and PPS etc. adapters say they aren't powerful enough), the RGB lights are freaking out, it needs a restart. It's just perpetual troubleshooting and annoyance.
When it works, it's amazing. The whole experience is gorgeous. It's super fast, the display is smooth, etc.
Combined with the microsd card overhearing issues, I just don't think it's a good purchase. I'll definitely be sending mine back.
How is the sleep/resume functionality? I've heard mixed reports about Windows-based handhelds ranging anywhere from "it doesn't have anything like that" to "it works perfectly fine just like Deck/Switch".
That is pretty much the killer feature of the Deck for me, and as far as I'm currently aware, that's enabled by it using Linux/SteamOS. If I can't sleep/resume a game on a handheld, I'd be much more inclined to just play on my desktop and reap the benefits of improved performance and graphics.
Ya, I've had it work once or twice where it just comes back and the game is able to resume. Generally though, the system is either dead or shut down or hibernating and not usable. I generally don't even try and use the suspend option. I save and exit out of the game to avoid messing up my save games.
It absolutely does not work as well as the Switch. It's one of the various constant annoyances of using the Ally.
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I was talking about the Ally, not the steam deck.
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This sounds like the PC experience to me but handheld. If it's windows it's an automatic deal breaker for me.
Steam deck definitely went the switch route. Simple user experience. Lower end spec so games can standardise towards it.
I just can't believe that they expect people who bought the Ally to interface with the regular ass Win11 desktop without touchpads. Sure, horsepower and a better display is cool, but not at the expense of battery life and heat. I hope it's successful so we get revisions and incentive for others to get in the game, but it it's not quite there for me.
Has anyone put steamOS onto an Ally yet? I think Windows will eventually come to the party with a decent mobile version tailored towards games, but until then I cant think of anything worse than windows on such a small screen without a better interface than just joysticks and buttons.
While not the official Steam OS, which Valve still hasn't released officially, people have thrown Arch on one to do benchmarking comparisons and there are tutorials for getting Linux on it.
Huh, I didnt realise this iteration of steamOS hadn't released. I remember tinkering with the distro they released (probably in alpha/beta) back in the day when steam machines were going to be a thing,
They switched from a Debian based OS to an Arch based immutable fork for the Deck. There are folks who have built a close version to SteamOS 3, but there would be no need if Valve would just release the official OS. I can't imagine why they haven't. It would only make it cheaper for other hardware manufacturers to release a product. I don't know how much of the Ally's price is just covering the Windows license, but it has to be a substantial percentage of the overall retail price.
I think the main selling point of the Ally is Windows though.
There are plenty of people who are scared to touch linux, even with a nice launcher on top that does everything for you if you are happy with a vanilla experience. I personally know people, in their 30s as well, who said a while back that they would rather wait for a windows handheld for "stability". They havent picked up an Ally though.
It's an immutable filesystem fork of Arch, not vanilla Arch. It's as stable as any operating system is, doesn't update in the same way Arch does, and doesn't even allow the user sudo privilege. Also, you don't even need to interface with Linux. The front end is extremely intuitive, but you also have the option of a pretty great KDE Plasma desktop mode if you switch over. Fortunately, it has no Candy Crush, Teams, or Cortana in the Start Menu.
So i can fetch AUR packages on the Steam Deck?
I’ve reached the point where “better” mostly means “smoothest experience.” That might include not crashing and low overhead. That almost certainly includes a smooth and predictable UI. That means a well thought out system design that balances performance considerations with size and weight, battery life, controller layout, and little things like fan noise.
Honestly, I’m fine with my Switch. It was my first handheld, and I appreciate the variety of games as well as the convenience. I ordered the steam deck because I have a massive library of unplayed or unfinished games on steam, and it seemed like the right way to go for that. I have a windows PC that is still sitting wrapped by movers and never unpacked.
For my “It just works” low water mark, the Deck looked like my best bet for non-switch gaming, and maybe now I can get past the first town on RDR2.
I have both and even with all of the Ally’s jank I’ll take the Ally over the Deck any day. The extra hardware power and the VRR screen means the games I play are silky smooth.
I honestly can’t go back to the Deck.
Choice in this market is good for end users, as is competition. Both of the machines are a compromise in one way or another and different in substantial ways, so it's really just down to personal preference. I can't wait to see how this market grows over the next few years.
I love how the author went from "these units are technically better than the deck" to "I guess if the deck had the same build problems as these other handhelds, they'd be more forgiving".
Better specs mean dick if your build quality is shit.
Hard disagree. Steam Deck is good because it fills a niche that no other handheld PC fulfills. You can't really nitpick when there isn't really any competitors.
The Deck isn't the most powerful, its display isn't the best, it isn't the cheapest. What people like the author seem to miss is that the Deck wasn't marketed to be the most powerful, or the best display, or the cheapest. It was designed to balance all these design considerations, such that even though it's not best at anything, it's not bad at anything either. That's really the allure of the Deck for me, that I don't really need to work around any limitations
Yeah I dont get the sentiment at all. If it was trash and couldn't run anything it wouldn't sell. But it's not, and it runs damn near everything, even if some higher end games will destroy the battery in 25 minutes, it'll be a great 25 minutes. You can also stop at any point in any game and just come back later and it resumes seamlessly, almost instantaneously, and with next to no battery loss. I'm not being sarcastic, I've never had ANY game system that can do that. The closest is the PS5 with rest mode but it's still way behind ateamdeck in wake up time. It's a first gen release and it's capable of things no other console (maybe switch - I don't actually know, I don't have one) handheld or otherwise, has been able to do.
Like love or hate valve all you want, but there's really not a lot to shit on the steam deck about. It's had like three competitors come out and two most people already forgot exist (Logitech something, and some other one). The Asus one seems capable but is bottlenecked by using windows. Let's not forget Google's attempt at a revolutionary gaming product.
To be fair, the logitech G Cloud was never going to be a competitor to the deck, since it's not made to run things on the bare metal
Just because it isn't a real competitor doesn't mean that it wasn't meant to be one. It was developed targeting what Logitech thought would be the biggest use case for deck, which was playing games that could be streamed, and have other hardware do the bulk of the lifting. The problem is that deck can also do that, and does it better. It was probably a fairly low effort cash grab by Logitech, but they still made it and sunk a ton of R&D costs into getting it out near the deck release.
It was probably developed directly in response to the deck being announced, in order to compete in an open market. If it wasn't directly in response, then they still felt strongly enough that it would compete that they didn't cut their losses after the deck was announced.
Lol Forbes.com is definitely where I go to read about gaming handhelds.
This sounds like a weird vendetta with a bunch of random nit picks. The Steam Deck certainly isn't perfect, but the value at the price is pretty much best in market and there are higher end options for those who want to spend more
I do love my Deck and use it all the time. It is also the most frustrating piece of kit I've owned in a long while.
I've always been concerned about the build quality too. Mine is well looked after, only 7 months since new, and I keep it in the case when not used. I noticed literally yesterday theres a crack in the upper front portion of the deck housing, directly middle above the LCD. How?!
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Oh yes the software is the frustrating part for me, far more than any hardware issues. For many of your reasons. I should have clarified. The hardware I fucking love, apart from that goddamn crack in the middle of the air vents :(
But despite the issues I still love the thing, and it is absolutely the best Game Boy Advance I've ever owned too which helps
Everyone's already mentioned the touchpads and SteamOS, but I've also not found any other device besides my Steam Deck that runs games as capably at 10W / 15W. That's important for me in a handheld. Too bad the screen doesn't support VRR or it'd have been perfect.
As someone who games at 4k on a video card from 2017, I can confirm that VRR is a must-have feature for gaming at lower frame rates.
VRR means that falling off your set frame rate doesn't matter. 56 FPS is just as smooth as 60 FPS. If something explodes and the game drops to 40 for a second, you don't really notice.
Steam Deck has also been the harbinger of Proton development. Even if you don't own one and never plan to own one, you now have the option of gaming rigs which run Windows games without needing the cost and bloat of Windows. That is an absolutely unprecedented game changer (pun intended).
Of course there are issues with the Deck. But it's not like Valve's "good guy image" came from nothing.
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