Valve’s gaming handheld is called the Steam Deck and it’s shipping in December

 

The Steam Deck, Valve's long-rumored Switch-like handheld gaming gadget, was just announced. It will be available for purchase in December, and reservations will start on July 16th at 1 p.m. ET. It starts at $399 and is also available in $529 and $649 variants.

The gadget has an AMD APU with a quad-core Zen 2 CPU with eight threads and AMD RDNA 2 graphics worth eight compute units, as well as 16GB of LPDDR5 RAM. According to Valve, three storage tiers are available: 64GB eMMC storage for $399, 256GB NVMe SSD storage for $529, and 512GB of high-speed NVME SSD storage for $649. The high-speed microSD card slot can also be used to expand the available capacity.

The Steam Deck comes with a plethora of control choices. There are two thumbsticks, as well as two small, Steam Controller-style trackpads beneath the thumbsticks, which could help with first-person shooter precision. ABXY buttons, a D-pad, and a 7-inch 1280 x 800 touchscreen for 720p gameplay are also on the front of the Steam Deck. A gyroscope is also included in the gadget for motion control. It has two shoulder triggers on each side, four back buttons (two on each side), and built-in microphones, just like the Switch.

Here’s a legend to all of the Deck’s ports and controls:

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“Steam Deck's onboard 40 watt-hour battery enables several hours of play time for most games,” Valve claims of the battery. “You should expect a maximum battery life of roughly 7-8 hours for milder use cases like game streaming, smaller 2D games, or web browsing.” “You can play Portal 2 for four hours on this thing,” Valve tells IGN. You'll be playing for 5-6 hours if you limit it to 30 frames per second.”

If you need to take a break from your game, the Steam Deck has a simple suspend / resume option built into SteamOS that allows you to put the device to sleep and restart your game later.

Valve will also sell a dock that will allow you to prop up a Steam Deck and connect it to external screens such as a TV. The “Deck can be connected in to your TV, monitor, or even your old CRT if you have the correct cables,” according to Valve, so you won't need a dock to connect it to a TV. The Deck has fully functional USB-C connections with HDMI, Ethernet, and USB data, as well as conventional Bluetooth. Native Bluetooth audio will be available, which the Nintendo Switch lacks.

On the software side of things, the Steam Deck runs what Valve is calling “a new version of SteamOS,” that it’s optimized for the handheld’s mobile form factor. But the actual OS is based on Linux, and will use Proton as a compatibility layer to allow Windows-based games to run without requiring that developers specifically port them for the Steam Deck.

However, the Steam Deck is still a full-fledged Linux computer, so more technically savvy users will be able to access the conventional Linux desktop as well. You'll be able to connect a mouse, keyboard, and monitor, as well as instal other game stores, ordinary PC applications, access the web, and more, according to Valve.

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The Steam Deck, according to Valve, is designed to mimic the usual Steam software on desktop, complete with chat, alerts, cloud save support, and synchronisation of your library, collections, and favourites. If you want even more power, you can use Valve's Remote Play function to stream games directly to the Steam Deck from your gaming PC.

When reservations for all three versions open on Friday afternoon, they’ll initially be available only to accounts with purchases on Steam before June 2021, in a bid to keep reseller bots at bay. There’s also a refundable $5 reservation fee, and one reservation per person. Your reservation isn’t exactly a preorder, but it does put you in line to preorder the system once there’s inventory available.

In December, the first units will be available in the United States, Canada, the European Union, and the United Kingdom, with other areas following in 2022. The preorder invitations are supposed to go out before December, and if you miss your window on the invite, your reservation fee will be refunded to your Steam Wallet.

However, the Steam Deck is still a full-fledged Linux computer, so more technically savvy users will be able to access the conventional Linux desktop as well. You'll be able to connect a mouse, keyboard, and monitor, as well as instal other game stores, ordinary PC applications, access the web, and more, according to Valve.

The Steam Deck, according to Valve, is designed to mimic the usual Steam software on desktop, complete with chat, alerts, cloud save support, and synchronisation of your library, collections, and favourites. If you want even more power, you can use Valve's Remote Play function to stream games directly to the Steam Deck from your gaming PC.

When reservations for all three versions open on Friday afternoon, they’ll initially be available only to accounts with purchases on Steam before June 2021, in a bid to keep reseller bots at bay. There’s also a refundable $5 reservation fee, and one reservation per person. Your reservation isn’t exactly a preorder, but it does put you in line to preorder the system once there’s inventory available.

In December, the first units will be available in the United States, Canada, the European Union, and the United Kingdom, with other areas following in 2022. The preorder invitations are supposed to go out before December, and if you miss your window on the invite, your reservation fee will be refunded to your Steam Wallet.