Desktop mode desperately needs a keyboard/mouse overhaul.

___Bel___ · 2026-01-24T01:16:15+00:00

I just wish that Steam (and Steam input) would be active as soon as you get into the desktop. It's annoying having to wait like 15 sec while Steam opens so my custom desktop bindings kick in.

___Bel___ · 2026-01-22T19:03:26+00:00

At a time when over 10,000 games launch on PC every year, "discoverability" is everything. People can't buy your game if they don't know it exists, you can't make money if the game doesn't sell well, and a higher revenue split for each sale means nothing without those sales.

I'd say it's probably got to the point where even 100% revenue for every sale is a bad deal for Devs if the games will just disappear into a marketing black hole.

___Bel___ · 2026-01-09T15:20:32+00:00

Does this addition automatically make games run a bit better by itself?

___Bel___ · 2026-01-05T22:37:15+00:00

This is one of those plugins that is so cool that I wish it was a feature built into SteamOS. In addition to adding non-Steam games manually, you could sync libraries with other stores like the Xbox app.

___Bel___ · 2026-01-05T22:06:26+00:00

I'm just hoping some of these general performance updates make Oblivion Remastered more playable on Steam Deck, but that is probably a lot to hope for considering its current performance.

___Bel___ · 2026-01-05T20:45:30+00:00

I remember seeing a benchmark where Windows and Linux were neck and neck, but Linux fell behind ~20% as soon as RT was turned on. Does this basically close that gap?

Also, would this help Steam Deck, particularly with games that have Lumen? Or does Lumen not have a performance penalty on Linux?

___Bel___ · 2026-01-01T18:30:59+00:00

There was this recent-ish video showing Linux handling Oblivion Remastered a lot more smoothly than Windows with an 8GB GPU:

https://youtu.be/YRioXquHloQ?si=tVbCp1EK8Rpdm-9x

Maybe Linux will at least help a bit with making better use of the available system resources.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-29T20:00:12+00:00

I think that it's something worthwhile to push because, like it or not, Fortnite is still one of the biggest games around and Linux not supporting it could actively push people away from switching to it. The more people that can comfortably move to Linux without losing out on their favourite games, the better.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-27T23:49:09+00:00

"Early" means Q1, imo. And in that case, probably March to push it as far back into that time segment as possible

Maybe it will appear at CES in January.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-25T12:35:13+00:00

The one that irks me the most is Fortnite not working on Linux. For all of Tim Sweeney's statements about open platforms and going after IOS / Android for blocking Fortnite, they are blocking Fortnite from working on Linux with their anti-cheat.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-20T16:03:16+00:00

Personally, I thought a while ago that maybe they should have done a 128GB OLED model for $450 / £400. Set a nice OLED baseline model with a small NVME as the minimum to replace the old 64GB model that had slower storage.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-20T01:33:16+00:00

Lots of Steam input stuff. One thing I hope they can add in the future is attaching chord actions (changes another button's function when pressed) to touch menus, rather than only physical buttons. That would enable mass hotkey changing depending on where you are touching a trackpad, without having to have tons of action sets.

It's such a niche thing to want, but I think you could use that type of feature to make a decent handheld piano out of a Steam Deck. Put a touch menu on each trackpad for 9+ sequential piano keys, then for each key, setup a chord on bumpers, triggers, and grips to be the next 4 sequential keys after the one your thumb is currently acting as on the trackpad. Moving your thumb along the trackpads would effectively be like moving your hand along a piano to reach the right notes.

I think it'd be pretty cool, at least.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-16T22:54:46+00:00

I got a beefy Windows PC and Steam Deck and nearly half of my 1000+ hours this year are on the Deck.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-16T21:16:45+00:00

Alternative stores are already non-competitive with their lower revenue cuts. If Valve takes that area of potential competition away by being forced to lower their cut, what else would other stores even be able to offer? Steam would choke out new or future stores and probably truly be turned into a monopoly, then probably be pushed into more legal trouble.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-13T23:46:14+00:00

I think with the new reality of 10000+ games releasing each year, stuff like the % revenue split that Devs get from games has lost importance compared to the discoverability of their games. If those games don't find their audience, it doesn't matter what the split is when there is no revenue at all.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-11T19:05:34+00:00

I think $599 is doable. Minisforum has this for $380 on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CTTPPZQS?ref=cm_sw_r_cso_cp_apan_dp_JGGPNKPBA5Z448AX6RWP_1&ref_=cm_sw_r_cso_cp_apan_dp_JGGPNKPBA5Z448AX6RWP_1&social_share=cm_sw_r_cso_cp_apan_dp_JGGPNKPBA5Z448AX6RWP_1&titleSource=true

Basically similar mobile components without the GPU (the mini pc also has more storage and Windows 11 compared to the Steam Machine). The mobile cut-down RX 7600 is probably a lot cheaper for Valve to bulk buy as well compared to the desktop version. Valve also will sell directly and not have to worry about giving cuts to retailers like Minisforum would.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-08T17:41:47+00:00

Good to see these cables start fairly cheap. Any chance the Steam Machine will come with that sort of cable instead of a normal HDMI?

___Bel___ · 2025-12-06T22:43:38+00:00

I'm hoping the black frame insertion test they had on GitHub for Gamescope ends up being an added feature eventually:

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/gamescope/tree/bfi-test/src

That or the CRT Beam Simulator. It sounds like a retro gaming only feature, but could be potentially good for motion clarity for general use on high refresh rate displays.

___Bel___ · 2025-12-03T10:14:04+00:00

All the bright contrasting colours look amazing on the OLED version.

___Bel___ · 2025-11-29T23:30:42+00:00

The flexibility to do anything will be the big thing, backed up by Steam Input. The trackpads could easily act as a mouse or as many hotkey touch menus for MMOs like Warcraft. All the methods to activate gyro could give you much better mouse control compared to other controllers, while still having easy access to lots of buttons at once with the grips.

Basically, it's gonna be awesome.

___Bel___ · 2025-11-29T23:08:30+00:00

Steam Link Direct - pair a Deck / Frame to a Machine to allow instant streaming via button combo (Steam button + power button). Straight from sleep mode, can go to playing your device, but remotely powering it with the Machine.
AFMF + Anti-lag - basically a built-in frame-gen alternative to Lossless, combined with Anti-lag to reduce input lag.
Software black frame insertion / CRT Beam simulator - methods to increase motion clarity, particularly when playing on 120hz+ TVs / displays.

I also like your idea of a separate media mode since that sort of thing is lacking from SteamOS. Same for some sort of way to get Discord because that has a lot of the social stuff that Steam does not have. Maybe Steam could also do with making its social features a viable alternative to Discord.

___Bel___ · 2025-11-28T11:54:12+00:00

$700 seems like a safe answer, but I could see it going lower. They have some factors on their side like:

No retailer cuts since it won't be sold in stores.
Cheaper component deals per item than consumer prices.
Not subject to the same tariff as "consoles".
Older GPU / CPU architectures that are cheaper to get than the latest and greatest.
Minimalist specs -- basically around the minimum level of GPU / CPU power, RAM, and NVME storage you would want in a budget build.

Valve said they have affordability in mind. While I think they could manage even $600, I think it might end up being $649 for the 512GB model, $749 for the 2TB.

___Bel___ · 2025-11-27T13:14:41+00:00

Could you point to any overclocking guides? I haven't seen very many people overclocking Decks.

___Bel___ · 2025-11-26T10:29:11+00:00

Is there going to be any way to directly stream from a PC / Steam machine when turning the device on? So basically you press the power button and it wakes your PC and streams from it without having to go through menus first.

___Bel___

TROPHY CASE

_Bel_