The new Valve Steam Deck OLED didn’t just change the screen: Almost every part of the device has had some sort of revision, from the screws to the power topology of the motherboard. Some of these changes happened silently in the Voyager platform refresh for the Steam Deck, but the majority of large changes are brand new. Memory underwent relocation and now uses better modules, the cooling solution has had its fan flipped and thickened, and the controller component PCBs have had some consolidation and durability improvements. In this tear-down of the new Steam Deck OLED, we’ll compare the new Steam Deck vs. the original, old Steam Deck “LCD” model.
Would be interesting in seeing the thermal and fan noise results.
Whilst I have no plans on buying the OLED edition, it did make me question that decision a couple of times watching these reviews come in. The LCD edition, with its quirks, is serving me just fine.
I’m also impressed with how candid Valve is bring with both their system & repairability improvements. Just wish other corporations did the same.
Valve seems to be firmly within the category of enthusiast run company. The heads of EA, Microsoft, etc clearly don’t game. Valve is clearly run by people who do and want their hobby to have a better environment. It’s the only expectation I have for their consistent pro consumer behavior. That or the fact that it’s been wildly profitable so why stop.
It makes me sad to think what will happen in the distant future when those people are no longer in charge. But for now, we get to enjoy their reign.
A large portion of the stock is held by employees so that may stay consistent for a good long while. Valve isn’t hurting, they’re able to continue to put out side projects like this and none of their competitors have really stood strong in the face of what they’re doing
The crux is that as long as Steam has no real competitor, Valve will have fuck-you-ima-tinker-with-side-projects money. The Steam Store is an infinite money printer.
Their biggest competitor though they could get 30% market share by giving away free games and signing exclusivity deals, instead of, you know, making a good gamestore. I don’t think we need to worry to much.
Well, maybe if GabeN retires, but im still hopeful.
Pro consumer behaviour like refusing to sell the Deck in Australia because of our Consumer protection laws?
Is that really why they don’t sell in Australia? I don’t believe your consumer protections laws are tougher than Europe. I can’t find any stated reason for not selling in AU. I suspect it’s just down to market size. They only recently started selling in Japan and they have 5x as many people.
Valve were fined $3M a few years back for lying to consumers about their rights to refunds per Australian law so it is an ongoing joke that Gabe now hates Australia and refuses to sell the Deck here as punishment.
That said it isn’t an entirely business-led decision to not sell here. Australians spend more on PC gaming than Japan.
I highly doubt Newell is harbouring some kind of grudge. Several countries have ruled against Valve in more onerous ways.
I’m not sure where you got the notion that Japan is a larger market than Australia but the Japanese spend around US$26B/year on video games. Australia is around $US$2.6B. Australia isn’t even in the top 10% worldwide. Now factor in expensive shipping, distribution, and warranty support in Australia, and it seems fairly obviously why they haven’t expanded there yet.
I said it was a joke.
I also specified PC games, which is the only market Valve cares about, and in which Australia spends more money than Japan. Add in localisation and other impediments to getting into the Japanese market and no, it’s not obvious at all.
Pro consumer behaviour like refusing to sell the Deck in Australia because of our Consumer protection laws?
That didn’t really seem like a joke to me but thanks for clarifying. I guess conveying tone is difficult across text.
I’m not sure if you’ve seen them yet but Steam Decks aren’t PCs. They’re handhelds. They compete with handhelds like the Nintendo Switch. I understand there is category overlap with the Deck but to call it a PC is clearly silly.
Taki Udon went pretty in-depth with thermals in their review. The already great thermals have been drastically improved. The OLED runs cooler in general and does a better job of keeping the heat away from your hands. The fan is quieter than the old model. I linked to the part of the video where they discuss thermals, but the whole video is pretty interesting.
This looks like a typcial console refresh. Fix the user pain points, find ways to make it cheaper to make, and maintain compatibility with the ecosystem. It’s more for new Deck users than as an upgrade for existing users. And it worked: I want one.
I had hoped the OLED screen would be compatible with the LCD Steam Deck, but I understand why they chose to redesign the internals.
I already dread having to replace the battery down the road, since I’ve got one of the early Decks with a heavily glued in battery.
I would honestly not worry too much.
The glue is a mother fucker, no arguments there. There ARE actually very good reasons for it but… it still sucks.
But as long as you aren’t going at it with a butter knife For Content, it is mostly just tedious. Get a plastic pryer/splitter and a heat gun and go to town. https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Steam+Deck+Battery+Replacement/149070 is the gold standard guide for that.
I’ve seen some solvents advertised for specifically this use case (remove glued in electronics parts) but I personally wouldn’t trust those without a LOT of reviews. Like, if it were that simple, ifixit and the like would already be selling it.
But also? I doubt it is going to be an issue outside of RMA-worthy problems. The days of batteries failing left and right are gone now that basically every device has logic to not over-charge or kill the zero. Think of the Steam Deck like a phone. It has a 2-6 year life cycle at which point it will be “weak enough” to not run anything remotely new and likely have a replacement with MUCH better everything (Valve best keep that audio jack though…). Now, PC gaming gets weird as I think my most played games at this point are Warframe and Dwarf Fortress (and that goes back to the curses only days…) but… yeah.
Now that was an intersting watch. It appears that not one part of the steam deck was untouched.
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The outer shell?
Even the screws were changed.
They do have that special edition clear one. And technically didn’t they add metal inserts for the screws to go in? Instead of the self tapping screws in the older model, I’m not 100% on that. I know the screws themselves are different for sure.
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The grip area actually looks different.
Changed the Steam and … buttons, changed the color scheme on the joysticks, and the joysticks themselves. Those may or may not count as “outer shell” But the screw sockets definitely do, and they have metal inserts now.
Can’t watch the video yet but damn, GN does meme arrow thumbnails these days?
https://dearrow.ajay.app/ might be for you (you can either pay a very tiny amount of money or wait for 24 hours and get a free license automatically).
I guess I don’t watch enough videos to have noticed, but are arrows a problem now? I can’t imagine them being more annoying than ‘thumbnail face’!
Arrows and emojis have just been so painfully prevalent in thumbnails desperate for attention. I don’t actually hold it against GN (or any channel), can’t really help that it’s what people click. It just seems so “not GN” lol.
Their videos are full of those reaction faces, though. No way are arrows worse than the faces.
At least it’s accurate and not some sort of clickbait
The real question is do the fans still smell good when they kick on for the first time? Mine lost its new-factory smell
