TL;DR: Antec is going to be selling a Steam Deck competitive device, based on the Ayaneo Slide. The device has a slide up screen that reveals a keyboard, which is good because using desktop windows is much easier with a keyboard. However the device’s lowest estimated power draw at low/no load is 15w, meaning it will use comparable power to the deck running at max power. This means the battery life will probably be pretty rough when compared to the Deck. It will also likely have a much higher price point.
Every single one of the competitors I’ve seen makes at least two of the following mistakes, each of which means they don’t stand a chance:
- Windows
- Display resolution > 720p
- No trackpads
- Awful layout
I could do without the trackpads but everything else I agree on.
Maybe you could, but the whole point of the steam deck is the ability to play any PC game, and most require mouse input to play well. Most people would be unwilling to make that tradeoff
That depends on what they bought the Deck for. Not everyone has much of an interest in playing games that require the trackpads, so there’s still a big market for handhelds that cover the rest.
IMO that’s just one of a hundred reasons that trackpads are better for the space they take. You can make them mouse input, that doesn’t mean you need to. That is level 1 trackpad use, using them as the hardware was inteded. The software it ships with heavily suggests making it your own. Having the ability to set up a pad specifically for map interaction, or for QAM buttons to have 16 extra virtual input buttons (really nice for RPG’s with lots of keyboard buttons for opening menus, such as Skyrim) or a button combination for auto-walk/sprint.
Without the trackpads you’re just missing a full spectrum of possible inputs that are free real estate for input remapping. On top of just the ease of use of not having to control a cursor with an analog stick… shudders. I personally would also argue that just because I only play Roguelites on the Steam Deck doesn’t mean that a dual-stick analog is all I need, as I’ve found many uses for the trackpads that enhance that experience.
Anyway, I’ll I’m positing is that trackpads have been slept on since the Steam Controller and people don’t realize all the ways that they can be easily incorporated without making it “just adding mouse input.” They have always been so much more than that, that relegating them to “just mouse input” is a bit of a disservice.
Why not 1080p?
Increased battery drain for diminishing returns. From the distance and screen size, it wouldn’t be that noticeable, but the performance drops would be.
As someone with a 4k OLED phone and a Steam Deck OLED, the difference pretty well screams at me. I don’t mind it so much though. It’s still pretty damn nice!
It’s insane to me that the competition can’t compete with the blueprint. I was really hoping that the deck would cause better products to follow, not worse.
The thing is, none of the competitors and rivals are competitors and rivals to Valve. Every sold device that can play Steam games, is a win. Unlike traditional consoles, Valve only benefits from competition. The Steam Deck kicked off a trend and made handheld PCs popular for the “masses” (relatively speaking off course).
Besides that, any handheld PC with Windows is just not at the same level of Steam Deck. The few more games that are playable is a plus, but the entire system is such a downgrade for a gaming first device.
Valve has a larger goal though of making Linux a viable alternative to Windows for gamers. The whole reason valve has made some much effort on Linux gaming is because Microsoft scared them when Microsoft started making plans to block software installs from anywhere except the Microsoft store.
Microsoft has backed off from that plan some since, but many new new computers running windows are in “s mode” by default which limits software to Microsoft store only. It can be disabled if you have administrator privileges and know how, but it’s still an example of Microsoft trying to shift towards a future where all PC games have to be bought through their store.
This is also why steam jumped at the chance to work with Google on getting steam on Chrome OS.
Is S mode really that popular? I’ve never seen that in an enterprise setting. End users won’t want S mode because it will limit functionality.
Basically all cheaper laptops come in S mode now, and a lot of people don’t know that they can turn it off. They also made it where the only option for disabling it requires you to first create a Microsoft account and use the Microsoft store, so you’re required to use their preferred method for software distribution before you can choose to use something else.
It’s a lot better than Microsoft’s original plan for S mode, originally it was going to be a completely separate windows build, and end users would have to buy a new windows key and reinstall windows if they wanted to use steam.
I don’t think any of the enterprise builds of windows use S mode right now, but I’m not sure.
I got a onexplayer for like $600 and it has the 7840u in it. No matter how you slice it, the 7840u is much more powerful than the steam deck. However, it doesn’t do well in low tdp. That’s what the steam deck is best at - low tdp gaming and battery life.
But so long as I’m near an outlet, I can play more AAA games and on much higher resolution and graphics than the steam deck for however long I’d like. On battery, only about 3-4 hours vs 6-8 hours on a steam deck.
I’ve never had resolution complaints on my handheld screen. There’s been scaling troubles and other graphics shortcomings, but resolution has never been a problem, how close are you holding the deck to your face?
Its about the same difference, but you can definitely tell the difference between 1600p and 720p.
Where are you getting 1600p screens that are 9 inches diagonal?
And what hardware are you using that puts 1600p into a 9 inch screen? Sounds a lot like overkill, or bigger numbers for the sake of having bigger numbers.
I’m no fanboy but Windows just sucks for anything portable. At first I was exited to see how manufacturers would pivot to adopt linux for their portables. Now it’s just watching flop after flop.
Same. I just can’t imagine using anything other than Linux for this kinda handheld. Like, I’m mainly a Windows user and I can’t imagine trying to use windows on my steam deck. When you want to make a gaming-focueed handheld like this, you want as much performance as you can squeeze out of the hardware. You’re not doing that with windows.
I understand what you’re saying, but that doesn’t have to be true. Many of the games are made to be run on windows, windows is still a effecient os, it’s just a lot of bloat, which can be disabled. Also a lot of optimizations in nt has been done for gaming, features which are missing in the linux kernel, but there are RFCs to add nt like synchronization primitives, in the linux kernel.
Many of the games are made to be run on windows, windows is still a effecient os, it’s just a lot of bloat, which can be disabled.
A) as someone else pointed out, “bloat” and “efficient” are exclusive to one another. Now, you can argue that windows is efficient in some areas and bloated in others, but “bloat” and “efficiency” are mutually exclusive when applied generally.
B) yes, most, if not all of it, can be disabled through registry edits and 3rd party hacks. However, in my experience, the more you try to debloat windows, the more unstable it gets. Then, it will all come back eventually via updates, which means you get to disable it all again. Finally, again in my experience, the more you try to debloat windows, the less stable it gets, and this carries over even when the OS reinstalls/reenables bloat you tried to get rid of. Seriously, my experience is that even after windows updates rebloat everything, the OS remains unstable, and becomes even more unstable after you debloat again. Granted this was with windows 10, but I imagine the same is more or less true for windows 11.
Also a lot of optimizations in nt has been done for gaming, features which are missing in the linux kernel, but there are RFCs to add nt like synchronization primitives, in the linux kernel.
C) and yet, iirc, recent Linux vs Windows 11 benchmarks show Windows games running on Linux via Proton/Proton-GE anywhere from slightly slower to slightly faster than Windows, despite requiring translation layers to run; while the Linux-native games typically run faster than their Windows counterparts.
Windows is just that bloated.
Bloat is in the form av pre installed software and services that can be turned of, Windows is not slow or resource hungry.
You’re the one contradicting yourself when you’re saying that linux requires a Translation layer. And the translations are not always 1:1. Please show me the benchmarks.
Windows IS resource hungry. No matter what hardware you run your OS on, any Linux Distro will leave Windows in the dust when managing resources, guaranteed.
Show me the benchmarks, stop changing topic.
You can start by looking at your downvotes, and I didn’t downvote even one of your comments.
Then, there’s plenty out there, but I will humor you with 1 to get you started:
https://www.softwaretestinghelp.com/linux-vs-windows/
Now, if you like Windows, that’s fine, nobody really cares, but that doesn’t make Windows good in any way, shape or form.
windows is still a effecient os, it’s just a lot of bloat
I like that contradiction.
which can be disabled
Pretty sure it can’t, especially not “officially” by the device manufacturer and certainly not in a way that keeps those debloat settings in place over the next few large updates.
How is it a contradiction, theres bloat software installed on windows, which can be disabled? Ubuntu to me is also bloated but that doesn’t mean that the OS is slow.
Yes they can be disabled, do you think governmental entities would run windows without being able to disable a lot of the features?
Ubuntu is THE distro that fucks it all up regularly. Most other distros have little to no bloatware.
The bloatware is not the point!! I am talking about the kernel!
The kernel is one of the main issues. Nobody can touch that hot mess other than Microsoft, and they do a crappy job at that. And you’re the one that brought up the bloatware, and said it can be fully disabled (which isn’t true). As for government use, read a bit and see how many governments are moving away from Windows, and many more that already have. Dude, nobody cares if you want to use Windows, have at it, but there’s no need for you to try to push that crap on some of us that have already been there and now know better. Enjoy Cortana, or copilot or whatever they are calling that dumb shit these days.
