Topher
Identifies as young
Not really a good comparison considering large TV screens are going to highlight that difference in power a heck of a lot more than a 7 or 8 inch screen will.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Don’t understand the general dislike for Windows PC handhelds. They are leagues above the Deck.
- Thread starter Mythoclast
- Start date
Not really a good comparison considering large TV screens are going to highlight that difference in power a heck of a lot more than a 7 or 8 inch screen will.
rodrigolfp
Haptic Gamepads 4 Life
Linux is trasher for gaming, but made worse by a tiny screen.
well at least windows handhelds are coming with much better lcds than the deck lcd, which makes me guess that the next windows oled will be better quality than the deck oled. i hope that makes you happy
jshackles
Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the capability to make the world's first enhanced store. Steam will be that store. Better than it was before.
I still have my Steam Deck set up with Windows and it's associated tools, and it's still absolutely fantastic. I thought it might be a fad thing I tinkered with for a while before going back to SteamOS, but for me having access to all my games and launchers is just a better experience overall for very little downside.
Steam big picture mode still runs on startup, so the only time I need to exit out of that is if I'm installing / setting up / configuring a new game. I can hold down the start button to toggle between "mouse mode" and "controller mode" which makes it easy to navigate outside of Steam (or if I'm playing a game that doesn't support controllers, I guess...). In fact, there isn't much that I could do in SteamOS that I can't do in Windows mode - though Decky Loader and Emu Deck did make some things easier.
Steam big picture mode still runs on startup, so the only time I need to exit out of that is if I'm installing / setting up / configuring a new game. I can hold down the start button to toggle between "mouse mode" and "controller mode" which makes it easy to navigate outside of Steam (or if I'm playing a game that doesn't support controllers, I guess...). In fact, there isn't much that I could do in SteamOS that I can't do in Windows mode - though Decky Loader and Emu Deck did make some things easier.
but oled does it? you know that not all lcds are as bad as the steam deck lcd right? some are not that bad compared to an oled screen.
Minsc
Gold Member
I am actually excited for an eventual Windows handheld device - a well built one that's plenty fast with an OLED display would speed that process up a ton, but I'm not 100% opposed to something like the upcoming Ally 2 if it fit the bill in all the other ways to compensate for the LCD display, or maybe it'd even have a tiny miniLED or something, though unlikely.
Still, I don't outright dismiss these handhelds, and I did pre-order the Ally. Just haven't found the one yet.
Last edited:
Topher
Identifies as young
Sure, Rog Ally LCD is better than Steam Deck LCD. OLED is better than all of them. I own both Rog Ally and Steam Deck OLED. The primary trade off is superior screen and battery life of Steam Deck vs superior power and compatibility of the Rog Ally. None of these stand head and shoulders above the rest.
BlackTron
Gold Member
you can barely run those
I might have assumed the same but it seems the deck can run these games somewhere around mid settings at 30-40 fps so idk man...sounds playable with the small screen
yeah i know i was just being sassy
but don't forget it's not just pros with oled, there's also some disadvantages with the tecnology. like under the sunlight lcds are better, and since this is an handheld, that's something to consider.
hououinkyouma00
Gold Member
OLED does a ton for image quality.
I'd much rather have the OLED deck then a ROG Ally or any of these way too expensive Chinese handhelds.
Frwrd
Member
It does? I’ve only seen the Steam Deck and Ally, thanks for the heads up
Topher
Identifies as young
Depends on which Steam Deck you get. Mine has a matte screen so it is actually better in sunlight than my Rog Ally. You may be right about the glossy OLED. Not sure.
Gamezone
Gold Member
No, and I also don't care about Gamepass or any other launcher on PC. Microsoft should release their subscription service on Steam.
rodrigolfp
Haptic Gamepads 4 Life
Yes.
It's getting better but we still keep getting PC games that either miss or have badly broken HDR even when console versions have support for it. Eg. the entire NFS lineup from EA to date...
Anyway point being that Win11 AutoHDR is kind of an - important bandaid to have if you care about HDR on PC. I'm sure eventually we'll get something like it on Linux - but for now Windows is a noticeably superior option for HDR gaming.
Both released some time before SteamDeck OLED too - but as I said in an earlier post, no HDR support - yet.
Last edited:
Minsc
Gold Member
It's getting better but we still keep getting PC games that either miss or have badly broken HDR even when console versions have support for it. Eg. the entire NFS lineup from EA to date...
Anyway point being that Win11 AutoHDR is kind of an - important bandaid to have if you care about HDR on PC. I'm sure eventually we'll get something like it on Linux - but for now Windows is a noticeably superior option for HDR gaming.
Both released some time before SteamDeck OLED too - but as I said in an earlier post, no HDR support - yet.
I figured there had to be some, thanks. I am not super familiar with Ayaneo devices and the sort - I know there's quite a lot and the impressions vary quite a bit, but I'd definitely choose one of those over a regular brand for the screen. I wonder how they compare speedwise? I'll have to look in to it more, and I do really want 32GB of RAM or at least more than 16GB for Windows as well. Too bad they seem to be going after the true portable market, and not just the large handheld market too. I do prefer larger screens, and always see it as a nice bonus when normal models move to OLED and also give a larger screen at the same time.
But when you look at the slim gaming laptops nowadays there's so many great choices with OLED now, so not having the same representation in handhelds was a bit disappointing.
And yes, the HDR is pretty huge, I see it as pretty awesome for those games that it works with, which seem to be getting better every month. However, that AutoHDR thing I've heard has some issues, like text and UI which uses white - doesn't it just push that text and white out at full brightness max nit HDR? Which sounds truly horrible.
Edit: That Air 1S is pretty tempting. Wish a more local company had specs like that, 32GB ram, OLED, but it is not a powerhouse like the Ally/Go. Runs on 5-25W, and I really don't mind seeing a handheld have a bit more power on the high end if needed. Still, it's a damn tempting set of specs.
Last edited:
Yea Aya Neo handhelds have always had great screens, their LCDs were already a notch above everything else, but indeed targeting the smaller form factor (presumably helped with sourcing higher quality screens too). And I'm with you - I got my handheld because of the 8-Inch screen, sadly not an OLED, but it was a rather nice screen back in 2022.
Other than that - it varies, but general trend is that nowadays most of these have good or even great build quality (often better than original Deck - as evidenced by many of them packing cooling assemblies handling 30+W with less fan noise and smaller form factors), but software side can be a bit hit and miss.
For performance of specific Aya Neo models - the 1S(first pic) is 7840U series - 25W is still gonna run around 2.5x the SteamDeck perf. The Air Pro was 5560U - so a faster CPU but a fair bit worse GPU than the Deck.
Personally I'm expecting next wave will have more OLED screens now that Valve set the standard, but for me I'm not sure that'll be enough to upgrade until AMD moves past RDNA3.
Yea I think it's got to do with availability of OLED panels in the right sizes. It took forever for laptops to adopt them in quantities too - even though tablets have been mostly OLED for most of the previous decade already.
MS doesn't automatically enable it for everything - there's some kind of vetting process for supported games. IME the text doesn't usually exhibit that problem, at least in the games I've played. NFS is probably still my favorite example of games that benefit from it (Especially 2015, but really every NFS game in past 10 years), but really a lot of games from last gen are boosted nicely.
Speaking of - HDR support recently got added to Retroarch - not sure how well it works on Deck, but it's worth trying. It's not there to make HDR-like effect, but more to help older games be more CRT-like in how the colors are displayed.
VitoNotVito
Member
Tell me you didn’t use the steam deck without telling me you didn’t use the steam deck
Mythoclast
Member
I did use one several times, and I hated how close of a system it was. I want freedom and compatibility, not Linux
VitoNotVito
Member
If you want freedom then obviously you’ll never play any console.
Steam deck is the closest PC will get to console experience. Fuck medieval Windows clutter.
Minsc
Gold Member
My problem with both the Ally and Go is the 16GB of RAM. Once again, because of the discussion in this thread, I *almost* ordered one last night, but alas, I cannot with 16GB of RAM on a Windows device. It's pretty stupid these days. I really hope the next one offers a 32GB option.
I don't really get the freedom arguments against the Steam Deck, it can be modded any way you want, including dubious ways, and you can even dual boot, but honestly I sort of feel if it doesn't run in Linux one way or another you're probably just doing it wrong at this point.
I don't really get the freedom arguments against the Steam Deck, it can be modded any way you want, including dubious ways, and you can even dual boot, but honestly I sort of feel if it doesn't run in Linux one way or another you're probably just doing it wrong at this point.
Bry0
Member
Just put windows on your deck, valve provides the drivers. There are no shackles, that’s the entire point. It’s yours to do whatever you would like.
they’re all PCs, you can put windows on your deck, Linux on your Ally, how on earth have yall turned this into system wars?
Last edited:
Thats where all that ‘plug and play’ talk comes from, since many of you treat it as a ‘Steam gaming handheld’.
As a PC gaming handheld, you’re getting in the Desktop Linux mode trenches to properly set things up.
Hopefully that never happens.
Minsc
Gold Member
Are you afraid it'll hurt Steam software sales on PC?
If everyone on Steam had free access to thousands of games including new releases, I could see that.
Nah. It’d significantly impact the availability of 3rd party games in the service and likely have significant impact on the viability of the service itself.
Devs put their games on GP knowing a massive portion of customers are only on Steam. Put GP on Steam and MS has to pay way way more money for content.