Wednesday, March 15th 2023
Steam Deck OLED Screen Update is not Simple as it Sounds
As the Steam Deck turned out to be a big success, and has pretty much revived the handheld gaming market, there were so many questions about the future hardware upgrades, or even the second generation. In the latest interview, Valve's engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais said that while Valve certainly wants to make the Steam Deck better and is "looking at all avenues," upgrading the Steam Deck to OLED screen might not be that simple.
Earlier, Valve's designer Lawrence Yang and engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais have pretty much confirmed that a new and more powerful Steam Deck will not be coming in at least the next few years. In the latest interview, Griffais shed a bit more light on how complex some upgrades could be, especially the screen. Talking to PC Gamer, Griffais said that Valve "understands the limitations of the current tech that's in the Deck, in terms of the screen."
"I think people are looking at things like an incremental version and assume that it's an easy drop-in," he added. "But in reality, the screen's at the core of the device. Everything is anchored to it. Basically, everything is architected around everything when you're talking about a device that small. I think it would be a bigger amount of work than people are assuming it would be."
That said, it appears that while Valve is not scraping the minor hardware upgrade idea, it might be just too complex and it pretty unlikely that we will see an incremental update similar to the Nintendo Switch OLED, but rather a proper successor with upgrades across the board.
Source:
PC Gamer
Earlier, Valve's designer Lawrence Yang and engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais have pretty much confirmed that a new and more powerful Steam Deck will not be coming in at least the next few years. In the latest interview, Griffais shed a bit more light on how complex some upgrades could be, especially the screen. Talking to PC Gamer, Griffais said that Valve "understands the limitations of the current tech that's in the Deck, in terms of the screen."
That said, it appears that while Valve is not scraping the minor hardware upgrade idea, it might be just too complex and it pretty unlikely that we will see an incremental update similar to the Nintendo Switch OLED, but rather a proper successor with upgrades across the board.
18 Comments on Steam Deck OLED Screen Update is not Simple as it Sounds
Or you order your own production line, like Nintendo has done for their OLED switch.
At the sales numbers the Deck is pulling now that may be viable, but that was definitely not certain when they initially started.
The same goes for the switch which also used lcd's for quite some time.
The engineering team is probably alloted $X worth of spend. a year/quarter. R&D into these things take engineering time and have the potential to push back releases.
Then you have the sourcing aspect. Where are you going to get the screens? Who are you going to contract? how much will it be? How fast is ramp up?
Are you contractually obligated to buy X amount of screens from other provider? Do you just pay the difference? What are the capx/tax implementations to such a thing?
Does the screen require a different connector? its OLED do we need to program the backlight zones? debug it? Is it supported in every game? How do we ignore it if not? How do we detect if it is?
Whats the battery strain? Is the glass strong? does it pass QC physical check? Can we make it stronger? Does it affect usability or clarity?
Do we have space for a new connector on the PCB? Do we need a different driver chip?
How much did it cost to figure this all out? Are we over budget? Is it even worth it? Can we even ship on time now?
It gets wild.
the Sabrent company has a video on how to upgrade the storage in the steam deck, his positive energy is next level, dude literally makes me want to buy Sabrent products now lol
im 99% buying a steam deck this week. the fact I can play FFXIV mmo simply by going into steam settings and turning on proton is bonkers to me. I had no idea it was that easy. can't wait to sit on a hammock and play FFXIV :roll:
any Sabrent reps out there that see this post, give that guy in the video a raise, cause he sold me on buying your storage. in a world of misery, its nice to see someone so genuinely cheerful. rock on mates
www.tomsguide.com/features/nintendo-switch-oled-battery-life-tested
"At the same time, our test wasn’t rigorously scientific, so it’s hard to say whether the OLED will have better battery life for every single game"
They tested it in metroid dread, which is a dark game and typically the only scenario where a OLED will use less power than an LCD. Otherwise you can see the new OLED desktop displays using twice as much energy in high brightness scenarios. It also gets less bright according to the article, another drawback of OLEDs
I would take the consistency and brightness of the LCD over the OLED. This is a mobile device, which means you are naturally going to want that brightness as it will be used in high ambient light conditions.
I've grabbed 512GB version last Feb. It has some fancy "anti glare" tech built into screen, lowering the contrast a bit.
It's a very fine screen, I've never thought "hey, where is my OLED".
It is other components that are problematic. E.g. that shitty whiny cooler by Delta.
There are absolutely no issues doing it. I mean it... zero, none, null... call Samsung and order it. Even china offers DIY OLED MIPI screens these days. And it is not that hard... not sure where it even came form...
Now, I'm really starting derail this thread.. lol Go check out the Steam Deck club forum. :rockout:
EDIT: Just to be clear I'm not saying that the 1tb model uses anymore power or isn't single sided. Sabrent built these drive for Steam Deck. I would have bought a 1tb if the price was right.