Steam has recently unveiled the long-rumored SteamPal handheld, which is now confirmed to be known as the Steam Deck. Featuring a 7-inch touchscreen with a Nintendo Switch-Esque form factor, the handheld seems to have impressive tech specs for its size.
The Steam Deck comes with an AMD APU which includes a Zen 2 CPU with 4 cores/8 threads operating at a frequency of 2.4 GHz to 3.5 GHz, and a custom GPU. The GPU features 8 RDNA 2 CUs with a variable frequency of 1.0-1.6 GHz, that should put in the ballpark of 1.6 TFLOPs of performance. It has 16 GBs of LPDDR5 RAM, and upto 512 GB of “high-speed” NVMe SSD depending on the variant customers spring for.
While the specs might not seem as impressive judging solely by TFLOPs count, the newer achitecture chip and plenty of memory should put the Steam Deck’s hardware ahead of what is possible on Xbox One and PS4. This looks quite promising for now, and it would be interesting to see how Steam manages to sustain peak performance for long durations of time in this small form factor. You can check out the full specs below:
Compute
Processor
AMD APU
CPU: Zen 2 4c/8t, 2.4-3.5GHz (up to 448 GFlops FP32)
GPU: 8 RDNA 2 CUs, 1.0-1.6GHz (up to 1.6 TFlops FP32)
APU power: 4-15W
RAM
16 GB LPDDR5 RAM (5500 MT/s)
Storage
64 GB eMMC (PCIe Gen 2 x1)
256 GB NVMe SSD (PCIe Gen 3 x4)
512 GB high-speed NVMe SSD (PCIe Gen 3 x4)
All models include high-speed microSD card slot
Controls and Input
Gamepad controls
A B X Y buttons
D-pad
L & R analog triggers
L & R bumpers
View & Menu buttons
4 x assignable grip buttons
Thumbsticks
2 x full-size analog sticks with capacitive touch
Haptics
HD haptics
Trackpads
2 x 32.5mm square trackpads with haptic feedback
55% better latency compared to Steam Controller
Pressure-sensitivity for configurable click strength
Gyro
6-Axis IMU
Display
Resolution
1280 x 800px (16:10 aspect ratio)
Type
Optically bonded LCD for enhanced readability
Display size
7″ diagonal
Brightness: 400 nits typical
Refresh rate: 60Hz
Touch enabled: Yes
Sensors: Ambient light sensor
Connectivity: Bluetooth, Bluetooth 5.0 (support for controllers, accessories and audio)
Wi-Fi: Dual-band Wi-Fi radio, 2.4GHz and 5GHz, 2 x 2 MIMO, IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n/ac
Audio
Channels: Stereo with embedded DSP for an immersive listening experience
Microphones: Dual microphone array
Headphone / mic jack: 3.5mm stereo headphone / headset jack
Digital: Multichannel audio via DisplayPort over USB-C, standard USB-C, or Bluetooth 5.0
Power
Input: 45W USB Type-C PD3.0 power supply
Battery: 40Whr battery. 2 – 8 hours of gameplay
Expansion: microSD, UHS-I supports SD, SDXC and SDHC
External connectivity for controllers & displays: USB-C with DisplayPort 1.4 Alt-mode support; up to 8K @60Hz or 4K @120Hz, USB 3.2 Gen 2
Size and Weight
Size: 298mm x 117mm x 49mm
Weight: Approx. 669 grams
Software
Operating System: SteamOS 3.0 (Arch-based)
Desktop: KDE Plasma