I think this screenshot is pretty telling.

Interesting, I wonder if the games with a bigger improvement is more CPU bound than GPU bound

Hyped about the devices we're going to see over the next year or so. Should be just in time to replace my first release Steam Deck as a noticeable upgrade.

My understanding is it's mostly just the advantage of not having windows running hogging resources, so it should be a bigger gain for CPU bound games.

**Edit ** There can be performance gains from using vulkan over DirectX too, so there probably are GPU gains as well. It will depend on the game though

The battery life test is even more damning. SteamOS in some cases had more than 2x better battery life.

Yeah you're right, I had mostly been looking at the difference between the steam deck and legion Go S on that chart and barely even noticed the difference between windows on the legion Go S there.

I know, right?!

I just hope that there’s enough movement in the market to not just push more developers to support Linux as a platform, but to disincentivise them from punishing players through lack of anti-cheat / incompatible DRM.

Also, low-key hyped for the (hopefully) eventual Steam Deck 2 once the market has re-aligned to a ‘new normal’ and Valve can once again push the envelope further!

I only got my deck last year, so it think I can hold off until the Deckard. Kind of okay paying 3 times as much for VR to not have it tied to Meta/Zuck.

Had my deck preordered and am still using it regularly. I'm really happy with it and just recommended the oled to a friend. Just out of curiosity: why would you want to upgrade it already?

I hope so too, but I don't think a shift that big is coming any time soon.

Linux users are still a tiny proportion of the online player base. Steam Deck sales are negligible compared to Switch or console sales.

I hope it happens eventually,but I think it's going to take much longer for AAA gaming corps to take Linux seriously.

Every laptop I've bought has come with Windows including gaming ones. Up to really powerful computers. Like having a 4080 in it or down to just integrated. I could be doing nothing and you'll hear the fan spin up hard on Windows.

On hardware with just integrated graphics, Windows just sucks compared to Linux. Fan spins up but you'll still get animation hitches as Windows background services are doing something. Switch to Linux and resource usage just matches up really well with what you know you've installed and set to run. Just whatever is popular: Ubuntu, Fedora, Mint, Pop_OS, etc compared to consumer Windows editions.

Plus it's nice installing an OS and not having to go through pages of telemetry opt-outs, encouragement to buy O365, OneDrive, Copilot+, Gamepass, create online MS account, etc. Windows went from a relatively neutral marketplace, besides the bundled software, to a platform for marketing MS and other companies subscription services

Neutral base of fairly standardized open source Linux operating systems is going to show itself overtime as preferable as these controlled platforms get monetized harder. Windows, MacOS, iOS, Android are all in varying stages of being subscription and marketing data farms

Mine was a pre-release preorder as well.

I wouldn't upgrade it now. Knowing me, I'll probably end up waiting till 2027 and buy a secondhand device from 2026.

I mostly play indie 2D games, so games I want still work fine. The revised Deck has a bunch of improvements I would have liked (OLED, WiFi 6, etc). If there are enough improvements in usability (screen, WiFi, size, battery, hardware power), then I'll upgrade and give the old device to my kids (who currently use it for more than 75% of the time anyway).

Who would have predicted, a decade ago, that the path to the actual year of the linux desktop would be taken first through the linux handheld gaming PC?

... Also LoL at SpiderMan 2, the only one that does a single frame worse, which basically at this point is just a solid indicator that game is still unoptimized as all hell.

Old man Gabe has been playing the long game, for all these years.

Ex-MSFT employee on a mission to apparently save us all from MSFT this whole time hahaha

Do we know if it's entirely coming from SteamOS? Iirc the advantages it had over Windows on the Steam Deck were not even anywhere remotely this pronounced.

I know the whole “Year of Linux” is a worn-out meme by now; but things are a joke, until their not - best case in point would be AMD CPUs pre-Ryzen compared to now.

Steam Deck sales may not compare favourably to Switch / Console sales - it’s hard to say as Valve are privately owned and under no obligation to publish numbers. But all of a sudden, we can add a not insignificant portion of Windows handheld users to the mix (not 100%, but not 0% either).

Microsoft clearly sees this as an emerging risk, which is why they’re partnering to create an Xbox-branded handheld.

In terms of online representation - it’s also a case of chicken and egg. Online games don’t support Linux due to anti-cheat implementations, so online gamers don’t use Linux. Plenty of single-player offline experiences exist for us!

Agree with all that. "The year of Linux" will be built up to incrementally; and the fact that gaming is so good on Linux pushes that a long way.

The Steam Deck is what pushed me to change to full-time PC Linux myself. Having hardware with pre-installed Linux that works flawlessly has been great.

BuT cAn iT rUn CoD/DeStiNy 2?

wtf happened at dead cells? I mean I almost don't believe the results

Windows uses a lot of power just existing, so you can't get any of the windows handhelds down to a low power consumption. I remember when the Rig Ally first came out, the verge tested it using 5-8w of power on the steam deck, and using 16-22w of power on the Ally. Some of that is the hardware (the Deck has a really power efficient chip for low power games), but a lot of it is windows.