this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2024
70 points (96.1% liked)

Steam Deck

14848 readers
55 users here now

A place to discuss and support all things Steam Deck.

Replacement for r/steamdeck_linux.

As Lemmy doesn't have flairs yet, you can use these prefixes to indicate what type of post you have made, eg:
[Flair] My post title

The following is a list of suggested flairs:
[Discussion] - General discussion.
[Help] - A request for help or support.
[News] - News about the deck.
[PSA] - Sharing important information.
[Game] - News / info about a game on the deck.
[Update] - An update to a previous post.
[Meta] - Discussion about this community.

Some more Steam Deck specific flairs:
[Boot Screen] - Custom boot screens/videos.
[Selling] - If you are selling your deck.

These are not enforced, but they are encouraged.

Rules:

Link to our Matrix Space

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Looking at the charging preferences of the Steam Deck, which from my research wants 45W at 15v/3A, it looks like the larger model should work just fine. And with it being $15 USD / $18 CAD this could be an incredible bargain.

It's so new though I can't find any info on it being used with a Steam Deck. I'll definitely be grabbing one to try, as it would be perfect for my USB hub that sits by the TV.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 12 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

There is no limit to when it will charge, you can use a lower power charger to extend your runtime - I use my 9V 2A (18W) Pixel 4a charger all the time while playing. Anything higher than 25w will keep you playing indefinitely, as that's pretty much the limit for what the deck can draw - 15W TDP and 10W for the screen, but obviously if you draw more than your charger can output eventually you will run out of battery.

But for quite a few lighter titles, 18W still gives you a few watts of net positive.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Anything higher than 25w will keep you playing indefinitely, as that's pretty much the limit for what the deck can draw - 15W TDP and 10W for the screen

Not really that simple. There are lots of other things consuming power, but otherwise you're correct.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

That "10W for the screen" includes them all.
When you reach the 15W TDP limit with the screen at max brightness (on the LCD version), the OSD will show you drawing about 25 watts, and it's measuring it directly from the battery. This also matches what people have reported for the power pass-through mode measuring from the wall outlet - once the battery is fully charged the Deck can power itself directly from the charger, and at full tilt, it's about 25 watts.
Sure if you really want to start separating them all out there are things like bluetooth, wifi, speaker amplifiers, the SSD etc, but compared to how much the backlight & screen controller draw, they are pretty much drops in the bucket. Well, the SSD might take a watt or two.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 7 months ago (1 children)

That "10W for the screen" includes them all.

No.

once the battery is fully charged the Deck can power itself directly from the charger, and at full tilt, it's about 25 watts

Yes.

they are pretty much drops in the bucket.

No.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

That “10W for the screen” includes them all.

No.

Taken straight from the LCD deck in front of me: With the screen as dim as possible sitting in the home menu, the total power usage of the deck is 4.9 Watts. The GPU is drawing 0.3 Watts. The CPU is drawing 0.3 Watts.
With the screen brightness turned to full but the deck idle, the power draw goes to 7.1 Watts, but the screen stops updating the image after 10 seconds. CPU & GPU are both still at 0.3 watts.
Jiggling the stick every few seconds to keep the screen on, the power draw goes to 9.6 Watts. CPU & GPU are still 0.3W each.

Result: The "rest" of the Steam Deck, minus SSD and cooling fan activity at full screen brightness, uses 9 Watts, at least 4.7 Watts of it being the screen and backlight alone, though I was not able to test how much the draw would be if the screen could be turned completely off, as that isn't possible in SteamOS.

15W + 9W is 24W, we are a watt shy of 25W.