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Valve still waiting on a 'generational leap' for Steam Deck 2 - but it's coming
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this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2024
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I wouldn't sound so sure. There are a lot of blockers to getting a working ARM based steam deck. First Arch Linux (which steam os is based on) does not offer official ARM binaries. This would mean they would need a new base os or work on getting Arch Linux to support ARM. With their recent donations to Arch Linux were focused on unblocking some issues with supporting Arch on ARM (notibally stuff needed for better automated builds) would suggest they want to stick with Arch.
Next you need good emulation layers for x64 and x86 as that is what all games are written in. Which there are leaks that say they are working on this as well.
But that is two big blockers that could take years to solve. So all comes down to when they want to release the next deck. Within a couple of years and I don't think it will be arm based. After that the chances go up quite a bit.
Thats two legs of support for an ARM architecture.
Sure. But what you are describing is "uncertainty". Uncertainty in isolation isn't a form of evidence. It could take years. It could not. Its not just Valve looking to solve this issue. MS has committed to ARM based interoperability; so has Apple. MS and Apple obviously want things to work seamlessly between ARM and x64, x86. The heat/ power to performance gains are just too much to leave on the table and both of those Software/ Hardware manufacturers saw this coming. If this was a project coming out of Valve & Arch doing the work; sure, I'd give it a time line of a couple to several years. But Valve while coming in with backing and there are other players looking to overcome and address the same problem. With teams like MS and Apple also working on it, I expect this to be figured out on a faster timeline. Months/ few years.
Sure. If thats your bet thats your bet. My bet is solidly on ARM. Its what the evidence we have points at, even if there isn't a ton of certainty around it.
That assumes they will share a meaningful amount of work. I do not see what Apple have done to help much at all - completely closed ecosystem with their own custom chips that they are not going to want to share.
MS have done a really bad job as well at getting ARM to kick off and have not been putting a huge effort into it that I have seen. And especially since valve is doing this in part to get away from MS systems why would MS help valve with this goal?
So yeah, if they did put in and share the effort it would take less time. But I don't see them doing that. Plus, it takes years to develop a product like this. And all evidence ATM suggests they have barely if at all started on the next version. Which does suggest that the next deck is likely more than a year away, likely two. Which does increase the chances that it could be arm based.