There's a reason we aren't as harsh on the Steam Deck. Actually, a couple.

I'm not sure if it's the meme but here (Europe) there is a huge difference in price between the basic 512GB OLED SD and the basic PS5 pro option.

569€ vs 800€.

If you think $700 is bad, it's £700 in the UK... which is $913. 🤢

Also:

• median household income, UK (2022): £32,400 ($42,265)

• median household income, USA (2022): $74,580

A PS5 Pro is 26% of the typical UK household monthly income.

A PS5 Pro is 11% of the typical US household monthly income.

The US pricing is bad. The UK pricing is absolutely insane.

The OLED Deck starts at £479. Still a lot but not as egregious. The LCD Deck is currently £262 ($344), which is pretty great.

And for those who have not tried it, the desktop is fully functional (not some half baked version. My son uses the desktop mode as a full school workstation for internet browsing, email, teams, Google docs, etc

Eventually, Sony will stop supporting the PS5 and it'll be a brick. If Valve ever stops supporting the Steamdeck, it'll keep running.

You know what the main difference between the Steam Deck OLED and the PS5 Pro is? Customers wanted and asked for the Steam Deck OLED.

Sales on PSN are appalling compared to Steam as well. Plus you can also get Steam sales on other sites like Fanatical.

Steam also has better remote play, and Steam custom controller profiles with nearly any controller are amazing.

Also nearly no backwards compatibility issues, whereas PS5 will only play/stream limited games from the past.

I have never felt as much envy as seeing someone play BG3 on an 8 hr flight. That was what sold me.

To cap it off the SOB killed Scratch and the Owlbear Cub. That flight was actual torture for multiple reasons.

Not to mention that you can buy the previous version for 300 € and get most of the same value (less storage, gpu, screen, battery)

Also the price scales wayyyy better. Steam Deck starts at 313,65€ now.

if you have less money, buy that, get an sd card, and if you enjoy it put an ssd in later.

Cheapest OLED steam deck is $549.00 (USD) while the most expensive is $649.00 (USD).

So really either way not only all those positives, but it's also at least $50 cheaper (which you can use to buy several games on Steam...)

Both run games at 720p

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Subscription for Internet access is the one that's always baffled me. What a stupid business model. I guess devices not belonging to their buyers is not a new thing.

No joke, I'm tempted to buy a Steam Deck (or true Linux phone) because... It can run a local HTML/CSS/JS app on a browser with filesystem access and audio support. This is the power of having an OS that is not locked down.

Speaking of which, what would you recommend for me to run a local HTML/CSS/JS app on a browser with filesystem access and audio support? (No, Android is too locked down to meet that spec) Other required specs:

• Portable: Can fit in a pocket
• 16GB or more usable storage
• Bluetooth support
• Ideally low-cost

If I'm playing modern games on a TV? PS5 easy. But still the pro over the deck.

I love my deck. As the handheld it's intended to be. It's not powerful enough for an acceptable experience running a AAA 3D game on a TV screen. You can ignore the resolution and artifacts and just generally low visual quality and poor frame rate on a small screen, because playing the games portably at all is a huge step up. You can't ignore any part of it on a TV. It's fine for indie games, older games, 2D stuff, etc.

But it doesn't have the performance for a good living room experience if you're looking to play modern AAA games. (Ignoring all their bullshit rootkits on PC that block a lot of multiplayer games out completely, which are the games you have to pay for on PS. You just can't play most of them on Linux at all.)

Some of the points in the meme are weaker versions of the full truth:

Desktop OS and you can substitute your own.

Biggest game library and you can also side load your stuff from other stores.

Studios that can release games on consoles don't even target people like me. I'm not going to get a console to play 5 good AAA games a year.

A steamdeck however...

And I can install games from other store fronts if I want.

The most expensive Steam Deck is still cheaper in my country. €680. While the PS5 Pro is €800.

And many will just buy the cheaper version and replace the SSD by themselves. The 512GB OLED version plus a 2TB drive is only €50 more expensive than the 1TB version. So even with like for like storage it’s still cheaper than the PS5P

Since buying a steam deck I've spent more money on games I can play on it than I would normally for the pc.

That's still cheaper than buying a ps5 on its own without the extra cost of games.

One can be used in an airport/aircraft/train and the other can not.

One is fit for travelling and the other is not

*squints* Sir, that is an LCD model you have there.

Also the Steamdeck has games worth playing.

If I was forced at gun point to switch back to console gaming I'd pick the latest Xbox just because of the backwards compatibility.

PS5 Pro: PRObably not for you

If the PS5 wasn't my first PlayStation ever, I'd probably be pretty disappointed with it. Kinda wish I held off and waited for this one, since I'd rather have it, but financing this just doesn't make sense in my current position. Would rather build a PC and use my Deck for remote play.

This is an aggressively mid generation, I have to admit.

Even if it's priced too highly, the PS5 Pro will probably sell pretty well. The Playstation Portal is very overpriced for what it is, and yet it's sold very well. There's a lot of Playstation fans with money to burn apparently.

I love the steamdeck. In almost always dock it and use it as my default computer.

If I did not NEED windows for a SINGLE work app, it would probably be my only computer.

Now that the Steam Deck and linux gaming has found some success I really hope Valve or someone else revisits the home console market with a similar approach.

You couldn't really build a PC for the same price as a PS5 with the same performance unless you're buying used parts in most places but that's not because Sony is selling consoles at a loss right now like the olden days. A large system integrator like Valve (or xbox if they want to change their formula) could offer similar perf/price without all the downsides of these locked down consoles.

Can you plug a steam deck to the tv and use a controller? Cause if not, I don't want it

My thing is if Sony wants me to pay computer prices, it better act like a computer. If it doesn't and the trend continues with PS6 then that's the end of me buying PlayStations.

PS5 Pro - only marginally better than an option that's only $450.

Steam Deck OLED - only marginally better than an option that's only $300.

Which do i choose? The $300 dollar deck and a $100 tb drive

Can you actually use steamdeck as a desktop PC though? Can it drive dual external monitors? Is it a reasonable "minipc" type thing? How much power does it munch on in idle?

Can I maybe put some other linux distro on it? So many questions

I'm legitimately worried about next gen, since Sony is doing the same thing with their pricing as GPU manufacturers.

That thing being, the increase in price is >/= the actual increase in performance. The PS5 Pro is a 75% price increase over the similarly disc-driveless $399 PS5 (hardware which is almost a half-decade old now).

The difference is that Steam Deck is actually cheap compared to what the competition does. It's also the first generation of Steam Deck and the upgrade with an OLED (and lot of other stuff too) is actually substantial. And there are multiple versions of the Deck available to choose less drive space. Imagine this was an option on PS5 Professional too. Contrary, the PS5 Professional is the most expensive console compared to its competition. It's so expensive, that it set a new bar.

That's the opposite of what Steam Deck does. Steam Deck is the only current generation game console that gets cheaper over time. Also one is a handheld format, which is hard to make cheap, especially because its compatible to PC hardware (and software).

A laptop because I have no where to go.

I would actually rather like a Steam Deck without a display but with at least one full USB4 port and the ability to split it similar to a switch.

Can you use a deck on an external monitor?

Yeah, but can any of those play the saves I already have on my computer??

It is not “biggest game library on earth” I bet, that would still be a high-end desktop running windows…

I already have a PS5, so the Steam Deck is much more tempting.

Got mine for my birthday. Of all the computers I've owned in my life, this is my favorite.

I won't be getting either, but if I was forced to choose, the PS5.

And the once PlayStation exclusive games have also been made available to Steam, thereby making them also accessible to Steam Deck. So the latter is infinitely a better choice!

Neither of them are capable of true 4K 120Hz+ gaming, so until then I'll stick with my PC.

steam deck is locked to a steam account

it requires internet to verify that on first launch

otherwise it is a great device. If it could use apple's messages.app then i would be so happy.