You could, but what makes Steam Deck special is that it’s SteamOS is built specifically for that hardware, enabling functions you wouldn’t normally see in gaming PC hardware.
The main benefits of SteamOS proper is that it is a distro that takes a very “windows” like approach to papering over/obfuscating a lot of the internals. And the main feature it has over the competition is that, because Valve have so much control over the OS, the gamepad controls of desktop work a lot better.
But I want to say Aya also provide that, but in Windows? I know either they or GPD do that because that was a big reason I didn’t want to GET (probably) an aya neo: Not super huge on so much closed source software provided by a random company having that much control over my OS.
And… I am still not super huge on Valve having that much power. But I “trust” them more.
At least one of the main features is seamless suspend/resume. Not sure what the state of that is on Windows but I’ve seen a lot of people mention that SD feature specifically.
And with VRR in general it matters a lot less if you have a steady framerate. Pretty much my only complaint with the steam deck hardware is that it is not a VRR display.
And, back in the day, you could do weird stuff with telling windows that your monitor had a different refresh rate to do this but it was far from pretty and prone to strange behavior.
Small nitpick. I’m not sure why you don’t like the idea of the vendor having stuff installed on hardware they make, to ensure it functions optimally. Like, on a primary compute device, sure, be picky about the OS. But this is a game platform. Nobody gives a shit that Nintendo makes their own OS for their hardware, why does anyone care how the Steam Deck does it’s thing?
I actually have a lot of issues with the walled gardens the console makers sell. That doesn’t stop me from using it, but I should not need to wait for Sony to “add support” for basic HDMI standard features like VRR and question why the only tvs that support that are their own.
In a perfect world? Standard, preferably open source, libraries and tools for anything possible with “ease of use” and the like provided through the same package managers and management tools that allow IT departments to manage/monitor deployed systems. This greatly reduces the need to hope that Microsoft add discord support to the xbox or that nintendo… understands what an internet is. And it greatly reduces OS development/overhead for the consoles because… it isn’t like people are buying playstations for the… I can’t even think of anything unique to the OS that isn’t purely UI/UX.
The difference is that if the device comes with Steam OS, then it’s ready to go out of the box and you’re assured the hardware has good Linux support.
If it’s originally a Windows device then you may have to jump through additional hoops to get everything working. Also you’ll have to deal with allowing other OS’s in the BIOS if it’s locked.
Also you’ve paid Microsoft for a license you won’t use.
The flip side is that there’s work to make a native Steam OS build for 3rd party portable devices:
Wouldn’t it be rather simple to install Linux on them though?
You could, but what makes Steam Deck special is that it’s SteamOS is built specifically for that hardware, enabling functions you wouldn’t normally see in gaming PC hardware.
What functions are you referring to?
The main benefits of SteamOS proper is that it is a distro that takes a very “windows” like approach to papering over/obfuscating a lot of the internals. And the main feature it has over the competition is that, because Valve have so much control over the OS, the gamepad controls of desktop work a lot better.
But I want to say Aya also provide that, but in Windows? I know either they or GPD do that because that was a big reason I didn’t want to GET (probably) an aya neo: Not super huge on so much closed source software provided by a random company having that much control over my OS.
And… I am still not super huge on Valve having that much power. But I “trust” them more.
But curious if am missing something.
At least one of the main features is seamless suspend/resume. Not sure what the state of that is on Windows but I’ve seen a lot of people mention that SD feature specifically.
There’s also the global framerate limiter. Pretty sure that’s impossible to do on Windows.
The AMD driver can cap your game framerate globally, 90Hz instead of 144Hz saves a lot of power but is still much smoother than 60Hz
And with VRR in general it matters a lot less if you have a steady framerate. Pretty much my only complaint with the steam deck hardware is that it is not a VRR display.
And, back in the day, you could do weird stuff with telling windows that your monitor had a different refresh rate to do this but it was far from pretty and prone to strange behavior.
Small nitpick. I’m not sure why you don’t like the idea of the vendor having stuff installed on hardware they make, to ensure it functions optimally. Like, on a primary compute device, sure, be picky about the OS. But this is a game platform. Nobody gives a shit that Nintendo makes their own OS for their hardware, why does anyone care how the Steam Deck does it’s thing?
I actually have a lot of issues with the walled gardens the console makers sell. That doesn’t stop me from using it, but I should not need to wait for Sony to “add support” for basic HDMI standard features like VRR and question why the only tvs that support that are their own.
In a perfect world? Standard, preferably open source, libraries and tools for anything possible with “ease of use” and the like provided through the same package managers and management tools that allow IT departments to manage/monitor deployed systems. This greatly reduces the need to hope that Microsoft add discord support to the xbox or that nintendo… understands what an internet is. And it greatly reduces OS development/overhead for the consoles because… it isn’t like people are buying playstations for the… I can’t even think of anything unique to the OS that isn’t purely UI/UX.
The difference is that if the device comes with Steam OS, then it’s ready to go out of the box and you’re assured the hardware has good Linux support.
If it’s originally a Windows device then you may have to jump through additional hoops to get everything working. Also you’ll have to deal with allowing other OS’s in the BIOS if it’s locked.
Also you’ve paid Microsoft for a license you won’t use.
The flip side is that there’s work to make a native Steam OS build for 3rd party portable devices:
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/06/the-linux-coders-turning-the-rog-ally-and-other-handhelds-into-steam-deck-clones/
and
https://chimeraos.org/