Steam Deck Teardown: Everything Valve Said Not to Do!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 พ.ค. 2024
- The hottest new device right now is the Steam Deck, a handheld gaming PC from Valve-the same company that brought us the Steam Machine, the Steam Controller, and … Steam.
Gamers are excited to have access to their library of Steam games on the go, but this thing also connects to a TV or monitor, kind of like a Nintendo Switch. It’s a really interesting device … to take apart.
Full disclosure: iFixit works with Valve to offer official replacement parts for Valve products. Valve also supplied us with a Steam Deck for the purpose of this teardown. They had no input on the editorial content or score in our video.
Our blog post for this teardown-including a hi-res X-ray image of the entire Steam Deck
www.ifixit.com/News/57101/ste...
Thanks again to our buddies at Creative Electron for the X-ray wizardry! Check them out at
www.creativeelectron.com
For a deep dive on what causes thumb-stick drift, check out our DualSense Drift video!
• Here's Why PS5 Joystic...
0:00 Introduction
1:03 X-Rays from Creative Electron
1:30 Opening the Steam Deck
1:59 Retail vs. Pre-Release Hardware Comparison
2:22 Disconnecting the Battery
2:34 Thumb Sticks
3:22 Capacitive Touch Thumb Stick Hardware
3:44 SSD
4:28 Trigger Buttons
4:39 Button Input Boards
4:51 Touch Pad Hardware
5:21 Heat Sink and Fan
5:31 Motherboard
6:06 Battery
7:14 Display
7:40 Steam Deck Repairability
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Giving the deck a 7 while giving the switch an 8 in repairability is in my opinion just unreasonable. This console looks way more modular and user repairable. Plus you can even get replacement parts directly from them.
You’re joking, right? Do you realize how easy it is to fix a broken controller on the Switch? You can just swap out the entire controller in two seconds. You don’t have to disassemble the entire console just to replace the joystick. You can have two sets of Joy Cons and never worry about your entire console being out of commission because one joy stick is broken.
@@samtherat6 I assume you are joking and that I am bad at reading sarcasm? Because buying a new controller is not repair.
But you can't replace the charging port
@@LauS0 Untrue. It's very much replaceable and quite easy with a hot air soldering unit.
@@loweflyer7778 Are you trying to argue that the Switch Lite is just as repairable as the normal Switch? Have the controller easily swappable means you don’t have to worry about repair for the controller, especially for the average everyday consumer. Most people wouldn’t want to risk the rigidity and breaking their Steam Deck if they can just swap out the entire controller with 0 risk.
Not bad, the battery is somewhat disappointing as I can see that being a common repair job. However valve is doing a great job and even just the example of them reaching out to ifixit to open it is a good sign. It's looking really promising
They can add pull tabs in the next revision, let's just hope they don't remove any modularity or introduce Hardware/firmware locks in any of the parts.
@@FR4M3Sharma I can definitely see future revisions getting an 8 or even a 9 score in repairability .
promising for what?😐
It's likely to prevent shifting over a long period. I don't think there's really many options available to firmly hold a battery in place while making it easy to swap out.
Honestly, it's not a big deal considering how much more they've already done for a customer's ability to repair the system.
How disappointing it is? It's still easier to remove than tons of hardware, replaceable too. They added access to cut the glue. Not big issues.
I love that Valve is going against status quo and making it easier for the DIY crowd to replace parts etc. Take note almost everyone else
I am following the Steam Deck, even though I don't game (and won't buy any gaming device), just for the technology, and openness of Valve. 10/10 great corporation. ツ
And the fact that Valve isn't much of a hardware company makes it even funnier :D
@@epicgames2051 That doesn't make it funnier - it is the reason WHY they're doing it. Valve don't rely on hardware sales at all. That's why they can make it so cheap and easy repairable. Most other companies make their money buy selling hardware so it's not a surprise that they don't want people to easily and cheaply switch used parts and use the device for a much longer time.
Please don't, the change port it's the biggest problem in most electronics
Furthermore, by publishing the CAD drawings and (promising to release) the image and source code for SteamOS 3, they're virtually guaranteeing we'll see Steam Deck clones. Which would probably be great for them as more Steam devices means more Steam sales, which means more Linux market share, which means more demand for Linux native games (or at least Proton compatibility) which means more demand for SteamOS devices. I'm probably naive to hope this is gaming's "Android" moment (or even that Steam dominance would be a positive thing), but I guess only time will tell.
I shouldn't be surprised that Valve decided to partner with you to sell replacement parts, and yet I am. I'm blown away by their openness. That's good news for Index owners too, since it seems some parts will have replacements as well. This makes me so happy!
Valve > Apple. It is so good that this company helps the community out, and supports right to repair. Luis Rossmann would approve. ツ
You are correct!
@@thatguyalex2835 i mean sure a billion > 0.001
@@anandsuralkar2947 22/7 > π > 223/71. So what, a billion is > 0.001. What is your point my friend? That Valve is 1 trillion times better than Apple (which it is)? :)
@@thatguyalex2835 L take.
I feel like 7 out of 10 is a little harsh but I do get that having the battery not being easy to replace is a biggy
The screen as well though. I'm not exactly sure why that wasn't screwed in. It seems like that should have been within the realm of possibilities.
Because you are not supposed to replace it. At least by yourself
@@TheCuteMaster screen was quite easy to replace though, its similar to most android phones. this should be 8/10 but -2 for the battery.
@@niodix all batteries are consumable and if you cant replace it then the whole device is made to die.
@@madtech5153 most consumers won't touch a phone repair any longer out of fear of breaking the screen. Luckily in the steam deck's case the screen doesn't hide any components behind it, but I still don't see why they couldn't just use side mount screws like any other laptop screen does.
I was hoping the excessive battery glue in Linus' teardown was just a one-off, or a result of it being a dev model or something. Hopefully Valve sees the criticisms about this and reduces the amount of glue holding the battery in on later models, seems kinda baffling to make it so repair-friendly and then make the number-one most likely component to need replacing difficult to remove.
If valve has a paid service to replace the battery themselves, I wouldnt really care because they already made so many user repair friendly choices, if the battery eventually needs replacement, go ahead valve. The value we get from their services far outweighs any costs of battery replacement
The battery isn't meant to be removed, but if you want to risk it then they'll let you.
@@Joreel where is the risk? A battery in any devise is the one component that needs replaced most frequently. The more you cycle a battery, the less life span it has before needing replaced for a new one. Making the battery this difficult to get out makes user replacement a pain.
@@Joreel Why shouldn't it? It's not only meant to be replacable, it's the most common replacement in electronic devices. Easy to replace batteries is something the law should force the companies to do.
@@Joreel risk what exactly? Elaborate please.
Yes I awaited an 8 score, but 7 also is fine, they really screwed up big time in the battery department. I hope Valve listens to critics and fixes it with pullable adhesive stripes or screwed down batteries.
Probably the battery and screen are the two biggest factors that drove the score down, however I consider this a huge win overall. If the microSD and USB-C being directly on the Mainboard were probably the other point, but I think they are there for speed as both ports offer some high-speed buses.
imho is better glued down in this case, screw it down it could take to fire hazard, and pulling stripes in a plate with hole is not that adviseable
@@TheCuteMaster Are you kidding, the screen was surprisingly easy, it just came off with very little adhesive and Zero cables to worry about, not needing to teardown the entire thing from the back to access it, I think the only way to do it without glue in the Steam Deck would have been needing an almost 100% teardown to access it, which I thin would be worse.
In the end I think the score is due to the battery and the modularity of the USB-C, and MicroSD the battery is quite the thing, and they got it out very easily compared to others in the platform, fortunately if they want the can fix the battery departure very easily
@@fippo717 I don't think they meant driving a deck screw through the middle of it
@@Pro720HyperMaster720 do people not know how almost all mobile tech uses the same "magic" to have the screen attached aka glue? I've seen people comparing it to switch like switch doesn't require hot air to have a screen replacement
I think valve also uses software to get rid of joystick drift. Steam already has this feature but you have to enable it for every game and it's kinda pain in the ass to setup. So you might not need to replace joysticks as often as you might think.
Yeah, adjusting the dead zone in Steam input will get rid of joystick drift. That's what I did with my Xbox controller.
@@Kevin-sl3gk yes that and also steam has joystick calibration but i am not 100% sure what it does but it probably also helps.
What do you mean "for every game"? You just do it once for your controller and that's it, it's always calibrated.
@@nebulous962 from the sound of it you take a "baseline reading" where it takes the input when you're not touching it and using that a baseline and "zeroing out" any movement acourdingly.
Yes and no, it depends on the failure, my switch joystick randomly pulls down and that can't be fixed in software
Definitely hope that they change the battery in the future, should be a fairly simple change from using that much glue to using pull tabs or providing better access to where the battery is adhered to the midframe would help a lot.
its not the finished model so there is hope
Mad respect to Valve for openly going "we don't recommend doing this to your device, but we WILL tell you exactly how to take it apart for repair". Providing a unit for iFixIt to teardown is just proof that they're not just doing it because it's good press with all the right to repair stuff happening. Good on ya, Gabe!
6:44 It looks like you can use some of the screws of the magnesium structure for 3D printed parts, maybe out of ABS or nylon for heat resistance, that hold the battery in place without the need for glue. Maybe I am missing something. Unfortunately, the shot doesn't show a lot of screws which would be necessary. The magnesium chassis could also fit tightly to the backplate not allowing this kind of mods.
Valve released the cad files for the plastic shell. So if modifying the back shell is necceasry for that, or say adding room for a full size m.2 adaptor, someones going to do it.
Also the files are under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International Public License. So there's no legal barriers to modifying and releasing them either.
@@TheAkashicTraveller bruuuh, a steamdeck with a 1tb m.2......
im lost. whats that about magnesium?
Main things I would wish for is threaded inserts for the screws holding the backplate and no adhesive holding the battery.
apparently if you go left until the screws “click” and then screw it back in it should go back like it did before
I imagine that once you replace the battery for the first time, it will be much easier, but then again, the fact that it's stuck with so much glue and deep within the chassis makes it kinda difficult.
Maybe introduce pull tabs for next time?
Btw, excellent job guys, and valve for their transparency, much appreciated.
That is a very good point, the next time you do it, it should be easier. I wonder why they use so much glue in the first place, I hope it can be reduced as production improves.
@@LaurenceGough maybe to keep it from moving? Idk, it would seem that tolerances are not necessarily loose enough, but I don't know enough tbh.
@@riveraluciano I always wondered why not use simple screws to do that. Also, older phones had removable batteries that weren't fixed, and I don't remember them rattling in the device if it was properly designed.
In my opinion resorting to glue is always the worst option and it means you failed at engineering a better solution.
@@thelegendaryklobb2879 I honestly can't confidently answer, but I can imagine that the lack of screws comes from risk of puncturing the battery, them being removable I think just boils down to making more closed systems. Newer phones that allowed for easy battery replacing like you mentioned were usually lower capacity or with much higher tolerances, but I doubt it has anything to do with that.
@@riveraluciano There are laptop batteries that use screws, so the puncturing risk is not a valid reason. You could also use tabs to hold the battery in place and screw those tabs to the chassis instead of the battery. Maybe even some form of textile or Velcro strap
Ifixit literally makes the best toolkits and tutorials
Thanks for the great work you continue to do!!
Big props to Valve and iFixit. I really hope this product is a roaring success so we can continue to see new iterations and improvements
From GN and LTT teardown videos I knew the battery was going to be painful, on the other than I love that the main board is easily accessible as well as the screen. Makes you wonder if you could ease the process to get that glued battery out by heating the front once you take out the screen.
Maybe some isopropil alcohol but i might be mistaken
@@orlandofurioso7329 they already addressed the alcohol. They weren't sure if it might affect the screen since the battery compartment has some holes that could leak through.
@@TheCuteMaster I think Orlando is referencing using the alcohol after taking the screen off lol
@@Newyevon2 yep
with the screen glued too, how is this easier? No big deal if you damage the battery that is pretty much dead anyway, but damaging the fragile perfectly-good screen is a whole different story.
I'm in love with Valve and iFixit. Just thank you, the both of you, Valve I know we have had our differences, but your constant love for what you do has kept me staying over these years. It's mainly the attention to detail that most companies miss. For iFixit, you know why we love you, should i say more?
this is my first ifixit video, wasnt expecting it to be this entertaining, nice job
Seeing this kind of transparency and repairability on a device from a company that does normally not specialise in hardware is a major step. I like seeing more and more easy to repair and swappable devices in the world. This will definitely make me buy it. Just gorgeous.
Honestly loving everything about the steam deck so far. The way Valve is approaching everything is amazing.
I agree, the battery is pretty disappointing from a repair standpoint, especially since it is one of the components bound to die before the rest of the hardware reaches its lifespan.
Other than that though, great on Valve for making it relatively easy to repair.
Keep up the good work guys! Love the content!
Awesome hardware. Awesome teardown. Can't wait to start carrying parts for it!
I bet a lot these design choices were done because they was trying to meet the target price.
I assume making the port modular and a better battery securing method costs a bit more to produce.
not necessarily, the iphone for instance uses pullable adhesive stripes, not really more costly than gluing it directly.
@@werpu12 ye they could have done that to the battery but OP still got the point that their primary target likely wasn't reparability.
That's definitely the case considering how cheap the base model is.
@@werpu12 yes but iphones have insane profit margins the steamdecks price was "very painful" as to quote Gaben himself
@@AndersHass yeah they focused hw first and to make it as powerful. Repairability and price were 2nd thoughts
Man! That screen replacement is much easier than I thought! Which mean.. someone might try to change it to an OLED screen hah!
Great minds think alike.
Awesome video as always and little glados at the last nice touch
What an amazing teardown video. Very easy to follow and was very well put together unlike the original video from Valve.
Great work to Valve and iFixit. Seems all great, let's hope they can reduce the amount of glue on the battery, I cannot see any need for that much, just a little to stop it wiggling perhaps!
Amazing to see some companies finally opening up a little more to repairability :)
I have taken apart my old laptop to replace the screen and it has taken me four days to reassemble it back together in working order. It was a big learning experience for me as I am not familiar with such things.
Huge ups for showing these videos. 100% My next tech purchase,.,.
I have no real need for this aside from a new laptop.
The fact that Steam is pro "Right to repair" makes me want it more.
This should be applauded.
No, it should be the standard. That's why the state of Massachusetts had to go after John Deere.
Valve is going about this in an excellent way, more companies should follow suit.
Nice work
That 3D XRay is amazing
A clean. Sharp. Neat teardown.
7/10 ?.... Everything looks very easy to repair and as you said 'if we are lost in there, it's our fault', it's enough to get a 8 or more
The only thing that looks sketchy is the battery's glue/adhesive.
Battery replacement is super important and should be easier.
@@kuhpunkt yes you're right but 3 points penalty ONLY for that... It's very punitive
@@RicolaMint you forgot about the charge port being directly connected to the main board and thats a highly used part
Go watch what a 10/10 Repair-ability score looks like. I still wouldn't trust myself to replace a battery or touchpad on this device, but it's great news that SSD is relatively easy to replace for an impending upgrade (on 64 GB version especially). Soldered USB-C port is a downer as it will get frequent wear and tear, since the battery life of the device is mediocre.
And the usbc directly soldered on the mainboard. Screen and usbc are the most common fails. Usbc is a pain to replace, no way a normal user could do it.
Why did they use glue for the battery, they were doing so well !!
Yeah i am little disappointed too
glue should be only for perimeter or stripes of double sided adghesive from 3M !
I am guessing they were uneasy about the battery moving sround. Pull tabs might work but the holes are what put me off there. Glue will stick to the screen and make it impossible to get out unless the battery is removed first.
You win some you lose some i guess. Maybe the V2 will have easilly replacable battery.
I don't see why they didn't use double sided tape or other light adhesive like most other devices. Strange choice in a device otherwise having plenty of repairability features.
There are laptops with internal batteries where the battery has little screw holes on the sides and just screwed in. I think they should've done the same with the Steam Deck.
I recently broke off the right trigger and im so SO thankful the trigget assembly is mercifully right at the surface of the device. Im not used to repairing my devices but the steam deck looks relativley easy.
I kinda figured you would be posting this wether or not valve wanted you to, but I am so glad valve is on board with it
wow intresting. with all this repairable device ifixit still give 7/10. its just sad that battery and usb port is harder to replace since both required to changed after few years. and god bless analog module and m.2 storage.
I feel like they should get a +1 for availability of parts.
I guess we don't really know how available they'll be if steam pulls a fast one, but I doubt it.
4:10 going with the 64gb EMmC was a good choice since it is modular :). Thank you "Good old Gamer".
Thank you!!!
Whew it's getting hot in here 😅
That's just the battery getting hot after it was punctured when someone tried to remove it. :/
Can't wait till I get mine.
Excellent video.
Can't believe that this is what made me want a steam deck, and oh boy do I want one now!
Missed opportunity to use pull-to-release adhesive under the battery. Oh well, maybe in some later revision?
imo it's because the profit margins are very small on the steamdeck. It probably is sold at minimal profit
@@rajder656 There's no way pull tabs have any significant impact on the bill of materials. There is no excuse for gluing in the battery like that.
@@broli123 when you're already making almost no profit then yes that's a concern because you cannot just factor in the price of the pull tabs but also how you're gonna put them in there.
@@rajder656 Yes because you need a billion dollar robot to stick pull tabs to a battery opposed to sticking glue. Do you know even what pull tabs are? Stop being a contrarian just to be a contrarian dude.
@@broli123 no but you do understand when you're on tight budget then a price of a few hundred k machine is too much ?
im blown away by the size of motherboard, full package there, cpu, gpu + ram, and yet its powerfull for casual gaming. AMD does great job here
As someone who was / is into the Nintendo Switch modding scene, this thing looks amazingly promising for mods! Now I want one!
Well, I guess whilst some companies are trying to turn computers into throwaway consumables. Valve has taken something that could have been a throwaway consumable toy and made it into a computer. Cool!
This makes me glad I reserved one of these. I'm looking forward to a decent, portable Linux box, which is mainly what I want it for. I've yet to see a decent Linux tablet.
This was neat to see, I had actually forgot that this thing even existed
Interesting with this view of the chassis and battery. Looks like they thought or are thinking and possibly working on magic pull-tabs for the battery. The holes in the frame would give good access to such glue tabs. IF they are adding pull-tab adhesive it would be a great plus on the reperability. Then it would only be to pull the tabs and the battery would be loose.
I thought the 64GB was all EMMC storage?
Edit: It is, but in a M.2 Slot, so it can be replaced with any SSD
I still have not placed my order because I am waiting on official (teardown) confirmation that the 64GB is an M2 Slot not a 64GB chip directly soldered in. I'd definitely buy the 64GB model and update myself to 1TB and it would come off cheaper than the price of the 512GB tier.
@@kaemelezzine1827 64gb eMMC has been officially confirmed as M.2 since July my friend.
You could try to go with a fishing line under the battery to cut the glue. In the next Revision valve should use less or weaker glue. Best would be some sort of clips or screws to hold the battery in place.
Using Clips and a weaker glue together would be the best to secure it in place and be easily replaceble. Specially since that there isn't much space inside the chassi
Yup fishing line to easily slice through the glue and metal housing surrounding the battery
here's one thing Apple actually does well: Pull-away adhesive under the battery. In such a tight space this would have been so much better. Still a great job on Valve's part for making the rest seemingly straightforward
Sold. I was in fear from previous valve hardware like the index controller drift and other peripheral I bought from this one, but this looks SOLID!
If it weren't for the battery, the score would've been considerably higher, right? I agree. I can see people needing to replace the battery more commonly than the sticks.
Given how much Valve got right here. It just boggles my mind as to why the battery doesnt just easily pop out with a small screw or something. And why the USB C port is soldered to the motherboard.
Wow Awesome Video. I Ordered mine last Summer and my Order say After q2 2022. So who knows when it might turn up especially being in the UK
„iFixit also works with Valve to offer parts"
I LOVE YOU GUYS :)
And Glados on the end ? Super funny :D
At 1:41 it's interesting to see that the grips are mostly hollow. On the first sight of the Deck's design I was immediately thinking that it was done on purpose to get some extra space for two cylindrical batteries.
Looks really simple to repair! Glad they included the m.2 drive so I can get a $74 512GB nvme drive and plop it into my 64GB model instead of shelling out $$$ for the 512GB model.
Does the 64gb emmc version has the m.2 slot?
@@-shakir5152 Yes, apparently they all do, which is quite unusual as an eMMC module on an m.2 stick is pretty rare.
@@-shakir5152 Yes, thats why I ordered it. It was confirmed to have it by several reviewers and Valve themselves.
Not as easy as that. There's a good chance that an off the shelf ssd will cause interference with other components or draw too much power.
:) THANKS MUCH! Being a senior Nerd in my 70's, ordered one after seeing my Daughter's :) Want to use it as a portable Linux Machine :) ALL the BEST and KUDOS for sharing! Cheeres! :)
Awesome & Thanks :)
My God.
Now I finally know the battery mAh.
To be honest, now I'm kinda scared of the Decks battery and how long it will last, bat I'm certain it'll all be alright.
A decently big phone, like the galaxy A12 I have will have a similar capacity battery in terms of mAh (mine is 5000mAh) but do note that the steam deck supplies it at 7.2V instead of the 3.6 most phones do, so if you had to compare them apples to apples in terms of total power you need to compare the Wh size not the Ah, so it's actually over double or maybe triple what you'd find on a large phone.
can just hook it up with an ANKER powerbank that charges from type c to type c that flows out amount of amp or whatever you called 40w or something like that... should be enough for it
Got it.
Unfortunately looks like I'll have to get a new powerbank, as mine charges 18 w max... sad times.
Battery life tests done by GamersNexus and LTT so far have been pretty good, so I wouldn't worry too much.
I’m still wondering if its actually possible putting amoled on Deck considering the screen is flexible to fit.
You'll Probably see 3rd party OLED screens when it launches.
@@FR4M3Sharma Let's hope so, that'll be sweeeeeet
@@LaurenceGough bump as well
I think the battery issue could be sorted very easily if they attached pull tabs in their next batches. And offer replacement parts with pre attached pull tabs.
Love the recognition Portal 2 stuff inluding GLaDOS. And yes thanks for the breakdown overview!
Well done Valve!
Glued screen and battery will be fixed with this much feedback. Valve is always fast when there is big opportunity to improve their product.
nothing to fix here. They are not supposed to be replaced by user
@@niodix Bad take.
Great review. I pine for the days where battery replacements were incredibly easy.
Love the GlaDOS end.
When are you going to release the Galaxy S22 series Teardown???!!! We wanna see it 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩
I hope Valve start using the kind of tape with pull tabs that you pull so it stretches and releases. It should be able to poke out the slots where you stuck in the cards and make battery replacement a lot easier.
As someone who has some sort of resistance in the left stick while pushing it for the first time after it settled for a few minutes (in use it doesn't come into effect), I appreciate the possibility to buy a new stick down the road without the need of an RMA and the possibility of getting a new one with other issues (first wave batch -> little hiccups are common)
I'm 1.5 minutes in and all I can say so far is y'alls production value and humor leveled up.
What I'm curious about is, would going through the screen be a better way of removing the battery? Since the screen seems like a harrowing (it IS just a thin sheet of glass) but relatively simple matter to remove, couldn't you take it off, and then just heat the metal frame directly, softening the adhesive of the battery for an easy removal?
I dont see why not
Or drip alcohol on the battery once the screen is off
Ifixit did way better than Linus ripping on it Lmao. Love it.
Great to see that the lcd and digitizer are all one unit. I got dust under the digitizer/touch screen on my old switch, and it never really was the same after that. By comparison replace my ps vita display was much more satisfying.
For the first try on such a device. This is top.
Let us see where they will go with that in the future.
Since you removed the shielding from the SSD, does that mean it would be possible to buy a 1TB single sided SSD and just stick the shield obto onto that?
Yes! That will be the first thing I do! Q1 2022!
@@liviutatarush1249 Weould be really cool if you remeber this comment and report back if there are any bluetooth/wifi reception problem. 👍
@@SpieleETC Of course! That sheet metal shield is removed and can be placed perfectly on a new ssd! In disassembling Linus, he took it out and put it back in without bending and effortlessly.
You can't just replace it with any SSD.
There's a lot of RF interference in that area so you have to make sure you use a low RF SSD and they aren't easy to come by. The shield just assists with the already low amount of RF.
Linus covered this
The m.2 drive Valve is using was specifically designed for the Steam Deck, so an off the shelf one could potentially interfere with other components of the Steam Deck. Just be aware of that when you replace it. Valve will probably be selling larger drives down the road as part of their replacement parts store to ensure it works properly with everything else.
Valve sets industry standards and makes everything they can open-source, then the industry shows how cowardly they are by never making any software or hardware that remotely compares to the quality Valve has.
aand that my friend
is capitalism in a nutshell
Valve is more like yeah repair it all you want so we don't have to do it, except the battery which we expect to completely degrade by the time our next console is out, you're welcome.
@@FAQUERETERMAX it's just a bit harder. It's not irreparable. Your argument would only work if they would serialise the battery to the motherboard
@@rajder656 If they did that it would be too obvious. Do you think Valve can't figure out how to make batteries easy to remove? Pull tabs are in a lot of devices these days, but they just added a ton of glue. Going by the recommended method which is a heat gun next to a ton of plastic is just insane, imagine how many steam decks will be ruined because of that... right at the end of their life cycle.
@@FAQUERETERMAX what would be too obvious? That they very aggresively priced steam deck and the cost of not just ordering the pull tabs but also applying them would cost too much? Also you can heat the glue up without melting the plastic. If you're using a reasonable amount of heat it shouldn't melt. Plastic doesnt melt in 50/100 degrees, the bottom line is around 160 degrees celcius
Thank you very much
I love the GLaDOS potato, that's a great touch!
Valve is doing it right, Making the Console cheap, having it run an Open Source Software (even tho it's partial), giving modularity in the Hardware and making it pretty much very easily repairable. I mean just look at the Switch Nintendo does the same, Soldered USBC and Glued Battery, But hey atleast the Deck has an easily upgradeable Storage.
I'm just hoping they don't introduce any Hardware/Firmware level locks like Apple and also make it available in more countries like mine.
They said the storage was designed specifically for the Steam Deck to minimize interference with the WiFi. Changing it out with a new of the shelf one could interfere with the WiFi's ability to work properly.
@@Joreel You can still use any other type of storage, the shield on it is what keeps it from interfering with the wifi.
Funny thing about the original Switch is that, to lower production costs of high-internal-storage (64GB) dev units and fit everything in the small form factor, the storage was originally on a separate (custom) board, which sits above... Wait for it... The WiFi chipset. If anything, the Steam Deck is a remarkably similar design, just using off-the-shelf parts!
That’s cool now if the steam deck could run every game in steam that would be a game changer!
It's a laptop in a novel form factor. You can supposedly install/dualboot Windows on it. Sure, not all games will run *well*, but they'll run.
I wonder if there'll be an main board upgrade path when the Deck 2 I released. That would be pretty sweet and evo friendly.
4:00 That SSD is so freakin’ CUTE 😍
It looks great but as you said it's still far from perfect. On a portable device like this the battery and USB C port should be considered a consumable item.
THIS IS GREAT NEWS OF AN EASY BREAKDOWN PEOPLE WILL DEF BE REPLACING THOSE SD DRIVES FOR LARGER ASAP I LOVE VALVE AND GABE THEY ARE SO FOR THEIR CUSTOMERS
@ifixit I'm curious to hear why you guys don't recommend the use of ESD (Electro-Static Discharge) wrist straps?
I so love the glados potato in the end
That repair score is too low. Should be at minimum an 8. This thing is more repairable than the original Nintendo Switch yet you guys gave that an 8 and the Deck a 7.
Either fix the score or be more transparent about the scoring process.
It deserves it for that nightmarish battery itself. They’ve GLUED two fragile ribbon cables onto the battery and for good measure they’ve also added a boatload of glue under the battery too. The most commonly replaced part is the most difficult to repair
Only 7/10 ? At least 8 or 9... 10 is only for full modular, but nevertheles - good job STEAM !
The battery is a bit disappointing. In my opinion a fair rating.
@@0xbenedikt exactly, 3point down for battery?
@@0xbenedikt yes the battery is the 'problem'. But 3 points penalty ONLY for that. For ME, it's too punitive
@@1ssac1 battery and glued display, 7 is well deserved, specially given they basically bathed the battery in glue.
7 is still a great score lol. It's quite modular inside BUT has the battery and screen glued in, and my biggest gripes here are the soldered USB C port and the self tapping screws.
I kinda like this new ifixit thing… this video is really good.
You guys are awesome.
Cant wait to get mine.