So I know it's not an all-time low, but $799 is still the cheapest I could see available at the moment. It appears they have stock online, so hopefully not pre-order (but advise if it is and I'll adjust the description).
Worth a look at if you're in the market for one.
Australian business - ACL applies, they'd be responsible.
Still might be sent overseas by PCByte to be fixed, right?
Probably. Unless PCByte wants to take the responsibility to open and repair it themselves
They might, or they might just replace and trash it. Ultimately it doesn't matter as its not your problem.
@playaz91: It actually is, because if they replace it, it's faster than sending overseas and back, fixing inbetween.
@pizzaguy: Sorry yes, I should have been more clear as to why it doesn't matter. You can opt for a replacement or refund thanks to ACL.
So yes it does not matter.
@playaz91: That can’t be true.
It’s up to the reseller/manufacturer to decided if it’s to be fixed or replaced/refunded.
@ozbargain-pashim: It absolutely is true and if any retailer or seller tells you otherwise than they are either flat our lying or completely ignorant to how the consumer protection laws work here.
The ACL clearly states that if something goes wrong then the consumer can make the call if they want a replacement or a full refund for the defective product.
@ezzahhh: sure the consumer gets to choose between a replacement or a refund, but the manufacturer can negate both of these options by opting to fix the product instead.
And given this is a reasonably expensive consumer electronics item, it should be covered for at least two years under ACL, not just the one year manufacturer warranty.
Sold an on Australian domain, I'd say you are entitled to more than a single year.
so it'll be same case.
No, it's not. It's an Aussie shop selling it and giving you an invoice/receipt. You get a 2-year warranty and if it breaks after 1.5 years, it's PCByte's to fix/replace it for you. Having in mind the question in the previous comment - I have no idea if these are sent overseas to be fixed.
https://www.pcbyte.com.au/return-policy
"1. Non-PCByte Product
any products sold on PCByte, except PCByte Custom System Products.
PCByte is not the manufacturer or producer of any Non-PCByte Product, and the only warranties offered in respect of a Non-PCByte Product are those of the manufacturer, not PCByte."
Oh they can say whatever they want about "PCByte Warranty" or "manufacturers warranty". They can even sell you an "extended warranty" for 3-5 years if you pay extra. That's 100% to confuse people.
And doesn't change the fact that if it breaks within 2 years, they have to replace or fix it for you free of charge in Australia.
@pizzaguy: Ok. i wasn't aware of these 2-year rules. Haven't really used any warranty in my life. I just read what the sellers' policies provide.
@JC1986: Dodgy sellers will try to get out of statutory warranties, but if you know your ACL rights, you can enforce them.
However, the above disclaimer you quoted is actually illegal, as it misleads consumers about their rights. They could be fined for even having it on the website.
@axyh: yeh apparently you get negged by citing them as well. LOL
It'll be annoying to deal with them with consumer rights for sure.
@JC1986: There are a few mentions in the terms as well. Clause 17.3 is pretty typical - ACL applies.
17.3 Nothing in these Terms excludes, restricts or modifies any consumer guarantee, right or remedy conferred on you by the Australian Consumer Law, Schedule 2 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) (ACL) or any other applicable law that cannot be excluded, restricted or modified by agreement.
PCbyte should take this comment down before they are fined by the ACCC
Like when they fined msy $750,000
According to some other forums, if you purchased from Valve directly, you may be able to get service if you have a US address.
This is 100% true, you can indeed get this warrantied from Valve but;
1) You are responsible for shipping to the United States which can be anywhere from $40-$160+ + Import Fees
2) Its going to take forever unless if its that $160+ expedited service
3) It will be sent to a US Forwarding Address and expect an additional cost of $60 AUD + Import Fees and GST which is another $60 to having it shipped back
Especially if this was a Valve Index, expect that cost on shipping to be in the hundreds before tax.
Can you upgrade the storage later on manually by yourself without breaking warranty?
Should be fine. Valve has made it self repair friendly. I've upgraded my SSD with 1TB Western Digital SN740
Was everything okay with the card? Bit skeptical of buying this kind of thing off Aliexpress. Amazon has these SD cards more expensive for half the storage space which is weird. And the miniSD cards like Samsung Evo are way too cheap to be realistic, they all look like scams ($15-25).
Everything was fine.
I'm really enjoying mine. The laptop form factor can't compare.
How weak do you think the Steam Deck is? You think the Switch is anymore capable? The Switch is no where near the SD in terms of hardware specs.
What a load of crap
You’re kind of special, aren’t you?
Agreed, I have a desktop gaming rig with 3080, a gaming laptop for lans with 3060 and I end up a lot more time on the Steamdeck because of the convenience even when at home.
Good feedback - what is your favorate game to play on the deck currently
Yeah, it handles games fine. Lower res + tweaks to settings results in playable FPS.
Yeah. Well not everyone is you.
Well, it actually is "your thing" gaming on a laptop spec 3060…
Your comments are not our thing.
Absolute ignorance. Comparing this to a laptop is laughable.
Also 'leave handheld gaming to the switch'? Many people have 100s-1000s of games in their Steam library, that you can now play basically anywhere. Not to mention Emudeck helps you easily run 1000s of retro games up to PS2 and some PS3 and Xbox/360 games.
No other PC handheld is as affordable and well-supported as the Steam Deck right now.
I upgraded to the Steam Deck from the Switch OLED - the switch specs are laughable in comparison to the SD and not everyone wants to lug around a gaming laptop.
Complains that the Stream Deck isn't a real gaming PC.
Then goes on about their laptop they bought to play hardcore games on lol.
You'd be laughed out of any hardcore PC gaming group for wasting money on a laptop for 'serious gaming'.
Steamdeck is fantastic for the price and much better value for money.
switch is soo gutless compared to the deck. Tbh switch is becoming more obsolete thanks to the deck's emulation.
I agree with everything except the switch, it physically hurts me to think of how garbage the hardware in a switch is. The Steam Decks issue is it's X86, which gives it horrible battery life.
Both are bad.
It being x86 has absolutely nothing to do with its battery life LOL.
I’m not saying it has great battery, but the problem with battery isn’t limited just to deck, its to gaming in general.
If you play games that are require switch level performance or demand, you’ll get similar battery life from the steam deck.
You can pull 8-10 hours easy on some games. Getting 1-1.5hrs on a triple a title should not be surprising.
The entire purpose of a portable gaming system is to play games away from power. If you can't take it with you on a trip without having to be near a power socket every 2 hours for it's intended games and they intended AAA PC games not just emulated indie titles, then the product is a failure. It may be awesome in all other areas but as a "mobile" gaming system it is not. The deck is meant to play AAA games like on a PC on the go. There is no way around that except to admit x86 is not made for mobile gaming. The entire reason Arm was invented was to build it from the ground up for mobile use, the power, thermals and cooling are all built against the short comings of x86 in mobile. All these decades later and laptops that cost 2K+ are still horrible at AAA mobile gaming, they are intended to be plugged in to play. All because x86 is not built for mobile. I have been dreaming of a AAA handheld gaming device for decades and I want one more than anyone, but the switch and deck are a joke when it comes to actual mobile gaming, the switch had disgustingly under powered hardware at launch, it physically hurts to play games on it. Nintendo runs on a cult fanbase who will defend Nintendo even if they infected kids with cancer. The deck is excused by a different cult, the pc master race who think they are better than everyone else because of a "Open" platform. I just want a AAA portable gaming system that can play console level games for 5-7 hours, the switch and deck are not it no matter what the fanboys try to twist.
@Zylam Marex: It's like you've completely forgotten that powerbanks exist. If you need to use it away from power for extended periods then this is how you do it.
Power consumption is directly proportional to performance - if you want a Steamdeck to last twice as long, then it's only going to offer half the performance. If you build an ARM system that had the same performance as the Steamdeck, then guess what, it's going to use about the same 15W - but it's not going to run most of the Steam library well because games are coded for x86.
@Nom: If the solution is to carry a powerbank for a portable device that is meant to be portable, the product is already a failure. Heck, why even put a battery in the portable device if power banks exist? Power consumption is directly proportional to performance - yes, but you are comparing apples to oranges with arm vs x86. Steam deck's geekbench is 871/3646 (https://browser.geekbench.com/search?q=Valve+Jupiter) , meanwhile the A16 is 1865/5458 (https://browser.geekbench.com/search?q=a16) with a max power draw of 3.66 Watt, better performance for less power. Let's look at Qualcomm's gaming focused chip Snapdragon G3X Gen 1 (https://browser.geekbench.com/search?q=razer+edge) 1172/3419, with a power draw around 10W, fully comparable to the deck. Also this argument of power to performance was used countless times in the past and as always missed one key element; you are comparing the inefficient pc windows/linux eco system, which once again is not designed for portable use. Android and iOS are built around mobile. iPhone's can game for hours with console graphics, heck even budget Android phones can. The power draw alone is not the full picture, but even then, arm beats x86. Each time people said it wouldn't happen, arm improved faster than every indication and continues to do so. The Steam deck is old technology that is just a stop gapp until arm becomes a true AAA gaming platform, which it could have been already, but Nintendo is obsessed with horrible specs. The good news however, is because of them and Apple's transition to Arm, we are very close to real AAA portables with great specs and most important battery life.
@Zylam Marex: Sorry I don't understand the point you're trying to make - Steamdeck exists for the Steam library, and that's a library of x86 titles.
The Steamdeck needs to be x86 and it needs to perform at least well enough to play most of the library.
Which it does, hence the battery life. There's no magical solution here - that level of performance gives you the resulting battery life. Nobody wants it to last twice as long but only offer half the frame rates 🤷🏼♂️
@Nom: Yup I am aware that the steam deck exists for your steam library, however it even fails there. There is no guarantee all of your library will work, devs have to support anti-cheat on it, which they don't and on top of that it requires tinkering to get the stuff that does work to work. All that just to play at mediocre res and frames for 1.5 - 2 hours? How on earth is that a good experience or even justifiable at $800? I never said there was a magical solution, I just called out the flaws and failures of such a device, because the tech and software it's made on is not meant for mobile, hence the issues. I did not fabricate the facts, these are the facts and they paint the picture of a device that isn't as great as people make it out to be.
@Zylam Marex: One of the big draws of the steam deck is the back catalogue. You're not going to get that on an ARM device.
Whatever device you're talking about is still a long long way away.
There are small steps towards it though - I saw a deal for Resident Evil village on Mac. It will be interesting to see what battery benchmarks are like.
@ihfree: Yes I am aware of the steam catalogue but as I replied to Nom above, there is no guarantee all of your library will work, and if it does it's at mediocre res and frames for 1.5 to 2 hours? That experience for $800. I don't have a problem with anyone buying the deck, why would I care, but when people start to talk about how great the deck and switch are, I find it painful when such obvious things are left off, I merely mention them and people try to defend them with no actual justification.
I don't know how far away actual Arm portables are with a AAA dev arm based support, devs already make multi plat games for the switch, and arm is powerful enough to emulate up to PS3. The elements are there, we just need them to come together. But in the meantime, the deck and switch are definitely not an experience worth the money they ask.
there is no guarantee all of your library will work
Well, obviously. But a significant portion does work and it's easy to check what works.
Personally, I haven't had a problem with anything I've wanted to play.
mediocre res and frames
It's a smaller screen. You don't need the resolution. While subjective, frame rate is more than playable, IMO, including many AAA titles.
for 1.5 to 2 hours
That's for a more demanding game. There are games that achieve much better.
great the deck and switch
I have both and they are great for what they are. No one buys a handheld expecting console or PC performance.
A high end gaming experience is a long way from being viable in a handheld or even laptop form factor. The power draw is too much. We can already get an idea of what a ARM based system would be like with M1/M2 Macs. Battery life is still an issue in more demanding games.
and arm is powerful enough to emulate up to PS3
I assume you're talking about Apple silicon. If that's the case, I have bad news for you - Qualcomm are lagging behind with performance.
ARM is just an architecture - it an be optimised for efficiency or performance and often has a mix of cores to achieve those goals, which is also what Intel have done. When you look at performance per watt, it's not as far off as you think with AMD chips. You also need to consider Apple are on a more advanced process node which gives them an efficiency advantage.
mediocre res and frames for 1.5 to 2 hours?
Mediocre res is just fine on a tiny screen, and I don't think most people are trying to game for more than a couple of hours in a single session, away from any power - that's a pretty niche scenario for a portable, surely ?
But in the meantime, the deck and switch are definitely not an experience worth the money they ask.
You realise both platforms have been wildly successful and so this statement is incorrect.
People are absolutely buying them at the money they ask.
tell me youve been living under the rock without telling me.
Waiting for oled
Will the next version have a larger screen ?
Unlikely in the near future, the developers said the deck was basically built around the screen, so size won't change but OLED and battery life is likely to change.
There's articles on this point, maybe for version 2 but I wouldn't hold my breath. Not sure if it's something to do with scale asking for a bespoke screen size or what.. OLED would be amazing though
Deck II is coming in 1-7 years!
They should announce between this year and 2028!
x4 for Australia if the last release was anything to go by
Long wait, 9 days ago they said they can't just drop an OLED in.
https://www.pcgamer.com/valve-likes-the-idea-of-an-oled-stea…
In before some Chinese manufacturer sells OLED upgrade kits
Why is the memory (64gb) so low? Games that run on this platform are basically cut-down versions of their PC counterparts?
No they are the full Steam version of the game. You would need to buy a microSD card to increase storage if you intend to have more than one game on the device at a time with 64GB
Or upgrade the internal SSD, but I believe that requires you to also flash over the OS and some other stuff first.
Can use a cheap microSD for storage with minimal speed losses, or upgrade the internal yourself which is cheaper than buying the larger storage model
Not that this is an answer to your question however this video explains the microSD cards that best suit the Steam Deck https://youtu.be/JGHZs8RTlVU
Looks more legit than Kogan IMHO
I think it is preorder? 10-14 business days and then up the top it’s actually categorised as “Preorder blowout”
Not that there’s any issue with that - just something for people to be aware of - it’s going to be 2-3 weeks and that’s if the times are accurate
I'm assuming this the closest to a non grey import we're going to get for a while. I'm almost tempted.
Probably isnt worth the buy at this point guys. Theres a lot of rumors about a hardware refresh being imminent. its like they waited till the hardware was nearing end of life for retailers to try bringing it into the country
Yep, though definitely leaning towards it being a design and screen refresh more than a SoC bump. There was an article that briefly specified from valves end that adding an OLED screen isn't as simple as people think though. It'd have to be a purpose made screen if they stick with the same specifications afaik.
honestly, i can almost bet we will not see any new steamdeck model that doesnt have a new SoC. IF they release one with an OLED screen, or bigger screen, id put my money on any new hardware having a new SoC.
Not sure where youre getting this, iirc they said there won’t be anything new for “at least a few years”
EDIT: You can disregard any rumours given Valves addressed it directly: no new steam deck for a few years.
https://www.techpowerup.com/305733/no-steam-deck-2-for-at-le…
i wont buy directly into the rumours, but valve isnt exactly a normal company… not the first time theyve said this is not happening, than bam here it is. regardless, even if it doesnt happen for a few years theres quite a number of more powerful alternative options.
I want it but I don't need it.
It's a handheld gaming machine that runs on Linux. Of course you need it
Pull up that turtleneck, your neckbeard is showing
Is there really any overlap between neck beards and turtlenecks?
With you there … Too many consoles and tech no time to use or play them haha still super tempting
Worth for emulation
Is it better to buy from Amazon in case of return/refund?
I've dealt with Amazon before and they are pretty easy to deal with when it comes to getting a full refund.
I don't mind spending a bit more for peace of mind.
Amazon don't sell directly. You are best dealing from a larger or better known Australian business if warranty is a concern.
If this item was "shipped from Amazon - sold by 3rd Party", then they will treat this just like if they were the sellers of the item, so if this is the case people have an extremely high chance of getting a replacement.
I picked up a 256GB version from a 3rd party seller through Kogan for $869 (I think I shaved off another $20 with shopback gift cards) with no issues. I think this price is a bit too steep, at the moment they're being sold for 10% off and stock may be lower causing higher prices, might be worth waiting a bit
Link to this seller or option?
Ah apologies, should’ve mentioned this was back in early Feb, and the seller seemed to run out of stock not long after - you can keep an eye on the Kogan listing for the steam deck and click ‘details’ to check the prices of all the different third party sellers, but seems to have skyrocketed. My main point is that this seems to be a price cycle thing - if you can, I would advise waiting. You can grab these for 10% off right now, so importers should be able to offer more competitive prices if anything
Hopefully one of these retailers stocks the official dock. Been keen to get one but i dont want to import one from the US
Im using the JSAUX dock, its just as good. They also sell transparent backplates with a thermal plate which helps out thermals by a few degrees during those high GPU usage gaming sessions
How does warranty work with these? Assuming the 1yr starts at the time they purchased it from where ever.. would it have to be shipped over seas for repair?