How would you rate the OLED deck? Did you keep your LCD deck? Have you noticed any of the smaller improvements like a more responsive touch screen? Has the battery life improvement been noticable?
Yes - went from my 512 LCD to the LE OLED. I already upgraded the nvme to a 2tb in the LCD, so I just swapped it out.
Screen is definitely more impressive, but that wasn’t the main reason I upgraded. It was the better battery life that made it worth it. The other efficiencies, upgrades to the controls, were icing on the cake, but battery life far and above was the thing that made it worth it. But as many have said, the screen is damn impressive.
There wasn’t a single shred of buyer’s remorse. But I also play on it every day and tinker with it non stop. So depending on how much you utilize your deck may effect whether it’s worth it for you or not.
Yes I absolutely love it. I will give you the same advice I gave my brother. He plays his 20% of the time, so I told him not to bother yet and wait for the next generation model eventually. Myself, on the other hand, pretty much abandoned my gaming pc for the steam deck, so upgrading was absolutely worth it.
The screen is way better particularly the 90hz upgrade, playing at 90 FPS is so much smoother than 60, since I mostly play indies and old games on the deck I hit that frame rate all the time. Also I used to love my Vita and Switch because of the Oled screen. I now can play my Vita and Switch games on a 7+ inches oled display with proper controls, plus all my pc games. The brightness increases makes playing games on the couch on plain day light feasible, previously I had to turn the blinds in order to properly enjoy a game. That’s no longer the case.
The battery upgrade is very nice, specially for more demanding games . I usually only play lighter games on a handheld as opposed to AAA and rarely play more than 2-3 hours per session so the battery has always been fine for me, however when playing games like Resident Evil the battery lasted about 2 hours, now it last 3.5 hours, enough for a full gaming session. Games like Hardcore mecha get over 10 hours which mean i could take the Deck on a Weekend trip and forget about charging it.
The sticks feel way better too, not as good as the PS4 controller, the middle part is still a little slippery but close enough.
All that said the games you will play are as as much fun in the Oled model than in the regular one. I sold my LCD Deck so the upgrade have been relatively cheap but if you have to buy a new one and find a sweet deal on an LCD model don’t hesitate, you will be able to upgrade to the Deck 2 in 18-24 months.
Yes.
The thing that has struck me the most is how much lighter it is. Nobody seems to be mention that, but that one small thing makes such an outsize difference.
The battery life is also very noticeable, and you can multiply the benefit by using energy conserving settings.
The other big difference is control responsiveness. If you play fighting games or other games with intense timing and accuracy needs, you WILL notice the difference.
The OG Steam Deck is still great, but the OLED is just better in so many little, meaningful ways.
