The Steam Deck™ OLED

Heya, 8bit here. Happy New Years, gamers! I got my hands on the new Steam Deck OLED edition 512gb model. The previous one I had for the past year and a half has a new owner. I gave it to one of my friends for Christmas just so I can have an excuse to buy the new OLED model. This blog post will be short, but I will talk about the unboxing experience and my first impressions.

Steam Deck and the carrying case.

Unboxing

The unboxing experience is the same as the old Steam Deck, however the first thing I notice immediately is that the big paper telling you to plug in your Steam Deck to turn it on the first time is missing and it’s just the AC adapter box and the Steam Deck case side by side.

A picture of my old Steam Deck LCD unboxing showcasing the now missing paper that alerts you to plug in the Steam Deck before use.

Here’s a video of me unboxing the Steam Deck OLED model, this time only featuring me and maybe a cat cameo, who knows?

Unboxing video.

What’s included in the box is:

  • Steam Deck OLED
  • Carrying Case a lot cooler
  • Charging Cable way longer!

First Impressions

The screen is the first thing you notice coming from the LCD Steam Deck, it is such an improvement. The colors are a lot better to look at, the screen refresh rate being 90hz makes games feel very smooth, and the increase screen size is a nice change. Holding it, it does feel lighter than the old one; kinda crazy how much 30g does actually make a difference. The case is different from my old Steam Deck LCD. Since I got the 256gb model last time, I only got the basic carrying case which houses the white steam deck logo, but the 512gb OLED model houses the same texture the old 512gb LCD model carrying case had but instead of blue, the color is orange.

The first thing I did when I got my shiny new Steam Deck was open it. Taking the back cover off the internals are very different than the LCD model that I’m used to. I had to unplug ribbon cables, audio cables and most importantly the battery plug just for me to get into the SSD. After replacing the 512 GB SSD with my 2 TB SSD that I talked about on my last blog post, the Steam Deck instantly knew it was on an OLED model and prompted for an update.

Steam Deck Firmware Update prompt when installing my previous SSD.

Downloading games on the OLED model is very fast. Thanks to the new WIFI card, I can finally access the 6 GHz option on my modem using the Steam Deck for blazing fast downloads. The OLED model also has an updated Bluetooth chip, but I haven’t quite used it yet since I don’t use wireless controllers that often. The charging cable is a lot longer than the LCD model which makes charging the OLED deck while sitting on the couch with a far away wall plug much more bearable and the charging block has the Steam Deck logo which is a nice touch, good job Valve 🙂

One thing I did notice about the OLED model that’s probably a problem in my unit is that the volume buttons are not good. Sometimes when you click it it doesn’t register an input and the volume down button is very mushy and not as clicky as the volume up button.

The only accessories that I kept is the dbrand Killswitch case for the Steam Deck, and it fits perfectly onto the new OLED deck and the Steam Deck dock. I bought myself a JSAUX glossy screen protector with oleophobic coating on Amazon.com for $10 for 2 glass. Installation was a breeze and I only have one spec of dust under the screen protector that annoys me, but it’s alright.

Conclusion

Even though it’s a small blog post, there isn’t really much to add with this new model. The changes in this thing are amazing and really help the quailty of life with the Steam Deck. The APU is just the same so can’t really talk about game performance on the new OLED model when it’s the same on the LCD model. Also the vent smell is back :O (if you didn’t own a steam deck before you probably don’t know what this means). Now that I gave away my old LCD model, I can finally justify this purchase. My rating for the OLED model would be a 9.5/10. Thanks again for reading my nerd blog, see you in the next one.

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