Valve Announces Steam Deck As Portable SteamOS + AMD Powered Portable PC

[skeevy420]

That does not change the fact that for a Workstation OS, KDE is simply to broken, to heavy and too buggy for being the default. No reputable workstation linux distro ships KDE by default. Thats not fanboyism, install plasma, test it, compare it and every sane person will come to the same conclusion. A poorly executed windows clone with questionable software design and licensing issues.

Which would be why every in almost every GNOME article we talk about how it sucks until enough plugins are added?

There's SUSE. They ship KDE. I'd put them in the respectable category. Aside from Red Hat and Fedora, where GNOME is from, nearly every distribution ships GNOME with plugins because (for 95% of us) the default workflow just sucks if you need a multitasking workstation desktop. The rest created their own desktop environments because they don't care for neither GNOME nor KDE.

I installed Plasma and have tested it for the past 7 or 8 years now. I came to the conclusion that GNOME 3 isn't a good desktop until I add enough plugins and those same plugins eventually break when my rolling release distribution, Arch, updates leaving me with a functional, fully working, desktop 3 months out of the year. The rest of the time I'm waiting on plugin writers to play catch up.

Funny how the place that basically funds Linux creates a desktop that doesn't have a stable ABI or API for plugins...the kernel equivalent to drivers...that's one hell of a coincidence...

I suppose by "licensing issues" you mean the CLA which a lot of open source projects have these days -- it allows a project to not end up like the Linux kernel where you have to track down 2500 people and have them all agree to a license change. In that regard GPL in and of itself can be seen as a "licensing issue".

Here's the real question: Can I buy the cheapo model and slap in my own storage? The cheapo and a 1tb nvme is cheaper than the premium....

[kiffmet]

That does not change the fact that for a Workstation OS, KDE is simply to broken, to heavy and too buggy for being the default. (...) Thats not fanboyism, install plasma, test it, compare it and every sane person will come to the same conclusion. A poorly executed windows clone with questionable software design and licensing issues.

I call BS on that one. The last time you have tested Plasma must have been years ago. I've seen total system RAM usage as low as 400MiB with recent Plasma versions and it's even working great on potato PCs (Core2Duo, + 9000 series entry level GeForce). Especially in the last 12 months, the KDE team has tremendously picked up the pace in squashing bugs.

When not trying to change every last obscure setting of the desktop, it's very unlikely to encounter any bugs. The default configuration may be Windows-like to make it accessible to new users, but this is not a bad thing. KDE and the programs of its ecosystem can also be configured to feel and act like GNOME 3, MacOS or XFCE with a few clicks. This falsifies your claims about it just being a "poorly executed windows clone" - as it can do so much more, yet it chooses to come with sane defaults.

Btw, this is an aspect where GNOME3 straight out fails IMO due to being intimidating and confusing for non tech-savy people, in part due to requiring users to learn keyboard shortcuts for efficient usage, but also due to breaking with so many established UI conventions. One who doesn't spend any time with it, might say on the first glance that GNOME3 is "just a poorly executed MacOS clone, but more cumbersome while actually shipping less features".

As for the licensing issues, I think it (QT LTS releases going closed source) is mostly an annoyance at this point and will resolve on its own in a few months, once Qt 6.X reaches feature parity with the 5.12.X series. In the meantime, the KDE devs can workaround Qt bugs by implementing custom behavior in their kde-frameworks stack, so it's not like they can't continue development because of this.

[kiffmet]

(...) Here's the real question: Can I buy the cheapo model and slap in my own storage? The cheapo and a 1tb nvme is cheaper than the premium....

In the IGN interview the Valve devs have denied this. It seems like the storage will be directly soldered to the mainboard. In any model you can add a high capacity MicroSD card however and these aren't as slow as they used to be.

[murraytony]

I hope it does well, should be funding lots of Linux development!

However, I looked at it and thought that I already have one with my Kishi + Phone + Stadia.

[skeevy420]

In the IGN interview the Valve devs have denied this. It seems like the storage will be directly soldered to the mainboard. In any model you can add a high capacity MicroSD card however and these aren't as slow as they used to be.

That's what I was afraid of. Here's to hoping the hardware modding community figures out something faster than MicroSD else I'm gonna have to consider the mid-range or premium. 64GB just isn't enough storage for a modern gaming device. Frankly, neither are the other two with games around 100GB these days. If you have a shitty ISP with bandwidth limitations this matters a lot because you can't swap games out every day unless you have some sort of high capacity file storage solution and slowly acquire your legally purchased games...it sucks...welp, I've hit 250gb, stop download games for the month...it really, really sucks...

[AmericanLocomotive]

That's what I was afraid of. Here's to hoping the hardware modding community figures out something faster than MicroSD else I'm gonna have to consider the mid-range or premium. 64GB just isn't enough storage for a modern gaming device. Frankly, neither are the other two with games around 100GB these days. If you have a shitty ISP with bandwidth limitations this matters a lot because you can't swap games out every day unless you have some sort of high capacity file storage solution and slowly acquire your legally purchased games...it sucks...welp, I've hit 250gb, stop download games for the month...it really, really sucks...

SD Cards have come a long way. There are now "Application" class SD cards with read speeds approaching 300MB/s.

Is it as fast an SSD? No, but it should be quicker than a mechanical HDD.

[Aiua]

That does not change the fact that for a Workstation OS, KDE is simply to broken, to heavy and too buggy for being the default. No reputable workstation linux distro ships KDE by default. Thats not fanboyism, install plasma, test it, compare it and every sane person will come to the same conclusion. A poorly executed windows clone with questionable software design and licensing issues.

This is such a ridiculous take, I work everyday on a KDE system without any issue.

[TemplarGR]

Performance will be fine. Seems people don't realize this is a 800p machine. I own an AMD FX-6300, with 16gigs of RAM and an R9 380 2GB of VRAM. with 2Terras of HDD, one of the faster ones though. I game only on Linux. And let me tell you, at 1080p, i can play many, many games, whether native or on Wine/proton, just fine. In fact, i can even play Cyberpunk 2077, last time i tried it was definitely playable on low settings, albeit at a lower resolution, around 900p. The deck seems quite stronger than my machine, i am willing to bet that with a little maturation from drivers and proton, it can definitely run a playable Cyberpunk 2077. And if it can run this, it can run anything. And my machine, is WAY under the minimum requirements for Cyberpunk 2077...

This little monster is gonna be a raging success, especially if Valve manages to convince more AAA companies to provide more native ports of their games, instead of relying on Proton. For example Bethesda could be convinced to release a Linux port of Skyrim SE and Fallout 4/76. It is worth it if they use Vulkan, because Vulkan ports could potentially work on Android platforms down the line.

[AHOY]

Anyone knows if it's IP6X salt-proof rated? I want to install GNOME there but I worry about the warranty

[TemplarGR]

This is such a ridiculous take, I work everyday on a KDE system without any issue.

I don't believe that. I have been using Arch for more than 14 years. While i mainly use Gnome, i occasionally try out KDE and there are always problems. I don't believe for a second it is going to be a polished experience. Sadly, KDE fanbois don't realise what "polished experience for a console" means.