I feel like steam OS is the perfect balance. You can go from minimal tinkering to getting down and dirty with the settings. I wouldn’t be scared off by it being your first gaming pc. I’m primarily a windows user … and even going into the desktop mode (which you don’t need to) the steam deck is such a device with tons of community support you will always find answers to a problem. Either via Reddit or YouTube.

I would go for it . I’ve been loving mine as a first time steam deck user (although slightly more technically experienced with computers altogether)

People I believe are being nitpicky with the glossy vs etched glass tbh. I do believe putting a screen protector on will more so replicate the glossy finish from what I’ve found online. It will also take away the anti glare effects.

So in reality it appears you can get similar effects from either steam deck depending on what screen protector you put on. From my understanding at least

I downloaded a few large games and it ended up going into sleep mode once it was done downloading.

Regardless though, oled tech has came a long way and I wouldn’t worry about burn in. Look at bob wulf on you tube with his switch oled. It finally has burn in, but he left it on for 2 years on the same screen. I think he didn’t have any noticeable differences until a year if I recall correctly lol

Don’t get the standard z1. I know the extreme model is on sell right now for $599 right now. Could also do open box but not sure if you will hit the 450. At that point I would go steam deck

I believe that’s intended . They were redone . I enjoy the bumpers, but don’t have anything to compare it to

I went to protondb and saw a good set up . I have higher settings and sitting around 35fps

Cryobyte33 has a good guide on YouTube and one of the settings shoot for 40 fps.

Good thing about red dead I felt it was a slower paced game… and it only runs at 30 fps on the PS5 if I remember correctly since they never updated any patch or anything. I just got my first steam deck as well and I’m tinkering a good bit with settings. In all honesty, shooting for a smooth 30-40 fps has been my target for these larger AAA games and it still feels fairly smooth

No I didn’t.

People have had a QC pop up here and there but out of the thousands sent out, it can’t be that much. It’s normal to have stuff pop up, and usually people are more vocal when things go wrong.

I got my LE SD. I love it. So far flawless. Getting used to SD trying to get other launchers and stuff going on it . I’m a windows guy so the Ally actually never bothered me.

Yes

If you plan to connect and use as a PC I would get the ally. It has windows which I’m assuming you used. The ally was awesome while I had it (returned it because I had some life events coming up) and that was at launch.

I however am pretty comfortable with windows and none of the reasonable complaints on windows didn’t bother me as much. The screen is gorgeous even for an lcd panel and it runs things amazingly if you don’t mind being tethered (I would mainly play at home in bed or on the couch where I can be semi present with my wife lmao).

I purchased the oled deck and it comes today which I’m very excited about . I returned it when I initially got it because I didn’t check my expectations and it was rough at launch with an OS I was completely foreign to .

Kinda 2 different use cases it seems for you it seems (pc replacement or gaming primarily). Whatever you decide I don’t think you’ll go wrong. I would just next look at if you are playing does the performance while tethered bother you? Do you want more battery life? What kind of games do you plan on playing and go from there.

Getting a single device route will definitely be cheaper I would imagine for you

This is awesome! How does it run. FPS wise? Always wondered how it would run on these handhelds but most videos I’ve found are in the starting zone .