Valve’s next gaming handheld device, the Steam Deck 2, is set for release in the year 2028, according to a new rumor.
Known hardware insider KeplerL2 took to gaming enthusiast forums NeoGAF to respond to a fellow member who speculated on the release timeline for the Steam Deck 2. Their response was short and to the point: “Steam Deck 2 is 2028”.
The insider’s launch window for the Steam Deck 2 is roughly in line with what was previously stated by Valve Corporation’s Product Designer Lawrence Yang during an interview with Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier in November, 2023. He revealed that him and his team would work on the Steam Deck successor after the launch of the Steam Deck OLED, and that it would feature a “next-generation” power upgrade. However, at the time, he said that the Steam Deck 2 would be at least two to three years from release. Schreier noted that, unlike with several of its past experiments, including Steam Machines and the Steam Controller, Valve appeared to be committed to its handheld device in the long run.
The Steam Deck is a handheld gaming computer created by Valve and launched on February 25, 2022. It runs on Valve’s Linux distribution SteamOS, featuring the Steam storefront. SteamOS incorporates Valve’s Proton compatibility layer, enabling the use of Windows applications and games. Besides its handheld mode, the Steam Deck can be connected to a TV or monitor via a docking station, functioning like a desktop computer or home video game console. In desktop mode, users can install third-party Linux-based applications.
The handheld PC features a custom AMD APU, known as Aerith, based on the Zen 2 and RDNA 2 architectures. Aerith’s CPU is a four-core/eight-thread unit, and the GPU utilizes eight compute units with an estimated total performance of 1.6 TFLOPS. Both the CPU and GPU have variable timing frequencies, with the CPU ranging from 2.4 to 3.5 GHz and the GPU from 1.0 to 1.6 GHz, depending on the process requirements.
