For people who have a steam library, it's an incredible value for money. When I bought mine, I basically not only had a mobile gaming option, but a nice one, and one that already had access to 70% of my substantial Steam Library, with many developers promising Deck-optimized settings and such.
It's genuinely great hardware and a great experience. So much so (and because Windows is such a shitpile) I actually moved my Ally to SteamOS too. No regrets.
I have to disagree. The low resolution of the screen is my biggest issue. Many UI elements and such are just genuinely difficult to read. Modern games are designed for 1080p or more. Rendering them at 800p gives quite poor results. I mostly use my Deck hooked up to the TV now.
Everybody's going to have their own experience, but I haven't found this to be true at all. I've played a lot of games on my Deck and only really had UI visibility issues with a handful of them. For the rest, it didn't even cross my mind.
I think a big part of this is that many (most?) modern games are designed to be played on big screens at a distance (e.g. TV <-> couch). The apparent size of the display in that scenario isn't much different from a Steam Deck held naturally.
I just wish the Deck had VRR. That and the general lack of power are my only real issues with it, and the power isn't that big a deal given the massive back catalog it supports.
The comment i see the most on reddit is the refresh rate and the battery life are the deal breaker with the price. Very interested to see the pricing on the steam machine. i was looking forward to it, but looks like it could be over $1000 if they adjust pricing up 40%. but again, id imagine it sells out fast.
It's genuinely great hardware and a great experience. So much so (and because Windows is such a shitpile) I actually moved my Ally to SteamOS too. No regrets.