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Not only is it the first release to support the next Gaming computer in the living roomit comes with long-awaited features for Valve mobile devices and More support for other companies’ mobile devices than we’ve seen so far – including the Xbox Ally series from Microsoft and Asus, the Lenovo Legion Go 2, OneXPlayer X1, and additional support for MSI, GPD, Anbernic, OrangePi, and Zotac.
What’s most interesting to me is that Valve is adding true hibernation and “memory off” modes to the Steam Deck — though only the LCD model starts — which should help extend battery life when you hit the power button or leave it idle. Some Windows devices currently last longer than the Steam Deck when asleep, because they go into a self-sleep mode to save power, while the Steam Deck has an instant sleep mode.
Additionally, Valve has finally added a setting in its Game Mode to allow you to use your Bluetooth headset’s microphones — something I’ve been asking for since the beginning. (Valve has added it To Linux desktop mode Last year.) Bluetooth Wake has finally been re-enabled on the Steam Deck LCD, so you can operate the Deck connected to your TV with a wireless controller from your couch.
The update comes with All types Improvements to Linux desktop modes that look like they would be useful on a Steam machine connected to a TV or monitor as well include desktop HDR, VRR display support, per-screen scaling, “improved window behavior for games running in Proton,” and an upgrade to KDE Plasma 6.4.3 among other things.
And for your Steam console or portable Steam device connected to your home entertainment system, they can now detect how many audio channels you have via HDMI to enable surround sound. (I think surround sound was already around, so maybe this is just a different and better automatic implementation.)
There’s also a new Arch system base and an updated graphics driver.
Perhaps most surprising is that the “Non-Surface” section of the changelog is huge. Valve says that long pressing your power button should work “across a wide range of devices” to shut down, restart, or switch to desktop mode. You should be able to change your processor power modes on Xbox Ally now, and the night mode and screen color settings on AMD Z2 Extreme laptops should generally work.
There’s also “significantly improved video memory management with discrete GPU pads,” you can limit the battery charge on any of the Lenovo Legion Go notebooks (in desktop mode), and “dull colors on Zotac and OneXPlayer notebooks with OLED should be fixed.”
There’s a lot in this update, and I may have missed a feature that’s important to you, so check it out The whole changelog is here And below.