A Steam Deck with an OLED screen is ‘more work than people realize’

Steam Deck is one of the latest hardware big hits. Unsurprisingly, Valve has managed to create a portable machine with which we can enjoy our entire Steam library wherever we are. The success has been such that people are already thinking about future enhancement updates or new versions of the console, which Valve has been hesitant to talk about lately.

However, that’s not to say the company isn’t looking to improve its system, and a lot of people are talking and wanting to see an OLED Steam Deck. However, as they recently pointed out, installing an OLED display isn’t as easy as it looks.

Steam Deck with an OLED display wouldn’t just be a display change

According to Valve’s Pierre-Loup Griffais, he recently commented PC Gamer that the company has evaluated this option, but it is much more complicated than a simple screen replacement.

I think people see things as an incremental release and assume it’s easy to use. But in reality, the screen is the heart of the device. Everything is anchored there. Basically, everything is designed around everything when talking about such a small device. I think that would be a bigger amount of work than people realize. I don’t think we’re overlooking anything. But the idea that you could just switch to a new screen and be done with it would take a lot more than that to be feasible.

This is something you need to plan ahead. When working on this screen, we made sure they could be supported, even if the update rate change wasn’t ready at launch. It was very important to us that all of this be supported. Therefore, it is something you need to keep in mind when evaluating and selecting possible options. But there’s nothing about LCD vs OLED, different display technologies that make this a deal breaker. It’s about how you design the whole system and what sits between the screen and the SOC.

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