Valve Is Collaborating with AMD to Help Ensure Windows 11 Works on the Steam Deck

While Valve has already introduced that the Steam Deck will help dual-booting between SteamOS and Windows 10, new information from a Steam Deck designer has additionally revealed that Valve is working with AMD to assist guarantee help for Windows 11 as nicely.

In a latest interview with Valve’s Greg Coomer, one of many Steam Deck’s designers, PC Gamer realized that whereas Valve’s fundamental focus up to now has been on optimizing Steam OS and the Steam Deck’s efficiency when operating Windows 10, Valve can be leaning on perception from AMD to assist guarantee help for Microsoft’s subsequent OS too, which is due out someday later this fall.

In regards to Windows 11, Coomer stated “We’ve focused so much on Windows 10, so far, that we haven’t really gotten that far into it. Our expectation is that we can meet that.”

One of the problems for Valve is that a few of the new {hardware} necessities like TPM chips which are anticipated to be a part of Windows 11 require the corporate to do some additional work to offer baseline compatibility. That stated, Coomer appears optimistic that due to the collaboration between Valve and AMD (who’s making the customized APU slated to be used within the Steam Deck), the Steam Deck ought to get help for Windows 11.

“It’s also a conversation that’s going on with AMD, to make sure that, at the BIOS level, we can accommodate that. So there’s nothing to indicate to us yet that there’ll be any issues with Windows 11,” stated Coomer.

Out of the field, the Steam Deck is slated to run the newest model of Valve’s Linux-based Steam OS, which makes use of a compatibility layer referred to as Proton when taking part in video games that don’t have native Linux help. And whereas Valve has been clear that its focus with the Steam Deck can be to ship one of the best expertise when gaming on SteamOS, help for each Windows 10 and 11 stays fairly necessary, particularly as a result of proper now it’s unclear if anti-cheat protocols in video games like Apex Legends, Gears 5, and others will perform correctly outdoors of Windows.

In certainly one of its FAQs about the Steam Deck, Valve says “We’re working with BattlEye and EAC to get support for Proton ahead of launch.” So although Steam OS would be the default OS for the Steam Deck, it’s actually encouraging to see Valve additionally seeking to beef up the Steam Deck’s compatibility with Windows 10 and 11. Not solely will this transfer doubtlessly present avid gamers with extra choices in relation to taking part in a variety of titles, however it additionally reinforces the ethos that the Steam Deck is far more open and versatile in comparison with extra locked down console options just like the Nintendo Switch, which is one thing Valve founder Gabe Newell has been speaking about so much.

Unfortunately, not like the Nintendo Switch, in keeping with one other story from PC Gamer, it seems that the Steam Deck doesn’t have a efficiency increase setting when linked to a dock. This means the Steam Deck ought to present comparable efficiency in handheld mode or when linked to an exterior show, which is likely to be a bummer for folks dreaming about taking part in video games on an enormous 4K TV with the Steam Deck.

Coomer explains Valve’s thought course of by saying “We really wanted to prioritize for using it in what we thought would be the highest use case, which is actually mobile. And so since we were focusing on that, and we chose like a threshold where the machine will run well, and with a good frame rate with AAA games in that scenario. We didn’t really feel like we should target also going after the dock scenario at higher resolutions. We wanted a simpler design target and to prioritize that.”

And whereas Coomer says that it is likely to be potential to create a better energy mode for the Steam Deck when docked, presently it’s not a “high priority design target.”

So whereas new information in regards to the Steam Deck is trickling out as we get nearer to its official launch someday earlier than the top of the 12 months, the joy about an upcoming handheld gaming machine constructed for the PC crowd continues to develop. Some of Valve’s early gaming {hardware} just like the Steam Controller might have been considerably clunky (particularly at launch), however the Steam Deck is shortly shaping as much as turn out to be Valve’s second try and make its Steam Machines initiative from again in 2014 a actuality, and this time, it simply may work.