Solutions:

  1. Manual set your GPU’s clock speed.
  2. Use Decky PowerTools to limit your CPU’s frequency between 400 to 2800mhz
  3. Revert your Deck back to the 3.4.1 update.

Most active Steam Deck Bug Report Community Threads on the issues

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/discussions/0/7529517132617601916/?tscn=1700480355

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/eventcomments/7529517132614912523?snr=1_2108_9__2107&ctp=10

Has been an issue since the 3.5 beta/preview builds on October 20th. 0 response from the Valve Team. Not even a “we’re working on it”.

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/SteamOS/issues/1176

Steam Deck OLED is also affected.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/discussions/0/7529517132622363506/

​

I’ve been closely following this ongoing issue with the Deck since the release of the 3.5 beta/preview builds and the release of SteamOS 3.5.5 Stable. It seems like this bug has been a persistent thorn for many LCD users, and surprisingly, it’s also affecting the new Steam Deck OLED models.

For those unaware, if you are on 3.5.5, your unit may be affected by a GPU clock cycle bug in which the clock speed of the GPU will cycle between 200 and 1040 mhz. This can reduce performance and battery life in some games. You can verify if you have it, and test the performance loss by using the performance overlay, running a heavy game, and manually setting the GPU above 1040.

Associated with this bug is an audio crackling glitch, where it sounds like the Deck was submersed in jelly, with popping and laggy audio. There are also a bug with the Official Dock, in which the DisplayPort does not work for customers.

What’s more concerning is the lack of response from Valve. We’re yet to hear even a basic acknowledgment like “we’re working on it”. Valve has always been receptive and open to their customers, and strange to see, especially for an issue that’s been active for a while now. It’s not just in one place – the Steam Community thread (most active bug report thread for the Steam Deck) and GitHub issue tracker both highlight the severity and spread of this problem. Many users on the community forum feel that the update was rushed out in preparation for the Steam Deck OLED, and are even on the fence of refunding their OLED due to the software issue.

I believe it’s time Valve addressed this. The community’s frustration grows, which is understandable. A little communication can go a long way in this situation.

  • kadupse@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    “BRICKED DEVICES” on all caps and bold font.

    You can’t brick a Deck by an update stalling at “x%”, you can simply boot an external .iso and reimage the OS.

  • Ezaver@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Oh damn, that’s somewhat concerning. A generous guess would be that once more OLEDs get into people’s hands and complaints pile up, Valve might address it. Especially since it’s on the stable build. Going by how consistent they were with updates when the Steam Deck originally shipped, I’m leaning toward giving Valve the benefit of the doubt, for now.

  • cirotheb5@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I think the 200/1040 MHz is just a visual bug, for me actually it happens when the GPU is not used so much in a game and the battery life counter goes up, so it shows more battery life

  • Vault13Deathclaw@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I have this problem. The audio crackling is especially bad and even setting the GPU speed does nothing to get rid of it. Often times I will launch New Vegas and it will crackle. I will have to relaunch it positive several times to get it to launch without crackling severely. Even still, I have had several games (New Vegas, Persona 3 Portable, Knights of the Old Republic II, Sonic Adventure 2, Mass Effect Legendary Edition, etc) crackle while playing them for a short while and this is a new development with 3.5; I didn’t have this with the previous stable OS 3.4.

  • 10hrsAway@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I thought the audio crackling was just because I was running emulation games. Guess not.

    • MilkIsCruel@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Audio crackling after sleep mode has been a pretty frequent problem for the ~14 months I’ve had my Deck now. It’s wild this still hasn’t been fixed.

    • Iongjohn@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Been having it with cutscenes on ps3 games, but not with the actual game… sometimes I want to get into CS to find out why these things happen!

  • ALECSLEE@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Worst part is the lack of feedback from valve…I mean, we could accept they need to launch the 3.5.5 before the oled model got to the market, and we can accept is a mess because of that, and we can even accept having to wait for fixes, but all this silence, or the support denying its related to the update when it has been proved multiple times that it is… .

    Personally, i’m thinking in refunding the OLED one i ordered past week, because if i’m not going to even know if valve is working on this, i prefer to refund it and wait with my LCD on the 3.4.1 until they fix this mess (if they ever do it…)

  • plastic17@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    The Github describes the problem as

    GPU switches between 200mhz and 1040mhz constantly. Sometimes if a game calls for a lot of work it will go up to 1500-1600mhz but as soon as the load is lower it goes back to bouncing between 200mhz and 1040mhz.

    OP’s description only includes the first part

    cycle between 200 and 1040 mhz.

    Which one is correct?

    Is it confirmed that the audio hissing problem is caused by the 200-1040 Mhz bug? One guy in this Steam thread speculated but without providing proof.

  • UareWho@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    My LCD version was bricked by the 3.5 update. It does not take inputs anymore in Recovery Mode or Steam OS, just keeps rebooting into Steam OS screen. I keep trying new shortcuts everyday assisted by Steam deck support. But at this stage Iam just waiting for them to say I have to send it in.

    • skunk_funk@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Did you boot it with a recovery image? Takes a very long time to boot but it’ll eventually go.

      Happened to me a couple updates ago. I was able to replace just the OS and redo the update, keeping all my tweaks.

      • UareWho@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        My problem is, I can go into recovery mode. But even if I had a recovery image I cannot use the dpad or A button to select anything. Only the power and volume buttons work. It feels very bricky :)

  • jack-of-some@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Hi.

    You have 0 reason to believe me when I say this, but here goes: At least one person at Valve is aware of the issue and is thinking through what might be causing it.

    I will update here if I know more.

  • dopeytree@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I haven’t noticed this specificly yet but did notice the default for some reason on some games out the gpu clock on lowest setting as if the main default for all games has been overridden. As soon as I changed it games all back to normal and I carried on playing cyberpunk2077.

    I presumed it could be a bug to do with deck loader.

  • GreenDave113@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I have just noticed another bug: Attempting to connect both Joycons to the Deck often results in a system crash.

    When it doesn’t crash, they remain as separate controllers with no option to merge.