I know the OLED was just announced and I’ve already seen the Digital Foundry video and LTT’s video on the Oled model, but as someone who never owned a Steam Deck, which model would you go for?
(Note; I never owned a Deck, but am interested, so this will help in deciding from others perspectives. Price wise, the 256gb is enticing)
Bearing in mind that nobody here has hands on time with an LED model yet, but:
The choice here is between money and quality.
The 256 LCD is still the same Deck it always was, just even cheaper. It’s still a great device. It makes an absolutely fantastic entry into the handheld world at this price point; rather than dropping $550 on something you don’t know you like, $399 is much more palatable. It will play all the games the OLED one will at the same framerate, just like how the Switch OLED will play all Switch games identically to its LCD brethren.
However, the 512 OLED has big advantages. The screen is vastly better in terms of things like colors, refresh rate, and all the other OLED perks. It has much better battery life - Valve says almost 50% more. It’s quieter and cooler due to the new chip even if performance is identical. It has a better wifi chip. It basically addresses most of the core community complaints with the original Deck models.
So it’s up to you if you want the higher quality device, or you want to save money.