- Valve's refurbished Steam Deck OLED is now more affordable than a new LCD model
- It's now 20% cheaper than brand new OLED models
- Stock is likely low in the US, already out of stock in the UK
Valve's Steam Deck OLED models have been competing with the likes of the Asus ROG Ally and the Lenovo Legion Go - and now, the competition grows with refurbished OLED models much cheaper than new options, and almost as cheap as the one remaining LCD model.
According to Tom's Hardware, the Steam Deck OLED is now 20% cheaper than the new 512GB and 1TB models, with the former priced at $439 and the latter at $519. This is via Valve's certified refurbished program, with devices that are fully tested and functional along with the one-year warranty you would get with a new model (more depending on your region).
While the Steam Deck OLED isn't nearly as powerful as the ROG Ally or Lenovo Legion Go (both use the Z1 Extreme APU), it stands as a competent device across multiple games - it has a 90Hz display with added HDR support and the possibility of 1000 nits of peak brightness, compared to the LCD's 600 nits.
While these refurbished options are available in the UK and the US, all options (including LCD) are currently out of stock in the UK. If you're in the US, the only refurbished models available are the two OLED 512GB and 1TB options - based on how fast this went out of stock in the UK, you might want to act now before it's too late.
What does this mean for competition with other handheld gaming PCs?
As I've previously mentioned, the Steam Deck LCD and OLED don't really come close to providing the same level of performance as other more recent handheld gaming PCs - both the Asus ROG Ally and Lenovo Legion Go outperform the device at a higher 1080p resolution, and this is even more of a case with the Ally X.
If you aren't too bothered about attaining high performance on a handheld, and you're more concerned about display quality, then the Steam Deck OLED or the Lenovo Legion Go are the two devices to consider. However, with this price drop of the refurbished OLED models, I would more than likely opt for Valve's popular gaming system over Lenovo's expensive Legion Go at MSRP.
There's no word on whether a successor to the Steam Deck is happening, but if it ever does, I hope the processor used will be able to match or at least come close to what Asus, Lenovo, and MSI's offerings.
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