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When the original Steam Machine was announced in 2015, it promised a massive change from traditional gaming experiences. The console-slash-PC gained a lot of attention, but a variety of factors stopped it from being a success. Poor performance sent many players back to standard PC gaming, while the high price meant Valve sold less than 500,000 units. Despite its failure, though, the Steam Machine had a lot of fans — many of whom have waited years for a follow-up. And now it might actually be on the way.
A Reddit user named u/coolbho3k spotted a reference to the Fremont project in the Steam Deck kernel. The code doesn’t make it clear exactly what sort of device Fremont will be, but it references a platform called AMD Lilac. Users have also found references to the same platform on Geekbench, where it scores significantly higher than the Steam Deck. Were it another handheld, this platform would leave the Steam Deck in its wake — and that makes it all the more likely to be a TV box or set-top box of sorts, according to Tom’s Hardware.
Now, the Lilac reference has been around for a while; it was first spotted over two years ago. That’s a solid indicator that Valve isn’t the only company using this chip.
There is also a reference to HDMI-CEC, something that wouldn’t be found in a handheld. However, the specific type of CEC is most often related to Google devices, specifically Chromebooks, due to its driver. That led u/coolbho3k to speculate that Google could potentially be involved in the development somehow.
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If Fremont is, in fact, a new Steam Machine, then it may also have streaming capabilities like those of the Nvidia Shield. If Google and Steam work together and bring ChromeOS to the platform, users could access ChromeOS in addition to SteamOS and perhaps even the Google Play store.
All of this is speculation for now. Until Valve makes an official statement about the device, we can only make educated guesses about the hardware. Valve announced the first Steam Deck at CES in 2014, and the information we’re getting now follows a roughly similar timeline. With CES 2025 just around the corner, it presents the perfect time for Valve to come out and announce a successor — and with a recent leak suggesting Valve is also working on a follow-up to the Steam Controller, there’s a lot of evidence that something new is on the way.
Patrick Hearn writes about smart home technology like Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, smart light bulbs, and more. If it’s a…
EA removes Apex Legends from Steam Deck due to Linux cheating
Electronic Arts announced Thursday that it’ll be removing Steam Deck and Linux players’ access to its battle royale Apex Legends in an effort to combat cheating, effective immediately.
In a post on the Apex Legends forums (spotted by The Verge) an EA spokesperson said it made this decision as part of its anti-cheat efforts. Basically, EA found that many of the exploits and cheats it’s trying to combat came through Linux distros. So it decided to block access for Linux users. And since Steam Deck runs on Linux by default (SteamOS is built from Debian and uses a layer called Proton to make Windows and Mac games compatible), that meant Steam Deck had to go.
Make sure you install the latest Steam Deck October update
Valve released a big Steam Deck update this week in the Stable channel that the company says can improve performance for its handheld across the board, and even grant up to 10% more battery life for the original Steam Deck in certain situations.
The manufacturer releases consistent hotfixes and small updates to the Steam Deck beta channel, but they usually fix a couple of things that most players typically won’t notice. However, SteamOS 3.6.19 is huge, with countless updates thanks in part to two big changes: a move to a more recent Arch Linux base, and an update to Mesa 24.1 for the graphics driver.
Steam Deck 2: everything we know so far
It’s a matter of when we’ll see the Steam Deck 2, not if we’ll see it. Valve has talked publicly multiple times about its plans for a next-gen Steam Deck, which shouldn’t come as a surprise given that the original is easily the best handheld gaming PC you can buy.
Although the Steam Deck 2 is still a few years off, Valve has been dropping hints about the handheld for a while. Here’s everything we know about the Steam Deck 2 right now, from the possible release date to details on specs and performance.
Steam Deck 2: release date speculation
