The Steam Deck has lastly been surpassed — by a fork of Valve’s personal expertise

The primary time I put in Bazzite on a Home windows gaming handheld, I laughed. It regarded like such a blatant clone of Valve’s Steam Deck interface. Its many bugs saved me at bay.

Now, an Asus ROG Ally X operating Bazzite has all however changed the Steam Deck in my life. For the second, it could be the very best handheld your money and time should buy — as a result of it brings 90 p.c of the Deck’s ease of use to the Ally’s extra highly effective {hardware}, bigger 80 watt-hour battery, and variable refresh fee display. Relying on the sport, it may possibly even supply higher efficiency and battery life than the exact same handheld with Home windows. I’ve been testing it for 5 months, and I’ve not often regarded again.

This mix received’t be for everybody, as a result of the $800 Ally X prices way over a Steam Deck, and Bazzite nonetheless has annoying quirks. However as a result of Bazzite can so convincingly remodel a Home windows handheld into a real Steam Deck rival, I imagine it singlehandedly proves that handheld producers are making the unsuitable selection in the event that they doggedly stick to Home windows, and that others ought to be a part of Lenovo in hedging that guess as quickly as attainable. Bazzite is a technique — one other might come as quickly as subsequent month, once we’re anticipating Valve to open up its SteamOS to extra companions. 

In evaluation after evaluation of handheld gaming PC, I’ve tried to clarify: Home windows isn’t an excellent transportable gaming expertise. It’s bloated, stuffed with self-serving prompts to share your knowledge with Microsoft, subscribe to Microsoft’s companies, and use Microsoft’s apps. It’s not designed to allow you to navigate with gamepad controls and even do easy keyboarding on a 7-inch touchscreen show. It’s not good at ensuring video games launch full-screen, and worst of all, I’ve by no means been in a position to belief a Home windows handheld to sleep and resume correctly after I drop it right into a bag.

The Steam Deck, with its Linux-based SteamOS, has no such issues. It’s far nearer to the “it simply works” expertise of a Nintendo Change or PS5. I do know my sport will virtually at all times be able to play as quickly as I hit the ability button, and there’s a gamepad-accessible keyboard able to go each time I like. However SteamOS hasn’t been broadly obtainable for different firm’s handhelds — which brings us to Bazzite. 

The open-source Bazzite is a option to convey SteamOS’s strengths to {hardware} that doesn’t but have Valve’s blessing. It’s not technically SteamOS, because it’s primarily based on Fedora Linux quite than Arch Linux, comprises many alternative and/or up to date parts and lots of customized tweaks. However it performs the identical video games the identical precise method, and the components you contact are generally even laughably the identical. Bazzite contains an actual copy of the Steam Deck’s UI proper right down to Valve’s personal tutorial on how you can use the Steam Deck’s buttons — all of which ought to theoretically be OK with Valve, because it expressly permits anybody to distribute a vast variety of copies of that software program beneath a restricted license.

Regardless of what you will have heard, it’s not true that Home windows handhelds supply extra video games than SteamOS. Not solely does Valve’s Proton compatibility layer run many Home windows video games higher than on an equal Home windows handheld, many titles which are damaged and deserted on Home windows have already been fastened by the Linux group. Whereas the Linux-based SteamOS does have fewer standard multiplayer taking pictures video games as a result of publishers aren’t prepared or in a position to supply the identical anti-cheat options, I’ve discovered it’s a small worth to pay.

To me, the shocking half is that Bazzite doesn’t really feel like a hack. For me, it’s been a lot extra dependable than Home windows that it makes Home windows really feel overseas on handhelds, despite the fact that I take advantage of Home windows on my desktop each single day. And it’s pretty simple to arrange, with its personal installer that walks you thru setup. You’ll be able to even competently dual-boot Bazzite alongside Home windows, holding down your handheld’s boot menu shortcut button(s) while you restart to swap between the 2.

And after I did that with the Asus ROG Ally X, straight evaluating Bazzite and Home windows, I typically discovered video games ran quicker, smoother, and used barely much less energy with Bazzite’s Linux-based working system.

It’s not evening and day. Whereas I noticed as much as 13 p.c quicker efficiency in Cyberpunk 2077 and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, generally efficiency was equivalent in different video games. In Returnal, the significantly demanding sport the place you crash-land on an alien planet stuffed with destructible objects and swarming enemies, my framerate was initially worse, although a latest replace put it on par; in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, my framerate was initially higher however an replace has now made it worse. 

Even with video games which are 13 p.c quicker, we’re typically simply speaking a few small handful of frames; I by no means noticed sufficient velocity enhance {that a} sport grew to become playable on Bazzite that wasn’t playable on Home windows by means of quicker framerate alone.

However they do typically really feel smoother, with fewer hitches! Just like the Steam Deck, I discover that framerate doesn’t usually dip as low with Bazzite because it does with Home windows. Many really feel quicker and look higher on the Ally X than on the Steam Deck OLED, too, due to the quicker chip and particularly the variable refresh fee display, which lets the Ally show each body its processors can generate as a substitute of capping at an arbitrary quantity which may really feel uneven. (It’s a killer characteristic for GPU-limited handhelds, and it’s an enormous deal that Bazzite helps it right this moment.)

Equally, I didn’t see battery life financial savings in each sport. I generally watch the Ally X drain its battery one, two, even three watts slower on Bazzite than on Home windows after I set the chips to equivalent energy ranges, however that’s not at all times the case. In Dust Rally, I noticed an equivalent 3 hours, 8 minutes from each working programs, and each Armored Core 6 and Persona 3 Reload drained the Ally on the identical velocity, every providing three hours of play. However in Dave the Diver, I used to be in a position to make Bazzite final almost an additional hour at 4 hours, 14 minutes, far nearer to my 4 hour, 42-minute outcome with the Steam Deck OLED.

That’s as a result of like SteamOS, Bazzite makes it simple to tweak how a lot energy and efficiency you’re utilizing on the fly. Not solely does Bazzite have the identical built-in Gamescope monitoring software Valve makes use of on the Steam Deck, it’s also possible to double-tap the Ally X’s fast entry button to tug up an built-in model of Handheld Daemon, an influence consumer software that permits you to change your chip’s precise TDP to toggle turbo or battery financial savings (or RGB lighting, or rumble, or many extra) in a snap.

Frankly, the interface is extra responsive and dependable than Asus’ personal Armory Crate UI overlay, although it may possibly’t fairly do every part that Asus does with its personal {hardware}. Two key examples: the Ally X’s rear macro buttons don’t work until you instruct Handheld Daemon to emulate a Sony DualSense Edge controller, which is straightforward however can imply mismatched button prompts in some video games. And you’ll’t maintain down the ability button to rapidly entry the Linux desktop mode or a shutdown menu. 

However utilizing these chip wattage changes, I simply managed to enhance battery life even additional than Home windows in a few of the least demanding video games I take a look at, ones the place the Steam Deck has typically run circles across the competitors up to now. In each Balatro and Slay the Spire, I obtained the hand held’s complete battery drain down to only 6.4 watts by setting the chip to five watts and dimming display brightness to minimal, which theoretically offers you a most of 12.5 hours from the 80 watt-hour pack. That’s class-leading battery life, of us — even higher than the Steam Deck OLED.

And while you want extra efficiency, the Ally X has the battery to take it locations the Deck OLED can’t comfortably compete. Once I set the Ally X to its 25W “Turbo” mode, I recover from two hours of Helldivers 2, and almost two hours of Baldur’s Gate 3, at a really playable 900p decision with a “Balanced” degree of render scaling. (For those who can tolerate a lower-res image, you will get almost three hours of BG3 at 17W TDP.)

In brief, I don’t fear concerning the Ally X’s battery with Bazzite any greater than I do with the Steam Deck OLED, significantly since Bazzite added help for the ROG Ally X’s excessive standby mode the place I discover I solely lose 4 p.c battery in a single day.

However there are issues I do miss concerning the Steam Deck OLED and its native SteamOS. Whereas Bazzite does embrace Steam’s great controller remapping and help the ROG Ally X’s gyroscope for precision aiming, it doesn’t magically give it a pair of dual touchpads to make generations of older mouse-and-trackball video games work. You don’t get the Deck OLED’s barely bigger display with extra vibrant colours and good HDR mild. I personally nonetheless suppose the Deck has higher ergonomics, too, although the Ally X is definitely my second favourite amongst right this moment’s main handhelds.

The gamepad controls additionally generally take slightly bit longer to come back again to life after resuming from sleep, even with out excessive standby turned on. Bluetooth microphone help appears completely borked in Bazzite. Generally there’s an extended delay after I’m attempting to uninstall a sport earlier than the system responds. Every time there’s a Bazzite replace, I’ll uselessly see Valve’s final replace message as a substitute of Bazzite’s and do not know what I’m about to get. Often I see efficiency take a flip for the more serious after an replace, like how Shadow of the Tomb Raider is out of the blue giving me decrease framerate than with Home windows. And it’s troublesome to inform how lengthy a system replace will take to put in.

Additionally, there’s a bizarre problem the place if I virtually totally drain the battery, right down to 1 p.c or 0 p.c, the entire system will sluggish to such a painful crawl it may possibly take 10 minutes simply to save lots of your sport and shut the Ally X down. And I have to shut it down, as a result of even charging to 100% doesn’t velocity issues up once more. That is simple sufficient to stop by merely plugging within the system on the 5 p.c or three p.c mark, such as you’d have to do anyway with most different handhelds.

I’ve advised Bazzite’s maintainers about this stuff, they usually say they’re engaged on them — together with a hibernation mode that ought to alleviate the 0-percent charging quirk specifically, and extra intuitive updates. “We’ve got additionally been bettering help for different producers, particularly OneXPlayer, and for the following replace GPD,” provides Antheas Kapenekakis, a Bazzite contributor who’s additionally the lead developer of Handheld Daemon. 

I don’t suppose I’d personally purchase an Asus ROG Ally X over a Steam Deck, at the least not now. At $800, it prices almost twice the worth of a base Steam Deck, and a whole lot greater than the OLED model I personally advocate. To be price all that extra cash, I’d wish to know the ROG Ally X isn’t simply the very best handheld right this moment, but additionally the very best handheld tomorrow. I’d personally wait to see a brand new crop of handhelds at CES in January, and listen to what Valve, Microsoft, AMD and Lenovo must say at their January seventh occasion.

But when I already owned an Asus ROG Ally X, or common Ally, or the Lenovo Legion Go, I’d completely set up Bazzite on it straight away, maybe utilizing a dual-boot configuration to ensure I can simply swap again. You is likely to be stunned by how little you’ll miss Home windows. You is likely to be stunned by simply how a lot better the transportable expertise can get. 

Images by Sean Hollister / The Verge