And this is why I think Valve was very shrewd when it came to deciding what hardware to use. Not only is AMD better supported, but it feels like every update just keeps improving everything.
Doesn’t matter if it’s actually better on paper (I don’t know if it is or isn’t), because it feels like the value only improves.
they wouldnt use nvidia because outside of the driver issues, they dont have an x86 license nor nvidia does semi custom designs for clients.
valves only other option is basically Intel, which at the time, didnt have much emphasis in igpu performance to give valve a decent value/performance ratio
Intel graphics has improved leaps and bounds but it’s still problematic and more poorly supported than AMD.
I imagine part of it (beyond general stuff like Intel trailing AMD in efficiency, both on the CPU and GPU side, as well as the die size being far larger for the same performance, meaning more expensive) is that Valve really didn’t want Intel graphics issues being reported in reviews and forums as being Proton/Linux issues.
On top of that, Intel straight up doesn’t have a custom semiconductor division. AMD does (predominantly for Xbox/PS, but they’re not the only ones).
Intel would either have to set up an entirely new working group for Valve (expensive! Something that Valve would’ve wanted to avoid considering they had no idea whether the Deck would be a hit or not) or they’d have had to go with an off-the-shelf intel CPU.
it mostly improved after tigerlake, but at the time of steam deck taping out designs, intel was still far behind and realistically was not an option. it will down the line given the AI boom has essentially made the igpu a very important piece of hardware, but not when the original deck was designed on paper.
unless intel was going to give valve a really good deal on tigerlake cpus back in 2020, it was not going to happen.
The “AI boom” means that Intel is going to take die space from the GPU and give it to an NPU. That’s how you get Windows 11®️ CoPilot™️ cetified.
I’m guessing this technology requires specific implementation into the game? Nonetheless, it’s so great to see these kind of efforts very suitable for battery based laptops and handhelds, they fit perfectly this use case imo.
It does. AMD have vsr, which is a driver level implementation of fsr1 and thus works in any game, but anything above that needs to be implemented by the devs.
I wonder if valve is planning on bringing the driver level implementation of frame generation to the steam deck as well. Theoretically should be able to support it I think, since it’s an RDNA 2 gpu.
You can tell proton to run any game with fsr1 already
