Can't decide between PS5 or Steam Deck

[TheSpearGuy]

assuming both are available

Which one would/did you choose and why ?

 

[Chary]

It's like comparing apples to oranges.

I'd pick the Steam Deck purely because I prefer gaming wherever. That's really my only reason. Maybe that, and I mostly game on Steam so I'd have a ton of games from the get go.

 

[Shardnax]

I wouldn't willingly give either company money but Deck would be my choice between the two. Much better value for the money.

 

[CoolMe]

Depends on what you're look for, PS5 is still early in its life cycle right now, it has some games but not much, and even if it is back-compatible with some PS4 titles it's no comparison with the Steam Deck, the whole Steam library is available without considering emulators and the like. Also the portability is a big factor too.

 

[Taleweaver]

Erm... I don't see how they're even remotely similar. The way you game on them and the library are vastly different, and that's not saying anything of things like gaming community or accessories (PS5 has a vr unit, hasn't it? ).

But ey... Me personally, I'm getting a deck. I'm often away (commuting or bring bored with my parents - in - law) and when we're home girlfriend hogs the television.
But even without those factors : the deck is an actual pc,and my 'gaming pc' is approaching retirement (its eight to ten years old by now). I'll probably also get the dock for at my desk, just to play on a big screen and with keyboard and mouse.
The fact that it just plays everything I can get working on Linux (and proton apparently being even better than now) is also a huge plus.

Also... I don't want to disrespect Playstation fans, but I can't even name exclusives, let alone that I care about them.

 

[Taleweaver]

Accidental double post (lousy internet).

 

[TheSpearGuy]

Depends on what you're look for, PS5 is still early in its life cycle right now, it has some games but not much, and even if it is back-compatible with some PS4 titles it's no comparison with the Steam Deck, the whole Steam library is available without considering emulators and the like. Also the portability is a big factor too.

Erm... I don't see how they're even remotely similar. The way you game on them and the library are vastly different, and that's not saying anything of things like gaming community or accessories (PS5 has a vr unit, hasn't it? ).

But ey... Me personally, I'm getting a deck. I'm often away (commuting or bring bored with my parents - in - law) and when we're home girlfriend hogs the television.
But even without those factors : the deck is an actual pc,and my 'gaming pc' is approaching retirement (its eight to ten years old by now). I'll probably also get the dock for at my desk, just to play on a big screen and with keyboard and mouse.
The fact that it just plays everything I can get working on Linux (and proton apparently being even better than now) is also a huge plus.

Also... I don't want to disrespect Playstation fans, but I can't even name exclusives, let alone that I care about them.

The portability of the Steam Deck is rather unpractical in my opinion. Yes you can take it with you, but is it really worth it if I am just going to play 5 min at the bus station
I got an RG350 for handheld gaming which is why I would use the Steam Deck only inside

To each thier own I guess ¯\_ツ_/¯

 

[CoolMe]

The portability of the Steam Deck is rather unpractical in my opinion. Yes you can take it with you, but is it really worth it if I am just going to play 5 min at the bus station
I got an RG350 for handheld gaming which is why I would use the Steam Deck only inside

To each thier own I guess ¯\_ツ_/¯

So, if that's not a deciding factor then the game library is?

 

[Xzi]

To make the decision simple: I'd say it depends on what you're lacking at the moment. If you've got a fair amount of Steam games, and Steam Deck would be a decent upgrade over your current desktop/laptop, go with that. If you've got a fair amount of PS4 games and a 4K 60Hz TV, go with PS5.

Steam Deck is gonna be cheaper both short and long term, while PS5 is obviously far more powerful and future-proof. Steam Deck is a full PC without limitations, whereas PS5 is strictly for gaming and video streaming.

 

[ov3rkill]

If you already have a gaming PC/laptop, then go for PS5.

If you have neither, then go for Steam Deck, for the simple reason that there's not much exclusive titles for the PS5 as of this moment. With Steam Deck, you can finally have a PC and a gaming handheld console to boot at that. You can even play emulators and any PC games you like.

 

[Deleted member 194275]

If you have a PS4 you have the whole PS5 library now and for the near future (at least more 12~18 months), so chose the deck

If you care about PS1, PS2 and PS3 compatibility, then, go for steam deck

If you care about exclusives, well, PC has thousands, so steam deck

For playing media (video, streaming services, music)? Deck

Portability? Deck

Cost of the games? Deck

Emulation? Deck

Frankly, PS5 probably will make sense in the future, but you will have the option to buy in the future, so wait.


(You are assuming that both are available, but I believe that PS5 will be way easier to get his year than the Steam Deck - and the deck will be scalped to the bone I believe)

Edit: There is one more reason to go with the PS5. This early models will be very collectable in the future, I believe that when the PS5 starts to sell on its full potential, we will already be buying a revised version, but that is only a belief of mine, I can be extremely wrong on that one

 

[AlexMCS]

Assuming you have a good PC (as in, built in the last 8 years with a decent GPU - 1050ti+ - everyone should have one at this point), PS5.
If you don't, I'd get a good PC over a Steam Deck, unless you really want an ok-ish portable emulator for semi-recent systems.

I'd only consider the Deck if I already had both a PS5 and a PC, AND if I was looking for some portable emulation goodness.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Depends entirely on what games you want to play, what you already own, and whether you consider portability a useful feature for you or not, so impossible to really say.


If you don't already have like a modernish gaming PC or a Sexbox or anything, go with the PS5 because you'll know 5+ years from now you'll be able to play any game released for it just fine without hassle, whether it's some new indie release or a AAA MAXIMUM GRAFIX REALER THAN REAL HEEHOO game. The Steam Deck, on the other hand, is going to be fairly limited simply to whatever can run on the low (but still very impressive for a handheld PC) specs of the thing. You'll have low-mid end indie stuff, but most "high graphical fidelity" titles probably aren't going to run well, if at all, on the Steam Deck a couple years from whenever it ships.


If you don't care about newer titles and don't already have a modernish gaming PC or Sexbox or anything and just want something to play your backlog from the past decade+ (including emulating at the very least up to like the Wii U and probably a bit of the Switch library) wherever you are, go with the Steam Deck. The specs are enough that most PC games released today and below should be at least "playable" (even if that means all low settings and 30fps ) and emulating other consoles should be no problem as mentioned up to the Wii U at least, so you have all of that stuff to play as well.

 

[Taleweaver]

Erm... I don't see how they're even remotely similar. The way you game on them and the library are vastly different, and that's not saying anything of things like gaming community or accessories (PS5 has a vr unit, hasn't it? ).

But ey... Me personally, I'm getting a deck. I'm often away (commuting or bring bored with my parents - in - law) and when we're home girlfriend hogs the television.
But even without those factors : the deck is an actual pc,and my 'gaming pc' is approaching retirement (its eight to ten years old by now). I'll probably also get the dock for at my desk, just to play on a big screen and with keyboard and mouse.
The fact that it just plays everything I can get working on Linux (and proton apparently being even better than now) is also a huge plus.

Also... I don't want to disrespect Playstation fans, but I can't even name exclusives, let alone that I care about them.

The portability of the Steam Deck is rather unpractical in my opinion. Yes you can take it with you, but is it really worth it if I am just going to play 5 min at the bus station
I got an RG350 for handheld gaming which is why I would use the Steam Deck only inside

To each thier own I guess ¯\_ツ_/¯

I commute for an hour (well... Two, considering I have to get back) each day I'm not working from home. And I'm at my parents - in - law for entire afternoons (I often go jogging for an hour), so it's an even better opportunity there.

I admit it wouldn't be worth it with just five minutes of spare time, though. I'm just not in your situation. :-)

 

[TheSpearGuy]

So, if that's not a deciding factor then the game library is?

Yeah I should have mentioned that I only own a Switch Wii U and 3DS
I never owned a PS4 or a gaming PC and never purchased something from Steam
And it is only possible to pre order a Steam Deck with an Account that is 6 months old

 

[BlazeMasterBM]

I don't know... if you're more into exclusives (and flexing) go for PS5

 

[Xzi]

Yeah I should have mentioned that I only own a Switch Wii U and 3DS
I never owned a PS4 or a gaming PC and never purchased something from Steam
And it is only possible to pre order a Steam Deck with an Account that is 6 months old

Reservations for Steam Deck opened up to everybody a couple days after they were first made available only to 6+ month old accounts. That said, if you don't have any Steam games and you've already got a Switch, go with PS5. You're obviously already covered on the portable side of things with multiple systems, what you're lacking is a system with some real power.

 

[RAHelllord]

Yeah I should have mentioned that I only own a Switch Wii U and 3DS
I never owned a PS4 or a gaming PC and never purchased something from Steam
And it is only possible to pre order a Steam Deck with an Account that is 6 months old

Most of the games on Steam that would be a good choice to play portably are also on the Switch, so the amount of (recent) exclusives you're missing out on that would benefit from the Steam Deck's form factor are rather small. The Steam Deck will technically have a much larger library available to it than the PS5 ever will, but many of those games are dated and you will notice they're dated, too.

I'd recommend you go through the PS4 released games and PS5 upcoming games and see how many games you'd like to play, then compare that to PC games you might have heard of and try and figure out whether they'd benefit from the portability or not. While the the Steam Deck can be played docked and thus perform as a "real" PC with KB+M the matter of the fact is you can get a much stronger regular PC or laptop for the same price.

Personally if I were in your shoes I'd buy a regular desktop PC first purely on the grounds that the Windows games library covers far more titles in the genres I care about than PS4 and PS5 do, and in my opinion that's really the only thing that matters: how many games you like can you get for the system you're buying.

 

[InsaneNutter]

I wouldn't buy either personally, the 64gb eMMC on the Steam Deck is concerning when their are no option for user upgrades to NVMe storage, the PS5 I've no interest in the console or games.

If I had to pick one it would be the Steam Deck as it would be fun to mess about with.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Yeah I should have mentioned that I only own a Switch Wii U and 3DS
I never owned a PS4 or a gaming PC and never purchased something from Steam
And it is only possible to pre order a Steam Deck with an Account that is 6 months old

I'm actually going to completely disagree with @Xzi above and say that you should get a Steam Deck as you have nothing else to play PC games on; there's already a gigantic library of PC games you can enjoy right away, whereas the PS5 is lacking that right now, but a few years down the line you will be able to get a PS5 much cheaper and there will be a large library of games you can enjoy then. Being an early adopter of new consoles rarely pays off.

That being said I would still recommend building a gaming PC from used parts over a Steam Deck unless the portability is essential, since you don't already have a gaming PC, because you'll be able to build something much more powerful that will also be upgradeable down the road when needed. Although if you do go that route, GPUs are a bit overpriced still but demand seems to be cooling down, so might be best to go with something with an integrated GPU at first and upgrade it with a dedicated GPU in a few months time.

The thing is the Steam Deck hardware will get outdated quickly because PC hardware improves at a relatively fast pace and new games are made with new hardware in mind whereas a console stays the same throughout its life cycle or at least for several years until an improved version is released, so the games are made to work with that hardware.
That's why a desktop PC that can be upgraded is much more useful in the long run.
Of course upgrades aren't free, so it would in the end cost you more than a $400 Steam Deck would. And don't get me wrong, you're getting a lot for your $400 with the Steam Deck. I just don't think it's a good alternative to a desktop PC, but it would be great for supplementing one.

 

[RAHelllord]

I wouldn't buy either personally, the 64gb eMMC on the Steam Deck is concerning when their are no option for user upgrades to NVMe storage, the PS5 I've no interest in the console or games.

Supposedly all Steam Decks will come with an internal m.2 2230 header, and allow for internal storage expansion that way, but you'd likely have to open it up proper and void manufacturer warranty, in addition to having to reformat it and everything. They haven't shared any details beyond that, though.