Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Steam Deck Docks: Valve vs. Jsaux”.
If you’ve got your self-esteem tank at some point, you’re going to want to hook it up to a TV kind of like a game console, you can do this directly through a USBC to HDMI connection. But you can also use a docking station, of which there are many different kinds for the steam deck the most popular one. The one you’ve probably heard of is the official one from valve the official valve steam deck Dock, and I like this one, because, frankly, it’s pretty small compact uh plugs into your TV. It’S got HDMI and DisplayPort on the back, along with uh ethernet Jack. A couple USB ports, but it’s a little bit expensive.
It’S like 90 bucks, which is frankly a lot for something that’s basically USBC to HDMI pass through. You can spend less. You can actually also spend more, for example, the other one I’ve been testing lately. Is this Json model which is 130 because it has a big extra feature in it that you probably don’t need, so you can actually get a model from this company? That’S a lot less now.
The one that I’m looking at right here has a very similar set of connections. It’S got the ethernet, it’s got USB a it’s got USBC for power. It’S got HDMI out. This particular one does not have DisplayPort, but they make one that does. The big extra thing in here is that there is a m.2 drive slot inside. So if I take off the top, you can see there’s an m.2 drive right there and you can use that to get extra game storage. However, it’s not as easy as slipping an extra micro SD card into your steam deck.
You actually have to set this up through the Linux desktop in the steam deck and, it’s frankly, a tremendous hassle. I would not recommend it. This version here is 130 dollars.
I would say, get the version without the m.2 drive in it and that’s about 40. 50. 60, depending on exactly which version you get so when you hook up your steam deck to a dock like this and plug it into your TV, what you’re going to do is take your power supply, a USBC cable out of that plug it into the back of The dock then you’re going to take your HDMI cable from your TV, plug it into the back of the dock as well. Take your steam deck slip it right into the dock and take the little attached USBC plug it into the top there. So then you get power into the steam deck and you get the video out through the dock into your TV now keep in mind, even though the steam bag is four or five hundred dollars or more depending on what configuration you get, it’s not going to look The same as hooking up an Xbox series X or a PlayStation 5 to your TV, those are dedicated devices meant for high resolution 4K gaming output, the steam deck, is a little handheld computer and it plays on its own little screen at a fairly low resolution. So you’re basically going to be playing at that lower resolution on your TV screen.
It’S not going to look fantastic, but if you want to use your steam deck and not have it on the little tiny screen in front of you, you know that’s one way to go. I do like that. You can take a third-party controller like an Xbox controller and Bluetooth it to the steam deck and then use that to the TV. Obviously, every step you’re adding a little bit of lag And Delay there, but again you’re not dealing with the highest Fidelity image anyway. So I tried some faster paced action games. Uh like Uncharted.
I tried some slower games like slay the Spire. I tried some first person shooters, they all work fairly. Well. You can tell in every case that you’re not playing on something like an Xbox or Playstation, but the magic of the steam deck. Is it’s really meant for that close-up handheld use on the tiny low-risk screen and really excels there, but I like having the flexibility to be able to take a dock and hook it up to your TV as well trying out a couple of different steam deck docks.
I think functionally they’re pretty much the same you’re going to buy it based on what kind of ports you want on it. What kind of extra features you want on it? How big and bulky and heavy you wanted? If you want something very small and easy to transport, then you might spend more on the official valve version. If you don’t mind something a little chunkier, then you could spend less fifty dollars and get one of these third-party versions of it.
If you’d like to read more about this, these steam deck dunks, you can find the links to all my stories about that below. .