Tech YouTuber Bringus Studios has published a 36-minute video analyzing, testing, and disassembling the prototype Steam Deck that sold on eBay in April. Bringus' analysis shows it to be a much less powerful device than what we ultimately got, but surprisingly close to the retail unit in terms of layout.
Though Bringus Studios published the teardown and performance assessment, fellow video-maker SadlyItsBradley was the device's deep-pocketed purchaser, lending it to Bringus for the video. There's no doubt as to the prototype's legitimacy: Externally, it's a perfect match for a prototype model showcased by Valve programmer Pierre-Loup Griffais back in 2022—the lead image for this article is from Griffais' showcase—and its unique software would be almost impossible to fake.
As for the device's provenance, your guess is as good as mine for how the engineering sample made it to online retailer Storm City Retro to ultimately sell it on eBay. Though it initially appeared to not have an operating system installed, Bringus Studios was actually able to boot it into a prototype version of SteamOS that we've never seen in action before.
Griffais described this model's unreleased Picasso APU from AMD as having "about half" of the retail Steam Deck's GPU grunt. Bringus Studios' testing of games like Counter-Strike 2 and Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga was even worse than that, though, likely due to a lack of drivers for the experimental silicon.
Cracking the bad boy open, the prototype's layout is actually very similar to the final Steam Deck, though the battery has a different shape and the whole shebang has way more of an off-the-shelf, jury-rigged feel to it.
The more rounded, bulbous industrial design of it is already weirdly retro, calling to mind Steam Machines or the OG Steam Controller. This is still 2010s Valve design language, we haven't graduated to 2020s Valve vibes yet.
Despite the aesthetic gulf, the actual layout of everything is almost 1:1 with the final Deck—it's even still a 16:10 screen, as opposed to the more standard 16:9 layout, showing that Valve settled on the format fairly early. I am very glad that, as Bringus Studios points out, Valve upgraded this prototype's Switch-like, "mobile" quality analogue sticks to the full-fat, gamepad-style ones on the retail Deck.
Ultimately, like so many games industry prototypes, hard or software, this is a fascinating bit of history and a worthwhile look into Valve's process for designing and iterating on its hardware. I also really appreciate SadlyItsBradley's generosity in facilitating such an instructive look at the hardware after spending so much money on it. This prototype could just as easily have disappeared into a private collection without relinquishing its secrets.
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