Beta Update Could Benefit Steam Deck Storage

gamerant.com:

With the delay ensuring that the upcoming Steam Deck system would not see it being launched at the end of 2021, there's been a few more weeks for Valve to make some improvements and last minute adjustments to get it ready. For example, the developer has been busy updating Half-Life 2's UI to make it compatible, as well as a similar upgrade to Portal 2. On top of that, there's been talk of an update for the company's own Steam client, which could benefit the handheld PC, particularly in terms of its storage.

According to a recent report from Phoronix, a beta patch for Steam aims to improve pre-caching capabilities for shaders, which could, in turn, save space, not just on a user's PC, but on the Steam Deck itself. As of last Friday, and for those who participate in beta testing for the client, the software will now «flush» this cached data, specifically for GPU drivers. Given that cache can become quite large, having it purged should go a long way to improving storage capacities, and that goes doubly so for the Deck.

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The Steam Deck will be available in different models, the smallest of which will feature 64 GB of eMMC storage. Given the propensity for modern games to take up a lot of hard-drive space, and that PC users generally have much bigger HDDs and SSDs, some may have concerns that purchasing the cheapest model will incur a significant disadvantage when it comes to storing software. While the device will also support SD cards for extra space, the fact that the beta update for Steam will free up more by default should provide some relief to concerned potential buyers.

However, it should be mentioned that the Steam Deck's operating system may take up 10 GB of storage,