Valve is working on implementing support for a 1200p Steam Deck screen in SteamOS, meaning you won’t have to install third-party patches yourself to get it working. The screen in question is the DeckHD, which was originally launched as a replacement for the Steam Deck’s screen in 2023, and increases the deck’s resolution to a much sharper 1,920 x 1,200, while also reducing glare and improving the color accuracy.
Since then, Valve has released the best handheld gaming PC right now, in the form of the Steam Deck OLED, but while the screen on this device offers a big improvement in image quality over the standard Steam Deck screen, it’s still stuck with the same 1,200 x 800 resolution.
That’s not necessarily bad, though. As we noted when the DeckHD first launched, the Zen 2-based CPU used in the Steam Deck is already challenged by lots of games at 1,200 x 800, let alone at 1,920 x 1,200. Its GPU only has 512 stream processors based on the aging RDNA 2 architecture available to it, making it much less powerful than any desktop GPU.
Even with some help from the frame generation tech used in AMD FSR 3.1, you’re going to struggle to get decent frame rates in a lot of the latest games at 1200p with the standard Steam Deck spec. Replacing the screen on your Steam Deck isn’t an easy job either, and you will also risk voiding your warranty if you do it yourself.
There are other benefits to the DeckHD, though. One is its anti-glare coating, a feature that was only implemented on the 512GB version of the standard Steam Deck, and one that’s worth having if you have a 256GB or 64GB deck with a glossy, reflective screen. The DeckHD also offers superior color accuracy, with the manufacturer claiming it hits 95% sRGB coverage, compared with 67% for the standard Steam Deck screen.
Support for the DeckHD screen in SteamOS was spotted by Tom’s Hardware on the official Valve GitHub page. Here, there’s a job called “Rebase DeckHD patches on latest gamescope code,” which has been set up to merge the third-party DeckHD patches made by balika011 into a SteamOS build. These patches enable the Steam Deck to recognize the display in SteamOS, and also set it up with the correct resolution and refresh rate.
If you’re already lucky enough to own a Steam Deck, check out our guide to the best Steam Deck games, each of which has been played and tested on the deck so they’re guaranteed to work.
