Steam Deck vs. Legion Go S: Which gaming handheld must you purchase?

Regardless of a ton of competitors from corporations huge and small, the Steam Deck stays the go-to suggestion for anybody who desires PC video games in a handheld kind issue—and Home windows being a clunky choice is an enormous a part of that. However the Lenovo Legion Go S has arrived with SteamOS in-built. So, now which one is healthier? Licensed handheld fanatic Adam Patrick Murray breaks it down for us.

Particularly, we’re speaking in regards to the base mannequin Lenovo Legion Go S SteamOS Version (wow, what a mouthful) with a Ryzen Z2 Go processor. This may be discovered on sale for round $500 at occasions, versus the Steam Deck OLED at $550. The primary-step improve over the $400 model is extra immediately appropriate with the brand new Lenovo mannequin, with its upgraded display screen, battery, and 512GB storage drive.

That OLED display screen is clearly an enormous enchancment over the cheaper one, however the Legion Go S’s display screen may be very high-quality for an LCD, and it’s additionally larger, sharper, sooner, and has a variable refresh fee. So, which one you favor will probably come down to private desire (or a necessity for aggressive velocity) quite than a flat “this one is healthier” willpower. Will Smith is torn on the choices.

What in regards to the specs? Whereas these are very related units, the most important differentiator is that the Legion Go S has a a lot newer processor. The Ryzen Z2 Go isn’t an earth-shattering powerhouse by any means, and it’s received an identical AMD 4-core setup. However its newer Zen 3 structure means extra energy and respiratory room within the built-in GPU, particularly on high-end PC video games with that denser display screen decision. The Legion Go S’s 16GB of RAM is identical because the Steam Deck, however it’s barely sooner.

The underside line is that you just’re going to get significantly extra efficiency on the Z2 Go model of the Legion Go S, by a margin of about 20 to 40 p.c primarily based on video games. (The Z2 Excessive model has a good larger hole, however it’s costlier.) Crucially, that’s matching the Steam Deck’s 1280×800 decision. So, if you happen to’re in search of pure efficiency, Lenovo is successful with the newer {hardware}.

What in regards to the bodily format of the machine and the way it feels in your fingers? The Legion Go S is larger and chunkier, principally because of its larger and taller display screen. Adam says that it feels higher within the fingers, however Will notes that Lenovo goes with only one rear “paddle” button on both sides whereas the Steam Deck has two. The Steam Deck’s two bigger trackpads are additionally significantly better for normal navigation and provide you with extra choices in-game. The Legion Go S is heavier, louder, and Adam says the vibration motors aren’t as good.

The Steam Deck has its personal downsides, although. Those that are used to Xbox-style controls won’t like the weird stick placement to the within of the D-pad and motion buttons, and people with small fingers may discover them troublesome to achieve. Sadly, this will likely be a extremely particular person distinction, and also you’ll wish to get your fingers on each of them to make the decision for your self.

Even if each are working SteamOS, it’s exhausting to disclaim that it’s only a smoother expertise on the Steam Deck. And it’s not Lenovo’s fault! Reasonably, Valve has been supporting the Steam Deck for 3 years now, whereas the Legion Go is sort of model new by comparability. You’ll simply get fewer hiccups in video games on the Steam Deck, with issues like inputting textual content or display screen decision choices or management customizations, than on the Legion Go S. Software program assist, particularly within the driver assist for Linux-based SteamOS, remains to be a little bit of a query mark.

Adam says that regardless of liking the display screen, the elevated efficiency, and the ergonomics, he’d nonetheless go along with the Steam Deck OLED in the mean time. Will is touchdown at across the similar place. For extra deep dives into PC gaming, be sure you subscribe to PCWorld on YouTube and take a look at our weekly podcast The Full Nerd.