Took the plunge after 2 years, and replaced the Delta fan with a Huaying one
Took the plunge after 2 years, and replaced the Delta fan with a Huaying one
Now that my Steam Deck LCD has been relieved of his duties as a daily driver desktop PC, I finally went ahead and replaced the Delta fan with a Huaying one. It turned out to be relatively easy to do ; and lo and behold, it is indeed quieter.
Recent adopters may or may not know there was a medium-sized kerfuffle about disparities in noise profiles of early Steam Deck units. It was proved and narrowed down to a difference between 2 fan models (see Gamers Nexus detailed analysis).
Obviously the one I got was a "bad" one, emitting a high pitched noise when running at full speed. I did not find it unbearable but it was still not ideal, particularly when using the SD in quiet environments.
Took me 2 years to get to the point where I figured it was an acceptable risk to attempt the replacement. How many of you did the same and kicked the Delta out of your unit ?
How did the daily driver experience go?
I did it for a week with an external monitor and I thought it was.. fine? Wondering about your experience.
It was OK but not great. I used the official dock and had frequent peripherals issues which could were only solved by rebooting both the SD and the dock. Turning it off and on again is more a Windows that a Linux thing usually, so that was disappointing.
On the software side, the "flatpak" way of applications delivery usually works well, except when the Discover "store" randomly chooses to offer downgrades instead of upgrades. I used software such as Firefox, GIMP, LibreOffice, OpenShot, OpenRGB, LosslessCut, LocalSend with no hassle.
As expected, gaming performance on a 1080p screen was not as smooth as the native SD screen resolution. I would not recommend it for games needing a bit of oomph unless you are fine with sub 30fps.
I use a Jsaux dock for the deck, all of my peripherals have been plug and play. Including my 5+ year old Wacom which blew my mind. (It worked right out of the box where Windows didn't let me properly configure it... I felt like a schoolkid!)
Anyway, I say this cause I wonder if there was an issue with the dock, or if you just use oddball peripherals.
I used a Deck as my primary computer for 2 months while waiting for my PC parts to arrive. It worked out so well that I installed Linux on my PC when I finally put it together. The Deck's hardware can struggle with heavy use, but it's perfectly useable for daily requirements for me.
Replaced the Delta for a Huaying as soon as I could, ifixit kept being out of stock, but I managed to snatch one earlier last year, it was scary, and removing the backplate felt like i was going to break everything, but the insides are well organised, it was quite an easy repair / replacement
I couldn't live with the hiss of the Delta, it was driving me insane
I swapped out delta fan a few months after release, agree fairly straightforward. Upgraded the nvme ssd to 1tb sometime before replacing with OLED model.
Really cool! Love to see some modding. And wow, that full kit of IFixIt.
Bought these to make the most out of those shipping costs. I do not tinker all that much, but having adequate tools like those certainly is a big help.
I also used them to replace the sticks of a Nintendo Switch joy cons with hall effects ones. I saw that similar components are available for the SD, but I currently have no drift problem, so ...
That’s their mini kit. I recommend their pro tech toolkit for most people, has all the bits and accessories you’ll need for most things, and then I also have their Manta kit, but that’s overkill unless you’re really into repair. I have a lot of toolkits though. I have a great Wiha set similar to the pro tech toolkit, and Drivesavers sent me a really nice kit as swag from when I used to outsource customer data recovery to them that I use at work.
Got one has well, then the Huaying started to rattle. Didn't get around to RMA it so I'm back to whining.
Why didn't you get the OEM one?
Both Huaying and Delta fans are OEM, your Deck could have either fan. Valve has multiple suppliers for some parts.
Not sure what you mean. I got this one: https://www.ifixit.com/products/steam-deck-original-model-fan?variant=39723201658983