I have a steam deck and haven't really tinkered with it (aside from installing a 1tb SSD to replace the 64gb memory it came with). Everything else is just me playing steam games I already own, although I have picked up a a double handful of inexpensive platformers during various steam sales.

I suppose if you're trying to get it to run the latest and greatest games that may require some tinkering, although it seems like an increasing contingent of games seem to be launching steam deck aimed updated and setting configuration.

I would guess my relatively anccient desktop i7-7600k and gtx 1080 is still a more capable gaming PC but doesn't fit as nicely in my backpack or in bed.

I just had a look. The listings I could see for the steamdeck had it at $800AUD minimum. For the switch I can buy it from a few different stores in my area for $370 AUD. That's very expensive and inaccessible.

I'm not trying to hate on the steamdeck. I think it's super cool and would love to have one. But it's too expensive for me and I'm not sure they even ship it to my area. While the switch is super affordable and a just more out of the box works experience. I know every game I buy for the switch will work great on it, meanwhile I can expect most games I have on steam will not have great controller support or may not run well on the system so its a bit more of a "at your own risk" platform.

Your issue is that you live in australia, where valve doesn't sell steam decks (yet?). So every steam deck listing you see is someone who imported it and is selling it at a premium since you can't get it in aussie land. I suppose not being able to buy one is a good reason to buy an Asus Ally instead, though, assuming you can stomach the higher cost and windows machine status.

I paid $350 canadian for a 64gb steam deck and paid another $100 canadian for a 1tb 2230 format ssd (thats only $80 now). I think the canadian dollar is slightly more valuable than aussie bucks right now but not double as valuable. 1 canadian dollar is $1.12 kangaroo bucks.

So your evaluation of the cost of the steam deck is just wrong. Its way cheaper than you imagine.

Also, valve has put literal years into Steam Input, which lets developers set up controller support, and also lets you load community sourced controller setups for your games. The Steam decks touchpads also let mouse driven games work pretty amazingly in a way that an xbox controller or switch can't.

You're just kind of wrong about the input situation. steam has basically the most sophisticated input software you can get and most of the time it just works, and when it doesn't you just load a community setup and play.

The Switch OLED is 320 euros, the Steam Deck is 420 euros for the 64Gb. Yes it's more expensive, but not "different magnitude" expensive.

Also there was a queue for the first few months, but now you can order it and get it shipped right away.

Also you can tinker if you want but you don't have to. Just play verified Steam Deck games and it's as simple as a Switch.

Expensive is relative, and compared to other consoles the Steam Deck is competitively priced. Despite the high level of hackability it's not "just a tinkerer' device". It has a purpose that it accomplishes quite well. Outside of installing Dolphin and Yuzu I haven't done anything with it outside of Big Picture mode. Haven't really felt the need to more, but it's nice to know I could.

Why some people are so hell-bent on seeing the Deck fail is a mystery to me. Either they are simping for some company in competition with Valve/Deck, or they are bitter about people having fun. I could understand the criticisms of it, of which there were many upon initial release, but overall it's a pretty good experience these days.