It looks like Valve is falling victim to the trend of hardware delays we’ve been seeing for a while now. The official Steam Deck Docking Station has been delayed. This was announced yesterday when Valve posted an update about it on the Steam Deck events forum. As of now there isn’t a set release date for the Docking Station.
The cause of the delay is due to “parts shortages and COVID closures at our manufacturing facilities.” This isn’t too hard to believe, as the disruptive effects of the pandemic are still affecting many sectors of the hardware industry. Valve also clarified that this would have no impact on the production schedule and reservation windows for Steam Decks.
No docking for Steam Decks just yet
Valve’s goal was to release the Steam Deck dock by late spring. However, due to manufacturing issues, this is no longer happening. This might be disappointing news to Steam Deck users that want to hook up their devices to larger displays.
While other options already exist on the market, those are far from official. There’s also the drawback that many third-party solutions aren’t designed in the most user-friendly ways, with the majority of third-party solutions simply being hubs with USB ports and display outputs. In comparison, Valve’s official Steam Deck Docking Station seems to be the perfect accompaniment to the device.
The Steam Deck’s Docking Station will feature three USB Type-A 3.1 ports, a gigabit Ethernet port, DisplayPort 1.4, and an HDMI 2.0 output. Of course, there’ll also be the Type-C port located in the dock itself to charge the device. It’s disappointing to not have Type-C located elsewhere on the device, but maybe we’ll get that later down the line. The full specs for the official dock can be found on the Steam Deck’s website.
Countless products have been delayed since the pandemic, so we’ll simply have to wait a bit longer for the Steam Deck dock to hit the market, just like everything else. Hopefully, it won’t be too much longer before users can get their hands on one. Valve has assured users that it will share more information as soon as it has some. Pricing would be a good place to start.
For now, all we can do is wait. In the meantime, be sure to check out Final Fantasy XIV Online on the Steam Deck. A recent update just fixed its problems. Valve has also introduced some new features like per-game performance profiles and continues to update the keyboard interface.
