I have been having those crashes on my Steam Deck, and for a moment I though I had a faulty hardware, but contacting Valve for support illuminated me.
This kind of crash / freeze accurres usually after 15 / 30 min of gameplay, but it can also happen right when you start your game. The game freeze; black screen; then the last frame of the game is back, and the audio stills playing.
Since I moved overseas, I am using an adapter + power strip to charge my Steam Deck, and because it was charging correctly, I would have never though of it being a problem.
Anyway, the power strip was faulty, so pluging the charger in the wall fixed all my problems (the adapter is working fine).
So if anyone has this problem:
- Try and see if your Steam Deck crashes while not charging (battery mode).
- Try different chargers and power outlets (in my case it was just the power strip, but it could also be other things).
- Try not use extension cords or power strips
If after this you still have the problem, or if that also happens when you are not charging, than it may be because an hardware issue (perhaps the battery?).
I hope your Steam Decks are working fine, but I figured this could help someone down the line.
I also want to thank Valve's Support, absolutely brilliant. Don't hesitate to contact them for any issue, they are the best.
Take care everybody and have fun!
Good question. I believe when you manually cut off the power supply (ex: unplug the usb-c) the Steam Deck can handle it fine, but if there are inconsistenty in the wattage it may cause problem.
As far as I understand, the Steam Deck, while in charge, it takes all the power from the outlet to operate (GPU, CPU), and a faulty charger (or power stick) can make the system very unstable while gaming.
Perhaps, those crashes are just a security switch to avoid permanent damage in case of faulty power supply.
I must say, Steam Deck is a complicate machine, Valve did great on building it.