Charging and Dock

For charging the Steam Deck does come with a USB Type-C charger right from Valve and the included case has a spot to fit it though I have found that it is a little tight. That said you can’t have too many charging options, especially now with more and more devices supporting Type-C charging. Like with the MicroSD card, there are countless charging options from just about any company you want. All you need is one that can support 45 watts of charging capacity as that is what the Steam Deck can handle when you are gaming and also recharging the built-in battery as well. You could go with a power adapter with multiple connections but to keep things simple I went with the most compact 45-watt charger from a brand that I trust, Anker.

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I went with the Anker Nano II 45 Watt because it hit the charging capacity and its design is more compact that the original charger for the Steam Deck. This means we can use the original charger at home and pack this and a cord in the case. It also means that if the cable or charger have problems it doesn’t take out everything, you can replace the half that went bad. The Anker 713 Nano II 45 Watt is 1.49 inches tall when looking at the Type-C plug end by 1.38 wide and 4.62 inches deep. It has just one Type-C connection and the back side has its flip-out AC plugs for US homes. It is a GaN II charger which helps with power efficiency and it supports Apple and other devices as well for fast charging which means you can have it handle multiple devices to save space when traveling.

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To go with the charger I wanted a bright-colored cable so it would be easy to spot and Ankers 643 line of silicone cables fit that perfectly. They have a variety of mostly spring colors and the Daffodil Yellow that I went with was bright and a unique color that would stand out wherever I left it. Black and white cables almost blend in anywhere you use them which can be nice, but if you are traveling the last thing you want to do is lose your cable. They have this cable with Type-C or Lighting connections and in 3 or 6-foot lengths which for the Steam Deck I wanted 6-foot and Type-C was needed of course. The silicon finish is smooth and shouldn’t catch on anything and carries up onto the connection itself with just a small bronze ring at the end of the plug before the Type-C connection. It also has a matching silicon wire tie strap that comes installed to help keep the wire bundled up.

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To pair with the charger I also picked up a USB Type-C dock designed to work with the Steam Deck. This is one of the accessories that I wasn’t sure just how much I would or wouldn’t use. But there were a few things that sold me on the idea of at least trying it out. A lot of companies have designs but I went with JSAUX which was recommended by a few people on the Steam Deck subreddit. The model I went with was the HB0603 6 in 1 dock. They have a 7-1 as well and a few other variations but I only wanted a few things. I wanted the dock to have a wired network connection which can be important with big downloads. I needed a few USB connections to make hooking a flash drive up and to be able to use a mouse and keyboard if needed. Then to go with that a display output of some sort, preferably HDMI so it can also work with a TV just like a Nintendo Switch. The HB0603 covered all of that and even supports 4k over HDMI, it also can handle up to 100 watts for fast charging.

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I was also a big fan of the aluminum design which gives the HB0603 more strength and JSAUX used rubber pads in the dock to keep the Steam Deck safe. The end of the dock has the 1 Gig ethernet connection and all of the other connections run out of the back including the Type-C input as well. The Steam Deck design isn’t ideal for a simple charging dock which is a bummer and something I hope thing consider in the future, but right now the Type-C power plug is up on the top edge so the HB0603 has a short cable to hook up to the Steam Deck and JSAUX did a nice job with that using a right-angled connection which has an aluminum housing for strength.

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Then on the back, you have the USB-C power input which can also be a data connection if needed. The HDMI, then three USB 3.0 Type-A connections. This is all you need to use the Steam Deck with a television, for streaming to output to a capture card, or to use a keyboard, mouse, and monitor. The Steam Deck is at its core a Linux-based pc and even has a desktop mode.

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