We have just shipped an updated Steam Client to the Preview/Beta channel.

General:

• Fixed the Recordings & Screenshots dialog not showing all games that have related screenshots in the game filter dropdown.

• Improved the text layout in achievement notifications when the name, description or both wrap across multiple lines.

• Fix some cases of header/footer flicker and invisibility during the first seconds after waking from sleep.

• When waking from sleep with a game running but the account now playing elsewhere:

  • Provide an option to exit the local game.

  • Go back to sleep if there is no input for 60 seconds.

• Fixed issues with trackpad typing if the trackpad is touched while the onscreen keyboard is opening

Steam Input:

• Improved the consistency of trackpad sensitivity between Steam Deck and Steam Controller

• Fixed cases where the Virtual menu modes could show the wrong activation type if it was created in the standalone menu vs from a controller source

• Implemented a version of the "Reorder Controller" dialog for Steam Input API games. Note - this disconnects the controllers temporarily so older games which do not handle hot plugging properly can lose controller input

• Additional polish for the multibinding page

• In the desktop UI overlay the desktop config will now be applied. For most gamepads this will not be a difference in behavior because they have a blank desktop config, but Steam Controllers or devices that have setup a custom desktop config will have mouse input to click on things in the overlay.

Remote Play:

• Improved color accuracy when streaming from a Windows computer

• Fixed the mouse cursor when streaming from Linux using the SteamRT3C client

• Fixed a capture lockup when streaming from pipewire on Linux and SteamOS

• Reduced Pyrowave latency when streaming from pipewire on Linux and SteamOS

• Added the -pyrowavestats command line option to log Pyrowave encoding performance

SteamRT3 Experimental Beta

• Fixed Steam overwriting PATH, LD_PRELOAD, and LD_LIBRARY_PATH variables when launching games.

This update is for the SteamOS Beta and Preview channels, and includes new features that are still being tested. You can opt into this in Settings > System > System Update Channel.

These notes contain all changes since the current stable SteamOS 3.8 release, with the changes added since the previous 3.9 preview releases noted below

General

• Add preliminary support for Legion Go 2 brightness control

• Fixed Steam Remote Play not working on Steam Machine when booting with no external display connected

• Fixed "Disable Frame Limiter" toggle not working when VRR is enabled

• Fixed the frame limiter incorrectly applying to VR titles when streaming from Steam Machine to Steam Frame

• Fixed loss of input if a launcher window is accidentally dragged around in Game Mode

• Fixed logging in to Desktop Mode via RDP with system users when enabled

• Fixed an issue causing certain games (incl. ELDEN RING and DARK SOULS™ III) to fail to run on recent Panther Lake Intel CPUs

• Worked around a firmware issue on some ASUS devices causing excessive fan speed upon waking from sleep

• Fixed a bug causing hidden WiFi networks to fail to connect on the first attempt

• Fixed boot screen corruption on Intel PTL+ devices

• Fixed a regression from previous 3.9 previews causing Steam Machine to occasionally wake from hibernation unexpectedly

• Fixed a regression from previous 3.9 previews slowing down system boot speed and causing the boot logo to briefly vanish during boot

• Fixed a regression from previous 3.9 previews breaking virtual keyboard input for some languages in Game Mode

• Fixed a regression from previous 3.9 previews with nested desktop mode

• Security and stability fixes

General

• Updated Arch Linux base

• Updated Desktop Mode from Plasma 6.4.3 to Plasma 6.7.3

  • For more information, see
    https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/6/6.7.0/
    https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/6/6.6.0/
    https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/6/6.5.0/

• Fixed a system crash when launching Forza Horizon 6 on Legion Go 2

• Fixed an issue causing frame limits to result in lower than intended FPS on certain external displays

• Fixed issues with suspend/resume on systems with RDNA1 or RDNA2 based dedicated GPUs

• Security and stability updates

Misc

• Updated the bootloader to improve compatibility with certain motherboards

• The Desktop Mode lockscreen is no longer prevented from being explicitly enabled in settings (but remains off by default)

Developer

• Switched WiFi backend to wpa_supplicant by default for new installations, improving compatibility with various WiFi networks

  • Enhanced wpa_supplicant to support fast WiFi reconnect on resume from sleep, previously only available in the iwd backend

  • Known issue: Existing installations will continue to use iwd unless manually enabled in Developer Settings

• Linux kernel rebased on Linux 7.2

• Added preliminary support for hibernation, not yet exposed in Game Mode UI

  • Enhanced Linux kernel hibernation support to enable interrupting hibernate requests and fixed various driver issues

• Various scripts and packages have been renamed from `steamos-` to `holo-`, with aliases to the former names where appropriate

• Improved support for running SteamOS as a VM guest with accelerated graphics (virtio-gpu, venus)

• Updated included renderdoc version

SteamOS 3.8.28 has just been released for all users with the following changes:

These notes contain all changes since the previous SteamOS 3.8.16 stable release. See here for changes since the previous SteamOS 3.8.27 beta release.

General

• Updated Mesa graphics driver to a new major release, containing many ray-tracing performance improvements, as well as other performance and functionality improvements

• Greatly improved VRAM management, improving performance and stability in cases where VRAM is limited

• The Steam Machine splash screen/logo now appears much more quickly after device startup

• Added support for waking up from the Steam Controller Wireless Adapter (2015)

• Improved battery indications when the device is charging in but using more power than the charger can provide

• Preliminary support for the Steam Frame Wireless Adapter

• Added support for Steam Controller (2026) to the built-in [c]hid_steam[/c] controller driver, enabling use with native controller applications when Steam is not running

• Fixed 20-30s startup delay in some games on non-Valve devices with no audio sources

• Fixed delayed start time for some games under Proton when no capture device is present

• Fixed an issue causing black screens in certain launchers, including Zenless Zone Zero and FINAL FANTASY XIV Online

• Fixed an issue where hotplugging HDMI displays could cause lockups in Desktop Mode

• Fixed an issue where TVs supporting an HDMI "Game Mode" would display the initial boot logo on startup before engaging said mode, causing unnecessary delay and flashing

• Fixed some cases of slow or stuck Wi-Fi connections with certain adapters

• Fixed an issue causing previous SteamOS updates to fail to apply for some users

• Fixed Firefox in Desktop Mode sometimes freezing when fullscreen

• Worked around an issue where Unreal Engine 5 VR games could display a blank right eye

• Fixed Bluetooth instability with Nintendo Switch Pro (v1) controller

• Fixed Desktop Mode allowing resolutions below 640x480 on certain displays, rendering it unusable

• Fixed a bug where the system would freeze on resume if an SD card was removed while suspended

• Fixed a rare Steam Deck issue where fan speed would revert to BIOS control until a reboot, resulting in higher than normal fan speeds

• Fixed an issue where game performance could be degraded after sleep/resume on systems with AMD discrete GPUs

Steam Machine Firmware 108

• Fixed an issue where the system could occasionally wake up immediately after going to sleep

• Fixed a rare issue where CPU performance could be degraded until reboot after waking up from sleep

Audio

• Add option to reset all audio configuration and settings to system defaults under Settings -> Audio

• Fix for HDMI audio dropouts with some game and TV combinations

• Improve reliability of HDMI hotplug detection

• Add option to prefer lower latency audio codecs for Bluetooth devices

Non-Valve Devices

• Improve support for MSI Claw and OneXPlayer device variants

• Improve support for devices with external or no Wi-Fi adapters

• Fixed an infrequent bug where some 3rd party handhelds would have input ignored when held

• Added initial gamepad support for MSI Claw 8 EX AI+

• Added initial gamepad support for Konkr FIT

• Added initial gamepad support for AYANEO Pocket S2

• Updated gamepad support for OneXPlayer Apex with new firmware

• Added controller support for missing OneXPlayer F1 and OneXPlayer 2 special edition models

• Fixed a regression with some MSI Claw devices on newer firmware losing access the Guide and Quick Access Menu buttons

• Fixed a regression with Legion Go 1 models on older controller firmware where gyroscope would fail to initialize

• Fixed a regression on OneXPlayer F1 models where rumble was being blocked and the joystick poll rate was low. As a consequence, the M1 (left) extra shoulder button is no longer able to function.

• Fixed issues with battery display on Lenovo Legion Go models

• Fixed a bug where the MSI Claw would freeze on resume if an SD card was present during suspend and resume

Developer

• Updated the Linux kernel to 6.18.50

We have just shipped an updated Steam Client to the Preview/Beta channel.

General

• Fixed the on-screen keyboard not popping up in non-Steam games after toggling wifi or suspending the machine

Steam Input

• Fixed the glyphs shown for the Xbox Elite Controller paddle buttons

Remote Play: Pyrowave

• Fixed occasional flickering when streaming to Linux and SteamOS clients

• Switched encoding to use the compute queue to avoid contention with game GPU usage

• Fixed GPU memory leak on the client when frequently changing resolutions

This update is for the SteamOS Beta and Preview channels, and includes new features that are still being tested. You can opt into this in Settings > System > System Update Channel.

General

• Fixed an issue where game performance could be degraded after sleep/resume on systems with AMD discrete GPUs