It has taken longer than expected, or that has been the general feeling, but it is here. Valve has announced this morning in Spain the stable version of Steam OS 3.6, specifically numbered 3.6.19. It was said that it was close to arriving even before I had one, which was in July, but Valve wanted to be on the safe side and waited to release it when it was in a good state, after no less than 19 corrective versions.
There are many “Fixed” items in the list of new features. Among them is one that mentions the option to capture video, new in SteamOS 3.6. These kinds of improvements have arrived during the development of 3.6, and in this 19th revision they have corrected what they had already released in the beta version. What you have below is a list with the most outstanding news from SteamOS 3.6.
SteamOS 3.6(.19) Highlights
- The base has been pushed to a newer Arch Linux, which brings improved support for new hardware, system performance improvements, security and general stability.
- It has also switched to using Linux 6.5. It's been at end of life for a while now, but that's not a big deal for an immutable distribution like SteamOS. Besides, it's normal.
- BIOS updates, including support for the Windows Bluetooth driver, have also served to increase the battery life of the Steam Deck LCD by 10% in low load situations.
- Speed improvements in upcoming system updates.
- Improved reliability when using certain microSD cards.
- Improvements to session response upon restart that was causing some GPU crashes.
- Improved recovery in some cases where the system might become corrupted.
- The game recording tool in 3.6.19 has already received many patches. It is still in beta phase.
- Security patch for Flatpak CVE-2024-42472.
- Updated MESA 24.1 graphics driver with performance and other improvements.
- Improved responsiveness in Steam UI.
- Improved performance and stability in high memory demand situations.
- Slightly improved cold start time.
- Many improvements to the display and external display.
- Improved support for Apple AirPods.
- Added support for ROG Ally keys.
- Improved support for PlayStation controllers.
- plasma 5.27.10.
- Official dock firmware updated.
- Complete list of changes to this link.
The rumor about a Waydroid's own implementation.
Now available
Steam OS 3.6.19 It is now available on the stable channel. To update, just press the Steam button, go to Settings, System, then Updates, press Search and Apply. If something goes wrong, we will write another article later on how to revert to a previous version of SteamOS.