Phoronix article: https://www.phoronix.com/news/Steam-Machines-Frame-2026
Also listed here: https://store.steampowered.com/sale/hardware
Valve has already sent support for the new Steam Controller upstream: https://www.phoronix.com/news/New-Steam-Controller-SDL
The Steam Deck uses the capacitive thumb stick sensors to completely disable the trackpads as soon as the stick above the respective pad is touched. This works very well, so I think they‘ll implement the same thing here.
That’s so fucking cool
On the opposite of the spectrum, my small hands doesn't play well with that feature. The capacitive sensors only works if your fingers touch the top of the sticks but I usually move the sticks by pushing on the round edges of it so I still occasionally brush against the touch pads which is annoying.
You should be able to disable them on a game by game basis if needed. Annoying thiugh
That brings up my following question.
If the thumb sticks are capacitive and they wear smooth over time how do you replace them? Are the capacitive sensors under stick caps? Do you just have to replace the rim only?
Does your capacitive phone screen wear smooth over time?
(The point being hopefully they'll be made of something that doesn't wear down from human fingies)
The case around it does. That's what I want to replace.
I assume the same way the steam deck gets replacement sticks. You'd replace the entire thumb cap and run a wire under and to a specific connector. So its unlikely you'll get a third party solution with capacitive touch but getting official parts shouldn't be impossible either, just more tedious.
I've not had any wear like that on my deck, but I'm not crazy hard on controllers. At worse the whole stick can be pretty easily replaced. The repairability on Valve hardware gets a high priority.