Wow, okay, so there’s this thing about prototypes—I guess they just kinda grab people’s attention, right? It’s like, these unmet desires turned into gadgets or something. Anyway, picture this: a Steam Deck prototype, yeah, one of those fancy gizmos, made some waves on eBay. Somebody over on r/SteamDeck happened to catch it. You’d think folks would whisper such things quietly, but, I mean, come on, it’s Reddit.
Oh, and guess what? Not just any prototype. This bad boy came with an AMD APU, Picasso silicon — classic 2019 style, a real throwback, if you will. It started at $3,000! That’s more zeros than I’ve got lips to stage a whistle. But it sold for 2k. Market forces or just a wild collector, I wonder? Geez, there’s a world where prototypes actually have codenames. This one was “Engineering Sample 34.” With all these blue highlights and some curvy bits—because ergonomics or something matter, right? It even had this sensor thingy on the joystick. Conspiracy theories, anyone?
And oh boy, the back of it had this sticker which basically said, “You shall not do this” in its ‘not for resale’ glory — didn’t stop our mysterious seller though. What a rebel. Makes you think about the purposes of such “DO NOT CROSS” lines, eh?
Valve, the crew behind all this chaos, whipped up tons of these samples. The exact age of this one? A mystery. Older APU in there kinda suggests a 2019-2020 deal. Oldie but goldie—or whatever. And no SteamOS. Blank slate? Again, who’s to say?
A peek at the BIOS (thanks Notebookcheck) — they caught a glimpse of some nostalgic AMD Picasso details. Ryzen 3000 mobile chips, GCN 5.0 for the GPU—it’s impressive tech talk, or maybe just nerdy rambling. It’s crazy how things shifted! Today’s models wow with 16GB RAM and 512 gigs of magical storage space. Meanwhile, this thing puffs along with just 8 and 256. Cute, in a retro way.
Now, who got this? Your guess is as good as mine. Could be a tech reviewer, could be someone just looking to sit in a corner reminiscing. Valve hints at a Steam Deck sequel, but for now… patience, pals. Anticipation tastes as sweet as the prize—or so they say.
