Valve has issued a warning to Steam Deck owners about doing things they know better not to do.
As reported by Dexerto, Valve customer service was asked about inhaling fumes off of the Steam Deck’s exhaust vents. Here is the company’s response:
“As with all electronics, it’s generally not recommended that you inhale the exhaust fumes on your device. While there are no safety concerns with general usage, directly inhaling the device’s vent fumes should be avoided.
We understand that it may be a meme, but please refrain from this behavior for the safety of your health.”
As Dexerto also pointed out, this had been becoming a popular meme with Steam Deck owners, but exactly what risks are they taking when they do this?
The Steam Deck is sold as a dedicated console-like device, but let’s not kid ourselves here. The Steam Deck is a thin and light PC, and not real dedicated hardware like the Nintendo Switch. You can literally install Windows on it!
PCs, in general, have systems that regulate their temperatures, to protect it from destroying itself. For a thin and light device like the Steam Deck, or say, a Surface tablet, the devices also have to be designed to avoid harming the users.
So the vents on a Steam Deck are designed to dissipate that heat out from the device. Those vents are supposed to be out of reach to the user, whose hands should naturally be resting on the grooves at the back of the Steam Deck, or touching the face of the console, on the buttons, sticks, touchpads, etc.
Now, this redditor believes that the actual smell coming out of the vent isn’t from the heatsink, but the EVA that the Steam Deck’s case is made of. That’s short for ethylene-vinyl acetate, but all you really need to know is it’s a flexible plastic resistant to UV and to cracking. The smell of EVA supposedly overwhelms the other smells of plastic and metal parts inside the Deck.
Steam Decks, like other consumer tech devices, have to pass consumer safety regulations around the world as well. So we should be reasonably protected from the possible harmful effects of smelling plastic or metal in our phones, tablets, or Steam Decks. But if you have particular smelling sensitivities, this sort of thing might be unsafe for you.
Obviously, Valve knows most people won’t be harmed by this, anymore than kids licking their Nintendo Switch cartridges. But Nintendo decided to put a nasty flavor to those cartridges so that they won’t have to risk their own consumers getting harmed by their own products. Every company would simply not want to have that happen.
So, these are what should be the self-evident reasons that Valve is telling their consumers not to smell the fumes coming out of their Steam Deck. You would be better off attaching a turbine cooler to it. At least that way, you would get better performance from the device.
