Upgrading the Steam Deck in Under 60 Seconds!

The Steam Deck base model is priced very well but it comes with a slow eMMC drive and a low amount of storage! So I decided to upgrade to a NVME SSD for something faster and more space!

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[jigsaw-bs]

!IMPORTANT! Before opening up your steamdeck for anything
ALLWAYS enable Battery Storage Mode in BIOS ...

[Bapiiyu]

A large issue I see with these guides is that there's another way about doing this

Excluding the issues where this one obvs doesn't tell you to remove the SD card and put it into battery storage mode, these guides always go the clean slate route

So if you have a bunch configs(e.g. decky plugins) then this clean slate route wipes it all and you'll have to reconfigure everything

So I'll throw it down here:

grab yourself a dock(highly recommended based on experience...) and a nvme enclosure

Plug in everything and make sure your deck is getting power

Then in desktop mode, jump in on the konsole and run a couple of commands

sudo fdisk -l

Or if you want a gui, jump onto KDE partition manager

Pull your nvme drive from that list(mine is /dev/nvme0n1 as an example)

And then pull your new nvme that is plugged in via USB(should be /dev/sda)

Now time to clone

Run:
sudo dd if=/dev/<nvme inside deck> of=/dev/<nvme outside of deck> status=progress

Example:
sudo dd if=/dev/nvme0n1 of=/dev/sda status=progress

Let this clone, it'll take time, but it's better than reinstalling a bunch of games and reconfiguring everything on a clean slate

status=progress is for you to check where it's at while it's working, but not exactly 'needed'

Pop in the new nvme and you should be good to go. I don't remember needing to extend /home or /dev/nvme0n1p8 (oddly), but if it's not showing the new space, jump into KDE partition manager and extend it that way.

I would also recommend hanging onto the old drive and the data on it for a little while just as a backup if your new drive fails or if you need to RMA your steam deck

[TSBaron]

You fool! You failed to warn your viewers to remove the SD card before removing any screws! So many SD cards were destroyed when the case was removed when their users failed to remove the SD card.

[ithildiess]

!! REMOVE YOUR SD CARD BEFORE THE BACK COVER OR IT SNAPS IN HALF !!

[Alex-ebqj]

Honestly after doing this a couple times upgrading from 64 to 256 to 1tb drives i’ve never disconnected the battery. I have however seen more people break their steam deck by disconnecting the battery, breaking the connector or connectors around it (audio), or the board failing after the battery disconnect. I’ve seen more instances where a steam deck has died when the user disconnects the battery compared to when they haven’t. Conclusion, don’t disconnect the battery, you’ll be fine.

[Esablaka]

FYI: that is NOT a heatshield, but an electro magnetic interference shield.
Looks similar but different purposes. :)

For people trying to replicate this: If you have an SD-Card installed, remove it before opening up the Deck, otherwise the Card will be snapped in half when lifting off the back case.

[LukusMaxamus]

The fact that he didn't edit or remove the video without explaining the SD card removal says it all

[Nick_With_A_Stick]

If you got sweaty fingers like me, wear gloves when handling the m.2 to prevent your finger oils from messing up the thermal conductivity of the heat spreader

[mickymalhotraworld]

i lost my sd card yesterday while performing the same 😞and the worse part is that the SSD i was trying to fit in didn't work, i bought m2 2242 SSD which in many videos did work but didn't work in mine, the error is (no nvme drive found) maybe the one i have isn't NVME, so I'm gonna buy a new one today, wish me luck guys 😞

Update: so i managed to replace my ssd with a 512gb one and it works like a charm♥️💪🏻and i bought a memory card too😂so everything is as smooth as it was

[jollygoodfellow]

You don't need to reinstall SteamOS if you use a cloning software like Macrium Reflect. You could copy the partitions and then expand the primary partition to fill the expanded storage capacity on the new drive, then clone.

[reynoldcracker]

How to do it in 5 seconds, insert the micro SD card in the SD card slot and call it a day.

[nicekit]

remove SD card first before removing the

[denniscarr]

thanks bro, I loved you in the royal tenenbaums btw

[NathanTruby]

An easier option would be to REMOVE YOUR SD CARD FIRST, clone your SSD, AND THEN do everything else in this video, minus the part where you install the OS.

You could also just put in a new SD card. Anything with 500GB and up should be more than enough for most people.

[FoxRacingGaming]

You forgot to mention battery storage mode, and to remove the sd card before taking it apart, or you break the sd card....

[TheMobOfChaos]

this was such a good instructional video bc i was thinking about not even doing it until i saw how simple this was

[lescarpio]

Just in case it was obvious: the video is less than 60 seconds long... The process is not.

[lego_minifig]

Im surprised there is not a shell for the deck with built in extra sd or ssd slots yet. It doesnt seem like the task would be too hard to engineer. Just add a new charging port on the shell and have the usb c port hooked up to a built in storage hub. The custom electronics would be the hardest part, but even that seems like something that could be designed by a hobbyist and produced through a service like PCBway

[isaactebben]

!IMPORTANT! Anyone looking to do this and has something already saved on their deck wants to move it all to a usb or sd card before switching so you don't lose anything.

[PepsiManX]

Wrong! You have to put the Steam Deck into battery preservation mode.