Steam Deck 2 Processor Revealed? AMD Gainsborough Codename Surfaces
I mention that because that's exactly what AMD's "Gainsborough" is thought to be. The processor has appeared in AMD's drivers, it's found in shipping logs, and according to serial leaker Tom with Moore's Law is Dead, none of AMD's partners have ever heard of it. So what is it? Well, according to internal documents he has, it's an SoC fabricated on TSMC's N3P process... and that's about all we know.
So why are we and many other outlets associating it with the Steam Deck 2? The SoC in the original Steam Deck is well known by its code name, Aerith, named after the flower-selling girl from the earlier chapters of Square-Enix's Final Fantasy VII. (If you doubt that's the name, the die-shrunk version of Aerith is known as Sephiroth.) Gainsborough is, obviously, her surname, making it exceedingly unlikely this chip is actually aimed at any other project.
The fact that other OEMs aren't aware of the part is even more convincing. Why would MSI, HP, or ASUS know about a semi-custom chip destined for Valve's Steam Decks? It all lines up rather neatly, but there's still the question of exactly what this chip actually is.
Tom speculates that it's likely rather similar to the APU meant for the upcoming PlayStation handheld meant to align with the PlayStation 6, often referred to as "Canis". That's certainly possible, but the "Canis" processor is said to be quite beefy, with a 192-bit memory interface and a relatively large 16-CU GPU. (While that might not sound big next to 16 CUs in Strix Point, RDNA 5 is much more potent per-CU than RDNA 3.5.)
Valve intentionally selected a very modest processor for the Steam Deck, and likewise, the chip in the Steam Frame is no powerhouse either. The firm clearly isn't interested in the "razor and blades" model employed (or previously employed) by Sony and Microsoft to move dedicated gaming hardware. Valve might cut its margins low, but it's not going to take a loss on each unit sold, and so I'll be very surprised if Gainsborough turns out to be that beastly.
Indeed, my personal expectations for Gainsborough are a chip much more similar to the rumored "Bumblebee" processor. That chip is said to be a monolithic 2+2+2 configuration with Zen 6 CPU cores, as well as an RDNA 4 GPU with 2 or 4 compute units. Modest? Yes. But it's still a significant upgrade over Aerith, and it would fit exactly with Valve's ethos of improving both performance and battery life.
