Windows on Deck - 22H2 Audio Driver

[baldsealion]

Note that this is not a personal support issue with Windows, this is a driver incompatibility with the Operating System.

This is a post simply to make Valve aware that this problem exists.

Users discovered that the Valve-provided audio drivers do not work for Windows Insider Preview build of 22H2. Now the full release 22H2 is available and users are upgrading and still experiencing the same issue.

References:

https://www.reddit.com/r/WindowsOnDeck/comments/xjkexm/windows_11_22h2_released/

https://www.reddit.com/r/WindowsOnDeck/comments/wqxcax/has_anyone_installed_windows_11_22h2_how_does_it/


As a side note, the Valve-provided video drivers also have no capability of hardware encode/decode, which means streaming at this time within the Windows operating system on the deck is not working properly.

[Prezidentas]

引用自 Kronpas：

引用自 SHADOW-XIII：

I am no linux elitist, I use and prefer Win.

I am not saying people shouldn't ask Valve to update audio driver, but they should not demand it or rage about it like some do.

This is EXACTLY same situation when you buy new PC with Windows on it and install Linux instead, some stuff won't work and most of the time it will stay like this because there's no drivers for those, or the drivers are old.

Anyone who installed Windows do it on their own and they have to figure out ON THEIR OWN how to deal with the issues if either company doesn't provide updated drivers or it takes time. There is NO GUARANTEE SUPPORT for Windows on the Deck and that is clearly stated on Valve pages and news.

Anyone who bought Steam Deck and expects full Windows support, didn't know what they were buying. Case of "more money than brain", or "spend first, figure out what you bought later".

The original poster demanded nothing, they simple wanted Valve to learn of the situation and hoped something could be done about it. I'm not sure what did you want to achieve by insisting people was demanding Valve to fully support Windows. Its your condescending toned comments that derailed the thread, lol.

引用自 Vairuotojas-Kontrolierius：

my Pentium 2 laptop also claims to support windows, but I don't expect it to run Windows 11. Deck comes with great drivers for Windows 10, enjoy it while it lasts.

Actually computers come with a sticker claiming they run great with a specific version of windows, not windows in general. My laptop has a win10 sticker on it. Win11 is at its core win10, its named 11 and themed differently because (partly) marketing.

well clearly it's not the same if drivers from 10 do not work on 11

[Kronpas]

引用自 Vairuotojas-Kontrolierius：

引用自 Kronpas：

The original poster demanded nothing, they simple wanted Valve to learn of the situation and hoped something could be done about it. I'm not sure what did you want to achieve by insisting people was demanding Valve to fully support Windows. Its your condescending toned comments that derailed the thread, lol.


Actually computers come with a sticker claiming they run great with a specific version of windows, not windows in general. My laptop has a win10 sticker on it. Win11 is at its core win10, its named 11 and themed differently because (partly) marketing.

well clearly it's not the same if drivers from 10 do not work on 11

Someone somewhere ♥♥♥♥♥♥ it up, hence this thread.

[Noman]

Steam Deck runs great on Windows11 - better in my opinion than it does with SteamOS. I was lucky that I got the 21H2 version of Win11 from Windows Media Creation Tool, when I first installed Win11 recently. So far II haven't received notification for 22H2 in Windows-Update.

Hopefully newer audio drivers come soon. 22H2 is causing blue-screen with audio drivers for many other audio chipsets too. It's very likely a straightforward crash to fix. Hopefully Valve will ask whoever did the last open source drivers to take a look. It may not be a priority for them, but it doesn't mean a solution won't come around in reasonable timeframe. We just need to keep bringing up this topic.

It's important because otherwise Steam Deck runs so well running Win11 natively with no tweaks needed. It's so remarkable how quickly it shuts down (S3 sleep) and wakes up, even within games (be it Gamepass, Steam, GoG, Epic, Origin, or any other platform)

[3 [WinampeD] - qUaK3R]

So much discussion around windows support. If valve didn't wan't to support windows they would have been shut about it running windows, and I would expect not for them to share a page with supported windows resources.

They even updated one of their drivers at the beginning, what's the doubt here?...

Also expecting for some working drivers, the previous one wasn't working that well itself, it has been a few months now.

[Prezidentas]

引用自 3 WinampeD - qUaK3R：

So much discussion around windows support. If valve didn't wan't to support windows they would have been shut about it running windows, and I would expect not for them to share a page with supported windows resources.

They even updated one of their drivers at the beginning, what's the doubt here?...

Also expecting for some working drivers, the previous one wasn't working that well itself, it has been a few months now.

you are contradicting yourself - you claim that valve wants to support windows, but also state that there hasn't been a working driver for a few months. either it's one or the other.

[Balderick]

Valve have confirmed they are working on win 11 audio drivers for Deck and have explained that due to the custom proprietary hardware being used in Deck they have to rely on AMD and other parties to provide audio drivers for win 11 on Deck.

Valve have also repeatedly confirmed they are working on better multi boot support to Deck.

These are really firmware related issues and Valve simply can not provide fixes as quickly as they can for SteamOS or Steam for Deck client.

Regardless no Deck user should be claiming that windows on Deck is unsupported as this is disinformation. Fact is windows on Deck is supported. Valve saying their support team can not provide "support" (as in folks asking about windows on Deck issues which are NOT related to Steam on windows client issues) is actually more evidence only the fan boys who think Deck is all about gaming on linux really believe "windows on Deck is unsupported". That belief is not founded on facts though, so is just an opinion.


Deck is for gamers. Including gamers who choose to use Steam for windows on Deck.


To be fair Valve could be much more specific by more clearly defining what is meant when they say

引用自 Valve：

We are providing these resources as is and are unfortunately unable to offer 'Windows on Deck' support. If you get stuck and need a way back to the default Steam Deck OS, please follow these recovery instructions.

2nd paragraph at https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6121-eccd-d643-baa8

which contradicts what Valve say at

引用自 Valve：

Both Windows 10 and Windows 11 are supported. For Windows 11, make sure you have the latest OS update (in order to get the latest BIOS with fTPM support) before installing.

last bullet point at bottom of https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6121-eccd-d643-baa8

imo Valve should be saying something more like

We are providing these resources as is and are unfortunately unable to offer any more help than what the windows usb installer faq says about the installation of windows on pc. We can provide support for any issues with Steam for windows client on Deck.

Valve saying you should reinstall SteamOS if you have issues with windows installation on Deck is a carbon copy of how and what caused confusion with Steam Machine OEMs. Which completely contradicted what the OEMs licensing criteria webpage for Steam Machines says. https://store.steampowered.com/steamos/oem

No end user should be tickled so much by PR and marketing fluff it confuses or misleads them. Or people just flip the bird and walk away.

Lastly, Valve saying they can not provide "official" support for installation issues with windows on Deck does not mean the community here should not or can not provide support. Which seems to be the hardcore gaming on linux diehards agenda in preventing that.


Please do not feel you have anything to contribute to this thread if you can not grasp the concept of Deck supporting windows because it is just an x86-64 pc.

[Stressed]

@Balderick - I covered that and more in post #27. Windows is supported. The hardware itself is designed to support Windows 11. The support doesn't end with Valve either. Windows Updates Steam Deck with 4 drivers. These are;

1. AMD - System - 2.2.0.121
2. AMD - AMD SMBus
3. AMD - System - 1.0.0.83
4. AMD - AMD UART Controller

The only way Microsoft would have these drivers is if they were given these drivers. Obviously AMD are the driver suppliers here.

There is some hope that the Steam Deck's APU driver support could be decoupled from Valve altogether as the 6800U (uses RDNA2) has recently been added to the main AMD GPU drivers. The main thing holding things back is the Steam Deck's custom audio hardware (only 2 drivers exist, which are broken in 22H2).

In which case, they need to do a cross-licensing deal to supply the audio drivers with the AMD GPU drivers and then we can all move on and threads like this one will cease to exist. We don't actually need Valve to provide support for Windows on Steam Deck, we just need them to allow AMD to integrate support into the main drivers.

[Kronpas]

引用自 Stressed：

@Balderick - I covered that and more in post #27. Windows is supported. The hardware itself is designed to support Windows 11. The support doesn't end with Valve either. Windows Updates Steam Deck with 4 drivers. These are;

1. AMD - System - 2.2.0.121
2. AMD - AMD SMBus
3. AMD - System - 1.0.0.83
4. AMD - AMD UART Controller

The only way Microsoft would have these drivers is if they were given these drivers. Obviously AMD are the driver suppliers here.

There is some hope that the Steam Deck's APU driver support could be decoupled from Valve altogether as the 6800U (uses RDNA2) has recently been added to the main AMD GPU drivers. The main thing holding things back is the Steam Deck's custom audio hardware (only 2 drivers exist, which are broken in 22H2).

In which case, they need to do a cross-licensing deal to supply the audio drivers with the AMD GPU drivers and then we can all move on and threads like this one will cease to exist. We don't actually need Valve to provide support for Windows on Steam Deck, we just need them to allow AMD to integrate support into the main drivers.

+1
People who installed windows on deck are savvy to a degree, they dont need valve to hand-holding them to play games on windows deck. But they do need proper windows driver support. The community could figure out how to make Steaminput or xinput work on the deck, but asking them to reverse engneering hardware drivers is just too much.

[Prezidentas]

引用自 Kronpas：

+1
People who installed windows on deck are savvy to a degree, they dont need valve to hand-holding them to play games on windows deck. But they do need proper windows driver support. The community could figure out how to make Steaminput or xinput work on the deck, but asking them to reverse engneering hardware drivers is just too much.

no one is asking anything - you want it to work, you so do what you need.

[Kronpas]

引用自 Vairuotojas-Kontrolierius：

引用自 Kronpas：

+1
People who installed windows on deck are savvy to a degree, they dont need valve to hand-holding them to play games on windows deck. But they do need proper windows driver support. The community could figure out how to make Steaminput or xinput work on the deck, but asking them to reverse engneering hardware drivers is just too much.

no one is asking anything - you want it to work, you so do what you need.

I'm not asking for your opinion and I was not replying to you. Kindly f_k off, thank you very much.

[Prezidentas]

引用自 Kronpas：

引用自 Vairuotojas-Kontrolierius：

no one is asking anything - you want it to work, you so do what you need.

I'm not asking for your opinion and I was not replying to you. Kindly f_k off, thank you very much.

I'm just hoping you arent holding your breath for those drivers

[Nube]

I don't understand why you want to discuss nonsense so much, valve will distribute an updated driver soon, that's a reality, this thread is to report the problem. The rest of the debate is absurd. Use 21H2 until the new driver is available or connect a pair of headphones to the jack. If you don't use windows on your Steam Deck, just shut up and stop messing around.

[Stressed]

@Kronpas - Exactly. All the community needs are working drivers. I've already proved that Valve intended for 22H2 to be supported. As soon as an updated audio driver is released, then, Microsoft can redeploy 22H2 on Steam Deck and we can all move on.

[76561198870432598]

We just uploaded a new driver with fixes for this. https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6121-ECCD-D643-BAA8

[Le Vagabond]

引用自 Significant Otter：

We just uploaded a new driver with fixes for this, can you try the new version?

installed on 11 22H2 build 22621.521 (bluescreened previously when trying to install this driver), "operation completed successfully" and my deck has sound on windows :)

thank you!