Steam Deck 2 Rumours Heat Up As AMD Gainsborough APU Breaks Cover
Rumors surfaced this week regarding AMD’s next-generation Gainsborough APU, with speculation that it could power Valve’s anticipated Steam Deck 2. The semi-custom chip appears to be a variant of AMD’s Z3 and Z3 Extreme processors. According to leakers, the Gainsborough features a six-core CPU configuration pairing four Zen 6 cores with two low-power Zen 6c cores, alongside a 12-compute-unit GPU built on RDNA 4m architecture—which incorporates machine learning capabilities from RDNA 4.
While the technical specifications align with potential Steam Deck 2 requirements, sources emphasize that it’s premature to definitively link the Gainsborough APU to Valve’s handheld console. Multiple parties could be developing custom chips using similar architecture, and official confirmation from either AMD or Valve remains absent. The rumors underscore the gaming industry’s persistent interest in advancing handheld gaming performance, though the ultimate application of this silicon remains uncertain pending official announcements.