This Steam Deck dock has a thermoelectric cooler

If you're lucky enough to find a Steam Deck, chances are you've already suffered from sweaty palm syndrome with this portable console, just like our own Jess Conditt did in her review. Worse still, the machine is prone to throttling or even crashing due to overheating, to the point that modders have come up with their own creative solutions. For the rest of us who don't want to void the warranty, Hong Kong-based Unitek now offers the Cooler Dock Pro for Steam Deck. It's basically Valve's official dock with a thermoelectric cooler - like the one that comes with the ROG Phone 6D Ultimate - on the back, if you don't mind paying the extra $30. /p>

Richard Lai/Engadget

Just like the official dock, Unitek's version cushions your Steam Deck - or any other portable device, for that matter - with a soft silicone band, and there's a short cable USB-C dangling from the back for console connection. The thermoelectric cooler, RGB-lit fan, and metal contact plate are all housed in a hinged module, allowing for minor tilt angle adjustment while still supporting the Steam Deck.

The Cooler Dock Pro comes with a similar set of ports to Valve's dock, but with some placed in the front instead — the latter include two USB-A and one USB-C (up to 10 Gbit/s), accompanied by two RGB lights. On the back you get a USB-C PD socket (passthrough up to 100W), HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort 1.4 and Gigabit LAN. It should be noted that this docking station supports multi-stream transport, that is, the daisy-chaining of multiple monitors in the Linux desktop mode of the console. If you're using just one video output, you'll get up to 8K at 60Hz or 4K at 120Hz; but if you're using both ports, it's either dual 4K at 60Hz or 8K at 30Hz on one and 1080p at 60Hz on the other.

Unitek has added an additional USB-C port on the left, which is dedicated to the cooling module. If you want to only use the cooling function on the go, i.e. without a display or accessory connected to the docking station, you can simply plug an external battery into this socket 10W USB-C.

Richard Lai/Engadget

Unitek claims that while running Apex Legends, the Steam Deck's average surface temperature was around 46°C (114.8°F), but when used with the Cooling Dock Pro, that figure drops to 34.5°C (94.1°F) — within the recommended ambient temperature range. For a more extreme test, we ran Forza Horizon 5 on Ultra Graphics settings, in which case the Steam Deck would normally fail to start a run, but it managed to last around six minutes on the Cooling Dock Pro. The company added that when lowered to high graphics settings, the game would crash after about 45 minutes of play, but with its dock it continued to work even after an hour. Of course, your mileage may vary from game to game, but this is more about extending the life of your Steam Deck.

The $119 Unitek Cooling Dock Pro is now available for