Yep, that’s the route I took. Bought cheapest steamdeck model on sale, took the chance on a 2TB stick from aliexpress and have been very satisfied so far. Link to the 2TB I bought, which is now roughly 15% off: WD SN740 2TB https://a.aliexpress.com/_ms4e8NQ Only concern I had was that this retailer did not ship it in antistatic wrap. Another one my brother got did ship in antistatic wrap though. It’s aliexpress, what can you do.

Good microsd cards are cheap as dirt and easy to use with a Steam Deck. I do not regret getting the lowest storage model and just using a card.

Thanks, just bought a base model + dock. I've got a bunch of 128GB SDs, and my only current plans are to use it for PC-98 emulation, so load times shouldn't be a problem.

Just so you're forewarned - some things always get installed on internal storage and people regularly have problems with it filling up.

IMO getting at least 256GB internal (or upgrading later) is a smarter decision.

You can work around this somewhat by moving things to external storage and they symlinking it back to the original spot (or so I've heard, I have the top end model and haven't filled it up yet).

only issue with microsd is very slow writing speed. For games that are in the dozens of gigabytes you will wait a LOOOOONG time for the process to finish,

> Is the base model EMMC able to be removed to install NVMe

Yes, guide here: https://boilingsteam.com/how-to-upgrade-your-64gb-steam-deck...

The only caution I would advise is that the fan loves to jam on mine post installation of the WD. The Steam Deck will run but throttle viciously. The problem disappears with reinsertion of the stock eMMC or a little 256GB module.

The only solution I found was to simply not screw in the rear outer enclosure screws fully tight, or to replace the cover with the JSAUX unit that includes an additional heat spreader.