Broken Steam Deck LCD repurposed into a low-power Debian Linux setup.
Running btop + Grafana monitoring with a small sub display, mainly used for backups, Linux experiments, and NAS duties over 2.5GbE 👍
I repurposed my Steam Deck LCD (the screen died) into a low-power NAS and monitoring node.
It’s running Debian 12 with a simple 2.5GbE setup and rsync-based backups.
I posted an earlier version a few days ago, and made some improvements based on feedback I got here — so thanks to everyone who shared ideas.
Current setup:
Device: Steam Deck LCD (screen dead, used headless / external)
OS: Debian 12 minimal
Network: 2.5GbE (USB NIC)
Storage:
6TB HDD (main NAS)
4TB HDD (backup)
Backup: rsync (manual + scheduled)
Monitoring setup:
Main screen (Deck output):
→ btop (quick local stats)
Sub display:
→ Grafana dashboard (CPU / RAM / disk / temp via node exporter)
Core monitoring:
→ Glances (still running in the background)
Grafana made a big difference — way easier to read everything at a glance compared to Glances alone.
Changes from previous setup:
Added btop for local, instant visibility
Added Grafana dashboard on a dedicated sub display
Kept Glances as the base monitoring layer
Notes:
Transfer speeds are still around ~280MB/s over 2.5GbE
The goal was low power + simple + practical, not over-engineered
The last image shows the previous version where I was only using Glances.
Now I can monitor everything in real time without switching views, which makes it much more usable in daily operation.
Simple, low power, and actually useful.