You can watch my teardown attempt above. I've sped it up at times, mostly through the bits where I have no idea what to do next. That's most of it.

My attempts to take apart the Steam Frame ended in me nervously replacing screws on our only review unit. I hadn't broken anything, but I expected I might do if I persisted in stripping the headset down any further. Thankfully, there's no need for me to go through all that again, as iFixit has published its own full teardown.

iFixit's Shahram Mokhtari doesn't mind prying things. Things that I didn't dare pry myself. For example, it's pretty easy to get into the Steam Frame's main 'core module', the bit housing the system-on-chip, optics, RAM, memory, and sensors. Beneath the magnetic face mask sit three switches, release these and the core module comes away from the strap. It's then just six Torx screws to remove the plastic cover that exposes most of the headset.

The optics (lenses/screens) are attached magnetically to a rail at the top of the headset. They're pretty easy to remove, too; however, the push fit connectors on the back of the are glued onto the back of the optics. I left these in place out of fear—fear of destroying a very valuable object ahead of our review date—whereas iFixit pried those off without a second thought.

It's much easier to access the rest of the headset without the optics flapping around. iFixit says: "this design is pretty darn good for such a complex assembly," and notes only the Bigscreen Beyond has an easier lens stack removal process.

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