Handheld Gaming PC's

[🆃 🆈 🅻 🅴 🆁]

So I own a pretty high end gaming laptop. However, there are times I just can't be bothered to sit at my desk to play, especially if it's just for a small amount of time as is usually the case for myself. That's where my handhelds come into it. Over the last year or two I've owned pretty much all the most popular one's for differing amounts of time and thought I would list some brief opinions for anyone who might be thinking about purchasing one of them anytime soon.

Ayaneo 2 - Loved this device at first. Sadly the software, AyaSpace, is a buggy mess. My device also had a crack in the plastic near to the exhaust which happened a couple of months into using it, despite no drops or misuse, and seems to be pretty common with these. The screen is amazing, but found it to just be far too frustrating an experience.

Steam Deck OLED - I just couldn't deal with the 800p display after using the Ayaneo. Everything looks blurry and pixelated. I will say that it's an excellent upgrade over the original SD though so fair play to Valve for that.

ASUS ROG Ally - I only owned this for about a week before I got rid. I just didn't like how it felt it the hand and thought it was a bit cheap feeling. Performance was great. I found the screen to be average. It just didn't stand out at all other than being competitively priced.

Lenovo Legion Go - My current device and by far my favourite so far. It's not a perfect machine by any means, but has the most immersive display. The screen is only an IPS but I really don't notice much difference between it and the OLED one on the SD.

So what handheld do you or have you owned, and which is your own personal favourite so far?

[xSOSxHawkens]

I am enjoying the SD OLED. For me the importance of a Handheld is a "good enough" AAA experience that I can get the longest play time from. The OLED wins hands down against any competition in raw run time at playable frame rates and settings. Could 800p be higher and look nicer? Yes. Would it take TDP no matter how you slice it? Yes. Thats the issue.

There is literally no magic bullet here. Anything at all, that uses a higher rez screen on any type of remotely similar silicon will draw more power commensurate to the rez difference to push it.

At 50wh battery and sub 20-23wh typical run power for demanding titles (10-11wh for lighter ones), the SD-OLED is no joke in portable gaming prowess. It might not look at nice, but you will play half again longer (maybe twice as long) before you have to plug in to something. Truly portable.

That said I am super excited for the next few years. Battery tech moves slow but has allot of push right now for EV's. Normal tech moves on 2-5 year cycles.

Next gen will probably be a tech upgrade with same battery chems, gen after than will be third gen tech with 2nd gen battery.

I suspect to see Z1 or Z1 extreme levels at a more modest 15-20w on the next gen, which would offer Ally style power at Deck style run times.

After that its open to debate how much it will advance for Gen 3, but what I would suspect is by gen 3 battery tech will move to second gen chemistry used in the deck, and I would expect Wh to increase to 75-100wh. If we assume a constant target of 15-20w on APU and 20-30w total system package we might be looking at 3+hrs on what is currently mid range or near that performance wise.

Overall exciting times. If only we had the battery density now to make the Z1e a long run time chip : /