Monday, November 18th 2024
MSI Claw 8 AI+ To Get Massive Battery and Lunar Lake CPU With Full Unveiling at CES 2025
MSI previously gave us a teaser of what to expect from its upcoming Claw 8 AI+ gaming handheld with Intel's Lunar Lake Core Ultra CPUs, calling it "the most advanced 8-inch gaming handheld in the market," but a recent CES listing has divulged more details about the upcoming challenger to the likes of the Lenovo Legion Go. For starters, the upgraded battery capacity has been revealed, along with an estimated battery life and performance figures. Supposedly, more information will be revealed about the Claw 8 AI+ at CES 2025, which starts on January 7, 2025.
According to the CES page, the new MSI Claw 8 AI+ will have an 8-inch display and an 82 WHr battery, which will supposedly be able to deliver "4+ hours of gameplay for AAA titles." However, these manufacturer claims are generally to be taken with healthy helpings of salt, especially in when it comes to claims as nebulous as "AAA titles" without any proposed quality settings, specific games, or frame rates. Regarding the display, it wouldn't be surprising to see MSI use the same display as the one found in the Lenovo Legion Go, since there is a somewhat limited selection of 8-inch displays for handheld gaming devices. The MSI Claw 8 AI+ will also use Intel's 2nd-generation ARC iGPUs in conjunction with AI-enhanced graphics, which should provide a healthy uptick in both performance and efficiency, with the CES listing touting 48 TOPS of compute power.
We previously reported on test results that claimed a 50% performance improvement for Intel's Lunar Lake-U CPUs at 15 W. How all this translates to performance and battery life in a handheld remains to be seen, however it should be noted that the MSI Claw 8 AI+ has a battery capacity rivalling that of many thin-and-light laptops. If Intel's iGPU is even remotely more efficient than the SoC used in the original MSI Claw A1M, it should be a massive improvement, since power draw and low-TDP performance were common complaints about the original MSI Claw.
The CES page is still available at the time of writing, indicating that, despite reports claiming it to be a leak, it may simply be an officially sanctioned teaser of sorts.
Source:
CES
According to the CES page, the new MSI Claw 8 AI+ will have an 8-inch display and an 82 WHr battery, which will supposedly be able to deliver "4+ hours of gameplay for AAA titles." However, these manufacturer claims are generally to be taken with healthy helpings of salt, especially in when it comes to claims as nebulous as "AAA titles" without any proposed quality settings, specific games, or frame rates. Regarding the display, it wouldn't be surprising to see MSI use the same display as the one found in the Lenovo Legion Go, since there is a somewhat limited selection of 8-inch displays for handheld gaming devices. The MSI Claw 8 AI+ will also use Intel's 2nd-generation ARC iGPUs in conjunction with AI-enhanced graphics, which should provide a healthy uptick in both performance and efficiency, with the CES listing touting 48 TOPS of compute power.
The CES page is still available at the time of writing, indicating that, despite reports claiming it to be a leak, it may simply be an officially sanctioned teaser of sorts.
11 Comments on MSI Claw 8 AI+ To Get Massive Battery and Lunar Lake CPU With Full Unveiling at CES 2025
I ask this obtuse question because today the ROG ally is discounted on Newegg for $399.99. It's a one start abomination that makes me happy to see burning out, and secretly wishing that Nintendo's offering for this generation wasn't the Switch. If they could put out a true banger, like the DS, with a real chance at PC games, then it'd be Valve versus Steam and we'd have some real competition instead of a three generations behind Nintendo console and a good but somewhat underpowered Valve deck.
It's a shame that in a few years these'll be dead because none of the third party offerings seem to be built to last...but it is nice to have more options than the steam "console replacement" PC specifications that went nowhere.
So, the MSI claw will be using next generation GPUs and considering how inefficient Alchemist GPUs in performance per watt are, it makes sense that Intel would make a huge leap in performance per watt for the Battlemage GPUs as they apply the hard-earned lessons from Alchemist GPU generation.
If they launch it with 32GB RAM and a 1Tb SSD, don't expect to see much change from $1K.