MSI Claw A1M Handheld Goes on Sale from March 8

[btarunr]

MSI Claw A1M, the company's ambitious attempt at a handheld gaming console based on the Intel Core Ultra "Meteor Lake" processor, instead of AMD Ryzen Z1 "Zen 4," goes on sale from March 8, 2024. This is according to a now-retracted Newegg store listing that mentions the release dates of the three Claw A1M models. The lineup is led by the Claw A1M powered by a Core Ultra 155H processor, 16 GB of LPDDR5-6400 memory, and 1 TB of NVMe SSD storage; for $799. For $50 less at $749, you get the same device, but with 512 GB of NVMe SSD storage. For a further $100 less, at $699, you get a model with the Core Ultra 5 135H processor, but the same 16 GB LPDDR5 memory, and 512 GB SSD, as the $749 model.

All three models feature a physically identical body design, including the controller layout, and lighting. Performance between the Core Ultra 7 155H and Core Ultra 5 135H models, is bound to differ. The 155H has a 6P+8E+2LP CPU core configuration, but more importantly, maxes out the Graphics Tile, with all 8 Xe cores being enabled (1,024 unified shaders). The Core Ultra 5 135H has a 4P+8E+2LP CPU core config, while its iGPU has 7 Xe cores. The star attraction with this console is its 7-inch touchscreen with 1080p resolution at 120 Hz refresh rate. Comms on all three models include Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4.



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[swirl09]

Actually looking forward to reviewers testing this thing out.

Pity about the screen size, as Wifi7 would genuinely make this a dream streaming machine.

 

[Chaitanya]

Actually looking forward to reviewers testing this thing out.

Pity about the screen size, as Wifi7 would genuinely make this a dream streaming machine.

At the same time wifi home devices are stupidly expensive(I remember seeing couple of RoGarbage products and Netgear north of $650).

 

[Hyderz]

kudos to msi using intel gpu and processor... be interesting to see it compared to others

but why name it claw.... is it that you grip the handheld like you have claws?

 

[Space Lynx]

I am also looking forward to reviews on this, nothing beats SteamOS for me, its just so nice to use I doubt I ever change it up, but still looking forward to reviews.

 

[sLowEnd]

Anyone know for sure if this has VRR? Last I heard, MSI was dancing around the subject with vague language.

 

[Space Lynx]

Anyone know for sure if this has VRR? Last I heard, MSI was dancing around the subject with vague language.

would be a huge mistake to not have this at this price point, its one of the only weaknesses of the Steam Deck OLED imo

 

[Chrispy_]

I'm expecting this thing to get poor to middling reviews.

• Intel are behind AMD on battery life and performance.
• Windows is still sucks for handhelds so it's down to the vendor software to solve the shortcomings for which MSI have a mediocre track record.
• The screen is small for the price and the resolution, and 120Hz is actually a handicap if the firmware and drivers can't seamlessly handle refresh rate and vsync changes on the fly.