The Aya Neo is a handheld computer that looks more like a game console than a PC. But with an AMD Ryzen 5 4500U processor, Radeon Vega 6 graphics, 16GB of DDR4-4266 memory, and a 512GB PCIe NVMe SSD under the hood, it’s a full-fledged computer designed to be held in your hands.
First announced earlier this year, the Aya Neo has a 7 inch display surrounded by game controllers. And while a “Founder Edition” was supposed to be available for order in October, it’s been delayed a bit.
But the developer of the Aya Neo has posted a new video showing the near-final hardware in action and promises that pre-orders will begin on November 7th.
Update 11/09/2020: The AYA Neo Founder Edition is now available for pre-order in China.Â
A few Aya Neo prototypes will also be on display at the WePlay gaming exhibition in Shanghai on November 14th and 15th.
At this point the hardware is still beta and nobody outside of the company has had a chance to test it. So I’d proceed with caution if placing a pre-order… but it’s also unclear if the pre-orders will be available to potential customers outside of China in November, or if the rest of the world may have to wait a little longer to spend money on this little game system.
Here’s a run-down of the specs for the prototype:
Display | 7 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel IPS LCD |
CPU | AMD Ryzen 5 4500U 6-core/6-thread |
GPU | AMD Radeon Vega 6 |
RAM | 16GB DDR4-4266 LPDDR4X |
Storage | 512GB PCIe NVMe (M.2 2280) |
Battery | 47 Whr |
USB Ports | 3 x USB-C |
Audio | Stereo speakers 3.5mm audio |
Cooling | Copper radiator 2 x 8mm copper heat pipes Fan |
Other | WiFi 6 Built-in game controllers 5-point multitouch Accelerometer |
Weight | ~ 650 grams (~1.4 pounds) |
A few other things we learned from the latest video:
- The Aya Neo prototype has three USB-C ports and a 3.5mm audio jack, but no microSD card reader.
- Storage can be upgraded by replacing the M.2 2280 SSD.
- RAM is soldered to the motherboard, so there’s no way to upgrade or replace the memory.
- 0.5GB of RAM is reserved for the Radeon Vega 6 graphics.
You can also see that the prototype is about the same size as a Nintendo Switch game console with the Joy-con controllers attached, although it’ll weigh nearly twice as much (a Switch + Joy-cons weighs 398 grams, or about 0.88 pounds).
Update: There’s also a new promotional image which gives us an idea of what to expect for the final design:
The lack of micro SD is such a loss for this. You could put all your roms in the micro SD and keep the internal SSD for more demanding games like newish PC games that benefit from the fast loading speed.
Micro SD adds a power drain to the device. If you load from micro SD often, it can chug down quite a lot of power. On gpd pocket gen 1 that would be up to 50% for high speed micro sd during movie playback.