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Anbernic is a Chinese company that makes handheld gaming devices, most of which are retro gaming devices powered by ARM processors and designed to run Android or Linux software. But now the company has launched its first handheld gaming PC with an x86 processor.

The Anbernic Win600 is a full-fledged computer that ships with Windows 10 Home pre-installed, but which also supports the Linux-based Steam OS. First announced in January, the Win600 is now available for purchase from Anbernic.com or the company’s AliExpress store. Prices ranging from $300 for an entry-level model to $475 for a top-tier configurations. Just keep in mind that Anbernic’s top model is substantially less powerful than a similarly-priced Steam Deck, although there may still be a few reasons to consider the Win600.

The first is that the Anbernic Win600 is substantially smaller than a Steam Deck, measuring 236 x 103 x 22mm and weighing 490 grams to the Steam Deck’s 298 x 117 x 49mm and 669 grams.

A second advantage is that both the memory and storage of the Win600 are user upgradeable, while only the SSD in the Steam Deck can be replaced. And the third is that it ships with Windows, while the Steam Deck comes with Valve’s custom Linux distribution pre-installed (meaning you need a Windows license if you plan to install Microsoft’s operating system).

That said, the Win600 still looks like a pretty tough sell. Early reviews suggest its AMD Athlon Silver 3050e processor with Radeon Vega 3 graphics offers just one sixth the graphics performance of the Steam Deck, which makes it an okay choice for indie games, some retro titles, and maybe a handful of modern games. But it’s hardly a speed demon.

When Anbernic first announced plans to enter the PC gaming space, it was easy to imagine that the company would do so with a competitively priced device. But while the Win600 is technically cheaper than a Steam Deck, it’s not much more affordable. And in recent weeks several other companies have announced cheaper products with similar or better specs, including the AYN Loki Zero (AMD Athlon 3050e for $199 and up), AYA Neo Air Plus (Intel or AMD options for $249 to $299), and AYN Loki Mini and Mini Pro (Intel and AMD options for $260 to $299).

But there is a fourth reason to consider the Win600: you don’t have to wait as long to get one. While Valve has ramped up inventory of the Steam Deck in recent months, there’s still a waiting list and if you buy one today you may have to wait a few months for it to arrive. The Anbernic Win600 is usually delivered within a week or two.

Here’s a run-down of key specs for the Anbernic Win600:

Anbernic Win600 (3020e)Anbernic Win600 (3050e)
Display5.94 inches
1280 x 720 pixels
IPS LCD
ProcessorAMD Athlon Silver 3020e
2-cores / 2-threads
Up to 2.6 GHz
AMD Athlon Silver 3050e
2-cores / 4-threads
Up to 2.8 GHz
GraphicsAMD Radeon Vega 3
Up to 1GHz
RAM8GB or 16GB
DDR4-2400
Single-channel
User upgradeable
Storage128GB
PCIe 3.0
M.2 2242
SATA 3.0
User upgradeable
256GB or 1TB
PCIe 3.0
M.2 2242
SATA 3.0
User upgradeable
Battery39 Wh
Charging45W
Ports1 x USB Type-C
1 x USB 3.0 Type-A
1 x 3.5mm audio
WirelessWiFi 5
Bluetooth 4.2
AudioStereo speaker
3.5mm audio
OSWindows 10 Home (pre-installed)
Steam OS (supported)
Dimensions236 x 103 x 22mm
Weight490 grams
Price$300$375

When Anbernic first launched the Win600, it was only available with 8GB of RAM and up to 256GB of storage. But in September the company added a new top-tier configuration that features the higher-performance Athlon Silver 3050e processor, 16GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. That model sells for around $475 as of mid-September, 2022.

In terms of physical design, the the Anbernic Win600 has a small screen surrounded by game controllers including a D-Pad, two analog stick, action, start, and select buttons, and shoulder keys. The system also features dual vibration motors.

There’s a vent on the back, indicating that the device is actively cooled, And USB Type-A and Type-C ports on the top of the system. There’s also a home key on one side, and a Windows key on the other, which will likely function as a Start Key. Other features are expected to include stereo speakers, a 3.5mm audio jack, and a microphone.

On the left side of the device there’s also a switch that lets you toggle between game controller and mouse modes, a feature we’ve seen on some other Windows-powered handhelds, which makes Windows a little easier to navigate on devices without a mouse or physical keyboard.

While support for user-upgradeable storage is common in modern handheld gaming PCs, the ability to replace or upgrade the memory helps set the Win600 apart. Unfortunately so does the fact that this model only supports single-channel RAM.

With Windows 10 Home software pre-installed, it should be easy to install popular game clients from Steam, Epic, or GOG, among others. But if you’d prefer an OS built from the ground up for gaming, Anbernic has also released software an instructions for installing Steam OS, the Linux-based operating system that Valve designed for its Steam Deck handheld PC (which also has an AMD processor with Radeon graphics).

Opting for AMD Athlon Silver 3000 series chips may have been a decision made to help keep the price low, but it means that the Win600 won’t offer the same level of performance that you’d find from higher-end handhelds with higher-performance CPU and GPU hardware.

That said, the chips should be capable of handling retro gaming, some indie games, and maybe even a few recent AAA titles at low graphics settings. Third-party reviews suggest it’s not a bad device… it may just not be very competitively priced.

The Win600 joins an increasingly crowded space that’s currently populated by small Chinese companies like GPD, One Netbook, and AYA as well as the Valve’s Steam Deck (which will ship with the Linux-based Steam OS, but which has all the hardware necessary for Windows gaming if anyone feels the urge to replace the operating system).

Here’s how the Anbernic Win600 stacks up against the competition:


via DroiX, Taki Udon, /r/anbernic (1)(2), Obscure Handhelds, and Retro Games Corp

This article was originally published January 17, 2022 and most recently updated September 12, 2022.

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35 replies on “Anbernic’s Win600 handheld gaming PC is now available for $300 and up”

  1. Well, it is September 2022 and the Win600 is even a worse value proposition as it was back when this article was originally published. The single-stick RAM absolutely cripples (apologies if that word offends anyone) the performance. If you live in a region where you can purchase the Deck at MSRP there is zero reason to buy this. You want something smaller? Go get the AYN or AYA devices . The WIN 600 is way overpriced and basically an emulation (God of War for PS2 doesn’t play on this BTW) and indie games. The battery life isn’t good either. I have the 64GB Steam Deck and a 255 GB Micro SD , all in for $430. Completely blows this device out of the water. Not even close.

  2. Looks like Anbernic is trying to ban Taki from buying devices with his own money because he actually gave a real/honest feedback before his review was up.

    “Addendum: I attempted to notify the company about the issues that I found in this review two days ago following the same process that I have used for the last 2 years. Instead of asking for clarification as they have always done, they decided to allow their PR/Official Discord mod to attack me on the official FB page of the company. Said person is now advocating that I be barred from being able to independently purchase products from the company. This is would be an unprecedented and highly anti-consumer move if done.

    For the record, I have reviewed 15 products from this company and only didn’t like 3. I even daily drive the release that came before this two weeks after the review.”

  3. Does Anbernic not have access to the internet to see what their competitors are doing? These prices are absurd. I honestly thought the Win600 was going to disappear when their competitors announced they were undercutting them.

    You can get an i3-1215U powered handheld for the price of their cheaper Athlon 3020e model (AYA Neo Air Plus offers i3-1215U for $300, or AYN Loki Mini for $349).

    We’re talking about a difference in Passmark score of 2,400 to 12,700, and a difference in 3DMark score (Firestrike) of 2,900 to 3,300.

    My guess is that Anbernic is banking on the fact that they have better product distribution globally. They have a very established fan base in many emulation handheld communities, and their RG351 series handhelds (and others) are stocked on many online stores catering to handheld gaming.

    The Anbernic Win600 will be on Amazon in no time, which will easily support their inflated prices through accessibility and exposure.

    If you’re comfortable ordering from China, buy the AYA or AYN options. You’re a sucker if you’re spending $300 on an Athlon 3020e handheld.

  4. Lol put a fan (active cooling) on fan-less (passive cooling) CPU processor 🙂
    Hope AMD makes a successor to “Dali” (3015e 3020e 3050e), now that Intel quit the Atom line with Tremont and ARM still has not stepped in – why it takes so long ?

    1. What do you mean when you say “ARM still has not stepped in”?

      ARM chips have been available on Windows products for quite a while already, and some of the Snapdragons being used outperform these AMD Dali chips by a long shot.

  5. How would the perf compare with the Intel version of the Ayn Loki Mini Pro? It’s around the same price. Maybe cheaper even.

  6. Several hiccups in this article, it will come in 2 versions, 3020e and 3050e. The 3020e is abysmal 2 cores/2 threads and will likely be the 299$ entry. Also, one really shouldn’t rejoice about replaceable ram, because that likely means it’s single channel! Of ddr2400! Good luck with that. This looks overall like another failure in the making, like the rg552. Which could’ve been acceptable cheap for its screen, but it’s expensive so…

          1. ETA Prime on YouTube already has an early look. Single channel ram unfortunately. Thankfully it seems the speed can be upped via BIOS settings if you install a better RAM module. I actually just bought a small 11.6 inch 2 in 1 from Lenovo with this APU (3050e) and I wouldn’t dream of using it for gaming. I just wanted a small, light, inexpensive laptop for basic browsing, Excel spreadsheets, and light photo editing. Emphasis was on cheap, portable, and not powered by Intel. For the money people should definitely go with a Steam Deck (which I also have) or one of the cheaper AYA options if they want to game on the go.

    1. Hey Brand, long time no see!

      Just wondering, with all these different x86 chipset options. How would you arrange them, in terms of the GPU, from the slowest to the fastest? Or maybe benchmarking in terms of a specific game’s fps (eg GTAV for low-end, RDR2 for high-end)?

      Would you be able to make a list of the slowest x86 handheld to the fastest x86 handheld, in terms of GPU/Gaming, and based on what you know about the products and the company?
      Won’t be 100% but just to the best of your abilities.

      To me it looks like it goes, from slowest to fastest, in this order:
      Vega-3cu, Mendoccino, Intel Xe 48-cu, Intel Xe 64-cu, Vega-6cu, Vega-8cu, Intel Xe 96cu, RDNA2-6CU, RDNA2-8CU, RDNA2-12CU.
      But I could be wrong.

  7. and working time is 30 min and after 4-5 years battery is not replace bacause not buing it

  8. I have it about month, hanheld version with one stick which looks like gameboy. And, oh man! Just won diablo 1 on it as mage 🙂 . I do not even start PS5 from the moment I got this beast. Now playing Persona 3 portable ..

  9. About SteamOS, I wonder if this’ll support all the easy to reach performance toggles like on the Steam Deck. How’s Anbernic in terms of Linux development and upstreaming? Their other handhelds are ARM based and run some sort of Linux based OS, right?

    I bought a GPD Win 2 recently to complement my home use only Deck as my pocketable out of the house handheld. I installed Linux on it and I just run my own scripts to control TDP and frequency plus gamescope in Steam launch options to enable FSR and limit FPS. The keyboard significantly helps with all this manual work.

    If all those perf controls work on the Win600 and it’s targeting the lower-end (and lower price among non-Deck handhelds), I can see this doing well among those who don’t care about physical keyboards.

    1. As much as I snubbed the Win 2 and GPD a few years ago, seeing where handhelds are now and in the near future, I got a Win 2 just over a month ago when new ones were available on Amazon.

      Undervolting (-100 mV CPU/GPU and -50 mV everything else) and FSR via gamescope makes the Win 2 a very viable pocket gaming handheld and UMPC today. The popular cooling mods aren’t even necessary.

    2. Why are your scripts activated manually? You could start them from a desktop file that also launches the associated game.

      1. You need a keyboard to write or tweak those scripts. No accessories required. Totally self-contained device. That’s the manual part.

        I made my own wrapper script that’s run via Steam’s launch options that then runs the game. In addition to game specific perf controls, I detect when the game is not on top (ie. alt+tabbed to another window) and suspend the game’s processes then resume the game when the game is back in focus via Linux signals. Manually created game level suspend/resume.

        Sometimes I don’t want to use my games’ default TDP/frequency so I use keyboard shortcuts to run scripts that set predefined perf (ie. alt+1, alt+2, etc.).

        I do other keyboard things too. A built-in keyboard is great!

    3. Anbernic themselves don’t upstream anything, they aren’t doing any real dev anymore mind you.
      In the past, they used ingenic’s “secret” sources (Because GPL violation) that they tweaked for their handhelds.

      Then they “borrowed” odroid go images for their clones.

      For their latest rk3566 handhelds, they just outsourced the dev to Rockchip and handed it over to the community to fix the mess, which is, really messy.

      But hey they do send the stuff for improvement and send devices for dev, so it’s not all that bad. They just release the bare minimum they can get away with, so don’t expect anything different this time.

      But x86 with a bios is a breeze to work on compared to arm so it’s very easy to install whatever on this kind of device.

  10. I don’t buy anything with Windows on it, but I do own several of the RK3266 handheld consoles from Anbernic. Overall, the quality has been good and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend them. I especially like the RG351MP.

    Although…with that said, their latest offering…the RG552 I wasn’t too impressed with. It seemed overpriced for what it is so I passed on it. The Odin Pro is a much better deal.

    This Windows device, the thumbsticks seem to small? I realize they’re trying to keep them low to the device…but it just doesn’t look right?

    At first, I was thinking their design cues look outdated, just like the RG552…but once I saw a shot of the profile…it appears as though they’re improving the design of their triggers. They remind me of the Switch Lite, or the PowKiddy RGB10 Max II.

    I’d also prefer the Select/Start on the bottom towards the thumbsticks instead of up high. Personal preference.

    Best,
    Steven B.(Liquid Cool)

  11. It could be an Odin Pro kind of situation with them testing Windows on ARM. The S845 is surprisingly capable, a firend of mine had the Odin and he can play the 2016 Tomb Raider on an ARM Windows handheld which is all kinds of amazing to me.

    1. Yeah I was also really impressed with the Odin Pro and how well it performs on Windows 11 gaming. There is a video on Youtube showing Skyrim running 40-60fps

  12. What are they trying to patent? Buttons and switches where your hand will be gripping and more prone to accidentally activating (ie. bad idea)?

    Also, if their handheld looks like this, how are they expecting to compete with the other Chinese handhelds (let alone the Steam Deck)? Price? The bar handhelds are all pretty much the same with different tweaks here and there.

    At this rate, I feel like whatever part of the market the Deck isn’t able to capture will just be shared equally among the rest of these small companies.

    1. Keep in mind the Deck isn’t available for most people around the world, even if willing to wait in a queue. So it isn’t an option and thus isn’t competing in the market right now.

  13. Now more manufacturers in the game, waiting for Alienware and Razer to join this party, they had UFO and Switchblade concepts in the past

  14. I feel a tiny bit sorry for GPD – after years of being the “only game in town”, now they have competitors coming out of the woodwork!

    Still, it seems like good news for everyone else!

    1. If those pics are true then that would be too small for my eyes. It is a difficult one because the icons in windows can be really small so they need a bigger screen – too big and you are in laptop territory. I have a onexplayer and that screensize is perfect for this.

  15. If it’s pocketable, then I’d get it. Otherwise, if I’m getting a non-pocketable slab/bar PC handheld, then it’s only the Steam Deck for me.

    1. Judging from the USB Type-A port, this thing’s pretty large. It’s not any more pocketable than the other slabs so pass. The Steam Deck it is.

  16. Waiting for a hologram of Roseanne Barr to explain the meaning of the device’s name to me.

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