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The first handheld gaming PC powered by an Intel Meteor Lake processor with Intel Arc integrated graphics is almost here.
Customers in the US can now pre-order the MSI Claw from MSI.com or Newegg for $699 and up, and it’s expected to begin shipping on March 12, 2024.
All models of the MSI Claw features a 7 inch, 1920 x 1080 pixel IPS LCD touchscreen display with a 120 Hz refresh rate, and up to 500 nits brightness, 16GB of LPDDR5-6400 memory, and Intel Killer BE1750(x) wireless with support for WiFi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4.
Other features include a 53 Wh battery, stereo 2W speakers, and a set of ports that includes one Thunderbolt 4 port, one 3.5mm audio jack, and 1 microSD card reader. The MSI Claw measures 11.6″ x 4.6″ x 0.8″ and weighs 1.44 pounds.
There are two things that set the entry-level $699 model apart from the two slightly more expensive models in MSI’s lineup: the processor and storage:
| Claw A1M-050US | Claw A1M-051US | Claw A1M-052US | |
| Price | $799 | $749 | $699 |
| Processor | Intel Core Ultra 7 155H | Intel Core Ultra 5 135H | |
| GPUÂ | Intel Arc 8 Xe cores Up to 2.25 GHz | Intel Arc 7 Xe cores Up to 2.2 GHz | |
| CPU cores / threads | 16 / 22 (6P + 8E + 2LP-E) | 14 / 16 (4P + 8E + 2 LP-E) | |
| P-Core max turbo | 4.8 GHz | 4.6 GHz | |
| E-Core max turbo | 3.8 GHz | 3.6 GHz | |
| LP-E Core max turbo | 2.5 GHz | 2.5 GHz | |
| Display | 7 inches 1920 x 1080 pixels 120 Hz IPS Touchscreen | ||
| RAM | 16GB LPDDR5-6400 | ||
| Storage | 1TB M.2 2230 PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe | 512GB M.2 2230 PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe | |
| Wireless | Intel Killer BE WiFi 7 BT 5.3 | ||
| Â Audio | 2 x 2W Speakers 1 x 3.5mm audio | ||
| Ports | 1 x Thunderbolt 4/USB-C 1 x microSD card reader 1 x 3.5mm audio | ||
| Battery | 53 Wh | ||
| Charging | 65W USB-C power adapter | ||
| Dimensions | 11.57″ x 4.6″ x 0.83″ | ||
| Weight | 1.44 lbs | ||
Other features include hall effect triggers and joysticks, a set of macro keys on the back, and MSI Center M software for controlling system settings on this Windows-powered handheld.
Early reports from folks who’ve gotten their hands on the Claw suggest it’s not as powerful or efficient as handheld gaming PCs with AMD Ryzen processors, but it’s unclear if this is due to hardware or software – it’s possible that GPU driver updates could improve performance in the future. It’s also never a great idea to judge performance entirely on pre-release hardware.
But now that the MSI Claw is about to ship, it shouldn’t be long until we see more accounts of how it compares with the long (and growing) list of other handheld gaming PCs when it comes to real-world performance.
Despite being less powerful than the ROG Ally, I’m still interested in this handheld for the simple fact that it has Thunderbolt 4, compared to the Ally’s proprietary eGPU interface.
I’d like a handheld like this that can also double as a desktop with an eGPU, and the Ally does that very poorly. There’s still lots of ongoing complaints about the XG Mobile interface being very unreliable, and their proprietary GPU drivers performing poorly. Not to mention their only eGPU model costs $2000, and it’s only a laptop-model GPU.
With the MSI Claw, I hope to see some examples of it being used with a Thunderbolt eGPU.
As long as it has reasonable battery life, this looks like the handheld for me.
“double as a desktop with an eGPU” – there’s having the graphics performance of a desktop, which is what I assume what you mean, whereas I want one of these handheld PCs to operate as a full desktop replacement (with a dock connecting to a monitor, keyboard and mouse) in a battery bypass mode. Then again, my gaming requirements are modest.
I think it’s rubbish.
MSi Claw, and the Lenovo Legion Go. The ASUS ROG Ally is great though. And lots of credit to Valve and the SteamDeck. But we should mention the OG of this market which is GPD which had been keeping it alive by themselves for many years.
I would rather “get ripped off” and buy an expensive GPD Win-Max-3 before I buy the Legion Go or the MSi Claw. Heck, I would sooner but the AYN Odin2 as I believe they are reputable.
But the likes of AYA NEO, and their ilk don’t excite me. It’s usually low-quality, or overpriced, or both.
I think if we had tens of millions of customers and users in cities around the world toting the SteamDeck and ROG Ally, that would be a good thing. The Switch and it’s successor won’t be competitive, not unless Nintendo are forced by their hands.