While the gaming world has spent much of the last week obsessing over the Nintendo Switch 2, it’s not the only exciting gaming handheld we’re getting our hands on soon. The Aokzoe A1X now has an official Kickstarter page, indicating that the brand behind the souped-up piece of portable PC gaming hardware is launching soon.
For those who don’t know, the Aokzoe A1X is launching as a rival to some of the top picks from our guide to the best handheld consoles, such as the Steam Deck OLED and Asus ROG Ally X. It’s got a very similar form factor to those consoles, but the big difference is that the A1X packs AMD’s Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 chip, an absolute powerhouse of a processor that packs even more cores than AMD’s new Z2 Extreme processor, which we’re expecting to see debut in this year’s Lenovo Legion Go 2.
Outside of the A1X’s state-of-the-art chip, the handheld also offers a 72.7Wh battery, which is notably bigger than the Steam Deck OLED’s 50Wh unit and the Lenovo Legion Go’s 49.2Whr battery, so it should offer a solid few hours of playtime before you have to reach for the charger. In terms of display, the A1X has an 8-inch 120Hz screen. On paper, that means you should expect smoother visuals from the A1X than Valve’s market-leading handheld gaming PC, with the Steam Deck OLED maxing out at 90Hz.
The only downside to the A1X’s Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor is that almost every other handheld we’ve seen with the AMD chip costs upwards of $1,000. For example, there’s the OneXPlayer X1 Pro, which retails for around $1,400, or the Ayaneo 3, which is almost $2,000 in its most expensive configuration. With that in mind, it wouldn’t come as a shock to see the A1X launch at a much higher price than a lot of the picks from our guide to the best Steam Deck alternatives.
Unfortunately, we still don’t have an exact launch date or any pricing information for the Aokzoe A1X, but you can keep up with all the latest via the Kickstarter campaign. For more tempting tech while you’re here, see our guides to the best gaming tablets and the best gaming phones. Or, if you’re biding your time until the Nintendo Switch 2 release date, get even more excited with our Nintendo Switch 2 hands-on preview.