MSI Claw: Exciting and Disappointing (So Far) 

I like extra competition, but the high price without a sizeable performance increase or stand-out feature kept my excitement at bay.

Fake gaming is when I spend more time buying games than playing them.

A small tip, if you wanna test VRR quickly you can use Nvidia's Gsync pendulum demo and enable test mode in the app. It will basically have a vertical bar scrolling horizontally, so if it tears it's extremely obvious and if it has vsync stuttering (aka VRR not engaged) it's very easy to see too. You can even adjust the target Fps range from within the app so you can test the range. Despite the Gsync name it works just fine on freesync and HDMI VRR

Oh no... RUN! It's the CLAW!!! Nothing can stop the CLAWWWWW!!!

I like this channel, videos are always well structured while having a chill vibe. Subscribed!

Awesome. The one channel and reviewer I was hoping would give their take on it. Thanks as always Russ!

what a thorough first look! nice, thanks and subscribed!

It's always great day when russ uploads my RU-vid notifications always asks me if I wanna watch your videos and I say yeah man I wanna do it.

"And now for some real world testing let's start with Contra for the NES" 😁I love this guy. Awesome video have a great time in Japan.

Celeste, a game on the pico, consuming 20w 😅. Maybe they can get it lower. For reference Celeste can run in silent mode on the ally with 6w draw on the GPU and 10w total. (On steam)

The Lenovo Go and Ally are still the best Windows based Handheld-PCs. The Steamdeck is the best Linux based and most userfriendly.

You're a true gamer now, Russ

For easy VRR testing, in Windows Settings -> Display -> Graphics -> Change default graphics settings. If the device supports VRR, you should see a toggle to enable/disable Variable Refresh Rate. If you open it on Rog Ally the toggle is there.

Burns fast through too much power.....not a surprise from Intel.

I like that you are honest about a recommendation without extensively testing it first!

That's so rad you're starting off the video with some whisker squadron!

I’ll be honest, the charger thing is a complete deal breaker for me. There’s no excuse for not being able to use other chargers. Defeats the whole point in having a type-C connection. It’s a handheld, it’s meant to be taken around with you, and I would not want to carry two separate chargers with me everywhere. Especially given the size of this MSI charger.

"The claw chooses who will go and who will stay!"

I love your channel; from awesome content to a friendly community in the comment section. Love the vibes and the videos! Keep up the great work! Have fun on vacation brother 😁

FYI In order to use the pop up keyboard during WIndows setup, choose "add a second keyboard" right at the beginning, always did this with the Ally and Legion Go. Hope that helps

Thanks for the review! Watched it while I’m trying to get through Dark Souls Remastered on my ROG Ally.

I find Russ' speech and vocabulary very calming, my heart rate gradually slowed throughout this video

I'm looking forward to the benchmark results

Appreciate the review, definitely avoiding this one for its battery and charging issues.

Going to be really niche. With Ally 2 likely to be using new Ryzen and MSI themselves likely to go to a variant of Arrow Lake next, this is quickly going to become a museum piece. ;) Few sold, if historical interest only as an experimental testbed for post-Meteor Lake Intel chip design.

I think the arrow on the back is pointing to a place to attach a strap. You can see the two slots, I'm guessing they're connected inside.

You should check out Intel Endurance Gaming mode. You would need to install Arc Control but you'd be able to select an FPS mode then it would balance the FPS with the wattage allocated to the CPU/gfx.

Cheers Russ, gripping video.

The arrow points to where you attach a lanyard or hand strap.

I would like to see a VRR comparison in the review. It would be cool to see the difference for something running around 40 FOS

yeah, I was looking at getting a new gaming-leaninglaptop this year and was very interested in seeing what the new intel CPUs would be able to do and how efficient they would be, because battery life is important to me (this is why I have an Odin 2...). and they're not all that great, so I'll wait another year for a laptop.

I feel like I’m gonna stick with the ALLY. Nice review! Can’t wait to see what the Ally 2 brings to the table.

You can use fsr and xess with this chip. Intel always uses too much voltage by default, I wonder if it underclocks well

seeing how Intel has improved their GPU performance with driver updates I am hoping they do the same with the new meteorlake series

0:53 whisker squadron survivors?!?!? That sounds awesome 👏🏼

Russ I have to ask. You hinted at a native 48Hz refresh rate mode during your 1st impressions. Have you tried running games at a locked 24fps while in that mode to save power? You can frame cap with RTSS if not allowed while in game. Just curious how bad it looks unless it's still playable.

Hardest pill to swallow with the ROG Ally is the battery life. If this ends up having less battery life, that's pretty rough. Only thing that could be its success would be if it can play higher end games when plugged in.

Whisker Squadron: Survivor just made my wish list.. never heard of this game!

Appreciate the insight into the new device. After gifting my steam deck to a future young gamer nephew of mine, I'm constantly looking at the various windows handhelds and debating if I should take the plunge. Your Gamesir G8 Galileo review helped me hold the tide til I make a decision lol.

Glad I pulled the trigger on the legion go. Best gaming handheld in my opinion. I welcome the competition tho!

For some reason whenever I think about the Msi claw, the song crawling by linkin park gets instantly stuck in my head

That intro will forever be 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

the cooling is super cool and important. my brothers all had bad laptop problems with nice gaming laptops and my msi stealth has lasted 10 years now. i'm assuming bc i got a nice fan to go underneath it.keeping it cool has been proven to make laptops last a lot longer.

I'm happy with my oled deck right now, looking forward to seeing what valve does next with a deck 2, steam os makes gaming so simple and straightforward.

Are you using imperial or metric fingers for measurement??

does anyone know why none of these have touch pads? it doesn’t seem like there is any reason.

Yesss I was waiting for this video since last week.

I hope you enjoy the claaawww. I immediately think of that one scene in Toy Story 1 with the alien toys. 😂 these handhelds are so cool to see them being developed over time. I heard that even Nvidia might be looking into the business. Nintendo and Sony really sweating rn. Although most of the new wave of handhelds look the same to me. The Steamdeck really started a whole new era

Honestly, the best part about this device is that you have access to the AI accelerated XeSS upscaling which is supposed to look better than FSR and equivalent to DLSS although XeSS support in most games is kinda behind the other 2 solutions.

In a future release, rather than increase the performance of devices like the ROG Ally or MSI Claw, I would love to see better battery life, battery life was a major reason why I purchased the Odin 2.

Russ. The dragon logo and wording is classic MSI design. :)

Finally a hands-on reviewer. Been waiting for this on your channel Rus. Thanks!

I was gonna wait to get this but I got my ally last month...so happy I went with the ally

The thing about all Windows handhelds on the market right now is that they use laptop chips and not chips specifically designed for handheld game consoles

Technical question: are those metric fingers or standard fingers?

The Street Fighter test is the best benchmark for a d-pad. Start with Ken/Ryu, then give it try with E. Honda and Zangief. If you can do all of their moves without issue, then it's a good d-pad.

After MSI BRICKED my 6 year old laptop in a forced windows 10 update, I vowed to never buy anything from them ever again. I don't regret buying a ROG Ally over this improvised firebomb garbage. MSI products all overheat and feel like they will catch fire at any moment even with turbo fan mode and a literal air conditioner cooling it. Which is why the reviewer here points out "stuttery gameplay" because the device easily overheats. All MSI computers do. This stopped being a problem for me when I switched over to another computer brand. I never once had those experiences with Asus. Meanwhile I had to unbrick that MSI stealth laptop at least twice within the first year I got it and another a year before it was bricked via forced windows update and it would easily reach 90 C even on idle right out of the box. If anything the msi stealth was anything but stealthy and louder than the replacement computer I got. The ROG ally is silent even when running a demanding game like BG3. The MSI claw also has inferior specs to the Z1 Extreme handheld PCs and is way overpriced. Should be $400 instead of $800 as its closer to the old steam deck in terms of specs. Also don't expect MSI to give a damn about the software here like ASUS and valve do. What you see here is final and they will never update it. They will want you to buy the "MSI claw 2" next year instead and customer support will outright tell you to fuck off if you have any questions about your device even if its still under warranty. "WE DO NOT DO REPLACEMENTS OR REPAIRS" is their favorite phrase.

Rgb back light face buttons, are they individually programmable?

wow which game is that, that we're seeing in the introduction ? looks amazing !

same as my msi modern 15 laptop charger - i think they might be considering longevity with the buttons. looks good and for msi to get in on this, is only a good thing

If they don’t fix the external power accessories that’s a MAJOR problem. Battery life on handhelds is not great but if you can atleast use an external battery pack it’s makes a huge difference. Without your pretty much gonna have to always be plugged into that laptop charger…

I keep picturing the claw grip when I hear about this thing

I have the same power bank, it's been wonderful with the ROG Ally. I am very worried about your travel with the claw.

Great early review. So far im really happy that i bought the Lenovo legion GO. i wanted to wait for the MSI claw but i decided to just get the legion GO and so far im liking it. one main thing im not liking about the MSI claw, RoG ally and steam deck is that they are much smaller. i prefer the 8.8 inch. feels better to look at.

The mice rejoiced they had outfoxed the cat. Then down came the claw and that love... Was that.

Can the battery from the MSI Claw fit in the Ally? That's my main interest.

May AI mode is buggy like thr custom TDP with the Legion go. What in full performance modes? Does the system and games still stutter? When power is constant?

That's a pretty slick little device. Does it have a motion sensor? I wonder how well it would work with Vita3K?

Even as a LA Clippers fan I still think the OG steam deck is the best value on the market.

...Vent smell NEEDS to become a bonafide review metric!! Love it!!! LOL

Great review. Loke and subscribe for you!

What spaceship game was he playing at the very beginning? Also I think the arrow on the back calls attention to the air intake. I think air goes up from the bottom and then blows hot air out the top. There's an animation on their website and shows the cooling solution and the air intake is near the arrow.

As a launch Steam Deck owner, all I can think whenever I watch all these handheld reviews is "Good lord the Legion Go just looks gorgeous every time I see it next to the competiton. How is it the underdog?". If Windows handhelds could get a standby mode like the deck I'd switch in a heartbeat.

It's crazy what kind of consoles are coming onto the market. I can still remember there were times when there was only Gameboy Advance and Sony PSP. Maybe I'll have the time to play the latest consoles at some point. Thank you and greetings from RetroGameCity 🤗🤗

Watching this video has me happy I just went ahead and bought the legion go. (Got the 1 tb new basically from Best buy, for 512 just a tear on the box) I treat it more of a mobile PC than a gaming console and it fits PERFECTLY in that niche.

For your full review, please comment on suspend/resume and Gyro usability for first person shooters. Most reviewers just forget those and they're quite important on my Deck!

Even though I am very happy with my steam deck, I'm really happy to see big PC manufacturers leaping into the space. Should be cool to see how the landscape shifts in the coming months/years.

Was waiting for you to cover this before I made a decision! Emulation on Android is looking rough so I’m definitely getting a Windows handheld

What's the game you're playing at the beginning? Very interested.

The hall effect Analog joysticks looks good.

Looking handsome Russ

I was researching for so long on what to get, and boom… This gets announced and I almost waiting. But I couldn’t resist the Deck OLED and bought that a month ago. Looks like I made the right choice instead of waiting on this. This confirms that for me. Great video.

How much can they improve performance with updates and stuff overtime? This is the machine I’m most interested in but I think I’ll wait and see if they increase performance

21:10 there is acutally an option for on screen keyboard you missed it 😅 Or windows 11 being windows 11 might have removed it, but I remember using the on screen keyboard in win 10 as my keyboard stopped working and I had just formatted my pc

Ugh... Really wish they'd start allowing 2280 SSDs in these devices. There's plenty of space to fit them. (hell, the GPD Win 4 can fit one and it's tiny)

I've never made a bad handheld purchase thanks to your in-depth reviews.

For this price, why did they go with such large bezels? That was also a factor with the rog ally and I wanted a steam deck olead but being able to download and run gamepass games and the extra power won me over. Hopefully the ally 2 can fix that along with haptic sticks and better battery

Hopefully, there will be drivers down the road that really open the performance up.

Seems well engineered and built, but The Intel chip is making this DOA. Its just too expensive, inefficient and underperforming. Even with deep discounts its just cant compete with what's AMD has been selling for almost a year.

Well, for the same money I bought the Legion Go and I'm far more satisfied. I'm using it everyday both as a desktop and a gaming machine

7:53 Is that arrow on the back just pointing out the attachment point for a wrist strap or lanyard?

That's funny. I have two mini BT keyboards like that (one is the same brand, if not the same model) for situations where either I can't easily connect a keyboard or it's a lot easier to just pop the receiver onto the device (I used to have to do that with my minisforum server box).

You can run FSR on anything - even Intel graphics.

You are the first as far as I know to do a true comparison between the AMD and Intel handhelds. Been waiting for this. I think I will pass on this for now until drivers improve. Thank you!

bought it just because of the vrr thanks for the review

I'm interested to see if the "SteamOS forks" could make the games run better and better limit the power draw (by limiting core usage) :)

You could of told me this was just a black ROG Ally and I would of believed you

The RGB on the controls are absolutely obnoxious.

Pretty much that exact sized charger comes with the Rog Ally in my country.

I think the thing that sets handhelds like the Steam Deck and Nintendo Switch apart is longevity and console like support and OS. Both are also not overdesigned. The two also seem to have much better battery life as well. If I were to get a Windows gaming handheld, I would definitely go for the Rog Ally. I like the Legion screen size though. The MSI Claw seems like doesn't accel in any one area.