More power under the hood and in your hands.
CES 2025 brought exciting new advancements in the tech industry and handheld users have not been disappointed. Asus, Lenovo, ZOTAC, Acer and MSI are all ushering in the 2nd generation of gaming handheld PCs. Today's focus is the MSI Claw 8 AI+ A2VM. Already shipping to US enthusiasts, we here in the UK just got an official pre-order at the time of writing.
MSI Claw 8 AI+ leaps and bounds ahead in Cyberpunk 2077 performance vs MSI Claw A1M.
As you'll see from the above video, under testing of Cyberpunk 2077 with the MSI Claw 8 AI+ we are getting an average of 54 FPS with the in-game benchmark tool using medium texture quality, XESS resolution scaling set to quality and the TDP adjuster set to 17 watts. In comparison, the previous generation MSI Claw A1M could only manage an average of 43 FPS with 35 watts and that was with low texture quality and XESS set to balanced.
When we crank the TDP to 30 watts in the new MSI Claw 8 AI+ we get an average of 73 FPS with medium texture quality and XESS resolution scaling set to quality. This is a huge leap forward in performance compared to the MSI A1M. The boost in performance shows when driving around Night City on the new handheld. An extremely steady framerate, good quality textures and no heavy lag spikes. A much more streamlined experience compared to MSI's first-generation handheld.
The incredible leap shows in testing when the 17-watt mode on the new MSI Claw 8 AI+ is outperforming its predecessor, Claw A1M using 35 watts. Enthusiasts won't be surprised by this as the first MSI Claw was arguably too late to market and far too pricy for the poor performance. A special thanks goes to Game Tech Planet for providing us with early benchmarks.
Heavy lifting brought to you by Intel® Core™ Ultra 7 258V.
The leap in performance is all thanks to the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V processor. With up to 47 NPU TOPS (115 overall peak TOPS), 8 total cores (4 performance & 4 efficient), 8 threads and a maximum frequency of 4.8 GHz. The Ultra 7 258V processor is also improved with a new 140V iGPU.
The improvements keep coming with a larger 8" FHD+ screen, 32GB LPDDR5x memory, Wi-Fi 7 BE201, a 6-cell 80 Whrs battery and x2 Thunderbolt ports. The upgrades have added to the total dimension and weight. The new MSI Claw 8 AI+ measures 299 x 126 x 24mm and weighs in at 795g this time.
Can Intel Outshine AMD This Genration?
An interesting focus on the next generation of handhelds will be the old Intel vs AMD battle. MSI has opted for Team Blue with the new Claw 8 Ai+ using Intel® Core™ Ultra 7 258V processor but ZOTAC for instance is Team Red with AMD's latest Ryzen™ AI 9 HX 370 APU. Acer, Asus and Lenovo are all Team Red as far as mainstream devices are concerned but OneX, GDP and Ayaneo still process with Team Blue.