Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Steam Deck was delayed, so I got this – GPD XP”.
Steam Deck’s been delayed. Now. What am I gon na do to play games on the go? Gamepad Digital’s got the answer: the GPD XP., It’s an Android device that promises to be everything. Modern gaming phones can be at a significantly lower price of entry., But it’s not phone and it’s got a parlor trick.
That Valve never thought to pull. Ha ha. It’S got swappable controls., But, unlike the Steam Deck, it’s not a mini PC..
So what can you do with it And does it deserve a spot on your wishlist? The ends NZXT for sponsoring today’s video. NZXT wants to make building a custom. Pc easier., With NZXT, Build just set a budget, see how the computer performs with your favorite games and Build takes care of the rest. Use the link down below to get your own custom, PC, today. (, electronic music ). This thing is basically half Switch, half phone with swappable controls and bizarrely, dual 4G SIM card slots.
At first glance, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s like the ROG phone, but no. Only the right section comes off. The left section is part of the chassis, so thankfully it doesn’t do voice calls or we’d be one step away from a Nokia N-Gage taco phone situation.
Data access does make sense, since GPD is marketing this as a way to play mobile games, including first person shooters. To achieve that, the removable controls aren’t just for show.. The right side can either be blanked off to become a great Asser to lead your team to victory in MOBA games.
Fitted with the traditional thumb, stick and button controls for emulators and streamed console games or replaced with a five button. Hot key cluster. That GPD says is ideal for first person shooters.. That might not look too intuitive, but the idea is that you can aim with your thumb on the touch screen and use these buttons for utility features.. The buttons feel characteristically good for a GPD product and compared to smaller handhelds like the Retroid Pocket 2 and Anbernic RG351 M. The sticks are much nicer.
Feeling. They’re the same as the GPD Win, 3.. True to GPD’s roots. All controller modules can switch between Xbox mode or touch simulator mode via a dedicated button.
Next to the thumb, stick. (, electronic music ), But enough about controls.. The device itself is running Android 11 with GPD’s, very not inspired by Microsoft, Metro, UI. And yes, they actually call it Metro.. That’S a lot newer than the Android 6 you’ll find on the Retroid Pocket 2 or Android 7 on the previous gen GPD XD Plus., And helps to make it relevant for more than just retro gamers.. That’S why it’s so strange that GPD chose a MediaTek Helio G95 SOC, which is well below upcoming competitors like the AYN Odin and KT R1, which both sport the far more capable Snapdragon 845.. It’S going to have to drive a 60 Hertz 1080p tall IPS display, which they call sunshine screen.. It’S not super premium and it has a lot of IPS glow, but it’s reasonably bright and wouldn’t be out of place on a mid range smartphone.. Unlike one of those. It’S got an integrated, active cooling fan that should hopefully prevent throttling over longer sessions. And what that very mid-range SOC, the chonky 7,000 milliamp hour battery just might give it some serious endurance., The biggest flagship, smartphones, typically ship, with 5,000 milliamp hours or less with brighter screens And much more power, hungry SOCs..
In fact, it drops less than 20 % from full over an hour of gameplay in “ Super Mario Sunshine.” (, bright music ), There’s 128 gigs of UFS storage on board, with the ability to swap one of the nano sims for a micro, SD card.. You could theoretically expand it even further with the USB type C port. If it could be relied upon to grip the cable. Look, it falls right, out.. Thankfully, you definitely won’t be filling up.
Your storage using the whole punch camera. At five megapixels. It’S primarily marketed for video calls, which is better than nothing for I guess. You’d, probably prefer to use a real smartphone for that, but I’m not your mom..
If I was I’d, tell you to buy a water bottle from LTTstore.com and stay hydrated more easily with the new caps., I won’t be around to take care of you forever.. The speakers would normally be unremarkable on a handheld like this, but these are supplied by AAC technologies., A Chinese company who happens to be the supplier that Apple uses, and these are in fact double coil, speakers. And well they’re, remarkably clear, but an iPhone. This is not.. ( upbeat music, ), There’s no bass, just mids and treble. Great for phone calls, but none of the included arcade titles are being done. Justice, here., You’d think there’d be more space for resonant chambers in here..
Let’S take it apart and see for ourselves.. The screws are all Phillips and all the same size., That is to say quite tiny., There’s a few clips too, but once it’s off oh check out the size of that battery., There’s the active cooler and hey the sticks on a separate PCB just like the Steam Deck. Get subscribed by the way, because if it’s not clear by now, we’re definitely doing more content on the Steam Deck and you won’t want to miss it. Down here. Are the speakers they’re not tiny, but they’re, not huge, either..
There’S definitely enough room in here for larger resonance chambers if they tried oh well., Let’s button it back up and play some games., The built-in Neo Geo games seemed to work pretty. Well, although that’s to be expected., Input lag seems pretty low as well, and the controls feel responsive as we come to expect from GPD devices., Even in the games that don’t ship with the console., While the Dolphin GameCube emulator is one of the pre-installed apps. It’S not quite running at full speed.. You will get the full 30 FPS most of the time in Super Mario Sunshine, for example, but shader compilation and some special effects will bring the games FPS down to the high single digits to say nothing of more complex titles.. What’S worse, the version of Dolphin included with the device doesn’t make use of the controllers, so you need to map the touch inputs. Manually..
The PSP emulator, on the other hand, does work with controller natively and runs reliably at 2x upscale, often even at the native tentative resolution of the handheld.. Although it does drop frames here and there, if you do that., But this isn’t primarily marketed for emulation.. The Anbernics and Retroids of the world are much cheaper and already do a good job of that.. Gpd spins this as a console for modern mobile games and PUBG Mobile and Minecraft are good candidates for the additional controllers..
But while setting up the touch, control, simulator isn’t difficult for these and there’s very little if any delay frame rates aren’t great. We’re getting 30 or 40 FPS in PUBG at best and in Minecraft’s default settings frame rate fluctuates between 60 and what looks like somewhere in The 30s, depending on what you’re looking at regardless of the graphic settings., If you’re willing to reduce the draw distance below the default of 20, you might actually be able to get a solid 60 FPS. Speaking of FPS woes, the FPS module bizarrely places the trigger lower Down on the grip than a standard controller, which will take some getting used, to., It’s kind of like if a Dreamcast controller also had shoulder buttons but there’s less to grip., [, Andy ]. Nobody knows what that is., But I do. The traditional controller grip, while comfortable is already a little bit on the smaller side, so the FPS module ends up being painful for me to use for any length of time., And that’s not the only issue here. The flat cap, let me grab this real, quick to kind of show you what’s going on here.. Normally these controls, what they do is slide directly on and off of this rail here.. It takes a fair bit of force to get that off by the way..
This flat cap is exactly what it sounds like it is flat and it just flops on there like that with the magnets. There’s, nothing here. Normally, there’s like something like this here covers this, but there’s nothing, there. And so visually and like in terms of feel.
This is really distracting to me., Not only that, but these grips are not easy to align.. Normally. What I want to do when I’m putting this together is like kind of get it in like that to kind of get it into the hole properly then slide it into place. But if you do that, what’s gon na happen is you’re going to have a little bit of a lip on the console itself between the controller and the console., And that actually makes it more difficult to take this off..
What you’re supposed to do is line it up very carefully so that the tabs get into those rails and then push it together. And even then, sometimes you’ll get mixed results.. This time I got it 100 %, but your mileage may vary very dramatically. Here., Oh and while we’re talking about weird control issues, the hardware Android buttons are in fact a little backwards.
Oops., Which encapsulates the overall experience. Pretty well. You’re losing a more powerful SOC for a big battery. You’re, losing a cohesive experience like you’d get with an Anbernic for a more versatile Android, UI. You’re, gaining bulk for swappable controls., And while the build quality is solid, you’re going to pay a premium for It over those other devices.. Is it worth it to be able to play mobile games on a secondary device? As someone who doesn’t play competitive mobile games, I can’t say., But as someone who daily drove a PSP for years and years, I can say that the emulation capabilities are promising., But at around $ 350 it’s not a big leap to 399 for an entry-level Steam Deck..
A handheld that can do all this and run PC games, albeit with lower battery life.. When that console finally launches these premium, Android handhelds may not be able to compete unless pwning players with smartphones is your jam.. Our sponsors always compete for these segways though.
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