MSI introduces its first handheld PC during CES in Las Vegas. The Claw A1M has an Intel Core Ultra chip with an integrated Arc GPU and a 7″ 1080p screen with a 120Hz refresh rate. The handheld will be available this year from $699.
According to MSI the Claw A1M will receive a ‘maximum’ Core Ultra 7 155H CPU from Intel. It is based on the Meteor Lake architecture and has 6 P-cores and 8 E-cores, for a total of 16 cores and 22 threads. The chip also has an integrated Intel Arc GPU with 8 Xe cores at 2.25GHz. The handheld also comes with 16GB of Lpddr5 memory and a maximum of a pre-installed 1TB M.2-2230 SSD.
The manufacturer tells The Verge that there will also be a cheaper variant of the Claw A1M. That version gets a lower-positioned Core Ultra 5 135H CPU and 512GB SSD storage. The processor in question has two P-cores fewer than the Core Ultra 7 155H and also has a less powerful IPU.
MSI further confirms that the handheld has a 7″ IPS touchscreen. The panel in question has a resolution of 1920×1080 pixels and has a variable refresh rate up to 120Hz. The screen is surrounded by two thumbsticks, a d-pad and ‘ABXY’ buttons and four other buttons. There are also two buttons on the back of the device and the handheld has four trigger buttons. At the top of the Claw A1M there is an on/off button with an integrated fingerprint scanner.
The device also has a 53Wh battery, which gives the Claw A1M a two-hour battery life. The battery is charged at 65W via a USB-C connection, which also has Thunderbolt 4 support. The handheld is 294mm wide, 117mm high, 21.2mm thick and weighs 696 grams. The device comes with Windows 11. MSI supplies its own software with which users can, among other things, start their games and set the power limit of the CPU.
The MSI Claw A1M will appear on the market in the first half of 2024. The manufacturer does not yet mention a more concrete release date. The variant with Core Ultra 5 135H CPU and 512GB storage will cost $699 upon release. The more expensive version with Core 7 Ultra 155H chip and a 1TB SSD is $100 more expensive.