Having first debuted at Computex earlier this year, information on the availability of the MSI Claw A8 handheld gaming PC has been lacking. At least, for anywhere outside of China.
Now, however, as spotted by VideoCardz, the Claw A8 has appeared for pre-order at some European retailers. And there’s no other way to put it, this thing is expensive.
Of course, without any official word from MSI, there’s always a chance this could be a placeholder. But given the price of the Intel-powered Claw already on the market, it feels like it’s accurate.
The reports suggest prices approaching €1,000 ($1,175), which is in the same ballpark the Intel-powered Claw 8 AI+ was listed at when it first hit the market. But it’s just too much, even if it is a ridiculously powerful handheld.
The Claw 8 AI+ has since settled at a lower, but still high price of $899/£899, so it’s not too far-fetched to expect this to be the mark the AMD version eventually hits.
I agree with the words of our pals over at Techradar — it’s overpriced. By all accounts, the big difference here is the use of the AMD Z2 Extreme versus an Intel chip.
There’s no denying how good the existing Claw 8 AI+ is, that’s not a debate. But it’s a $900 handheld in a world where you can buy the cheapest Steam Deck for less than half that. Both Claws are more powerful and better equipped, but when you’re talking hundreds of dollars, it’s already a hard sell.
MSI also continues to do a pretty awful job of marketing these things. You could have forgiven them with the original Claw since it wasn’t that great, but the new ones are exceptional, even if they’re expensive. And yet there’s minimal information provided, even to press.
We’ve managed to spend time with the MSI Claw 8 AI+, but truthfully, it was one of the harder review samples we’ve had to try and get hold of. I just don’t really get what MSI’s end game is with these things right now.
Lest we also forget that ASUS and Microsoft has the Xbox ROG Ally X coming along by the end of the year, too, with similar hardware. The Xbox Ally X rumored price of €899 is below these pre-order prices for the Claw A8, so at the very least, you feel MSI would need to match that.
Then, for U.S. customers, I guess there’s the eternally looming tariffs situation which could interfere at any given moment. Either way, if you want one of these, you’ll have to dig deep.
