There's more to life than the Switch, SteamOS, or portable Xboxes! Several manufacturers are driving a very active segment: portable consoles running Android. They obviously allow you to play Android games, but these devices are also adept at anything related to emulation. And when it comes to flexibility, Android allows designs that are decidedly out of the ordinary, as is the case with the astonishing Sugar 1 from OneXSugar.
This device combines a 6-inch screen framed by two controllers, which fold and unfold to reveal... a second screen, this time 3.9 inches. It's sort of a mix between a Switch and a DS! The console currently has no price, but pre-orders are scheduled for May.
One of the Sugar 1's defining features is the Snapdragon G3 Gen 3 chip under the hood, an update to the Gen 2 model launching in 2023. The system-on-chip contains 8 Kryo cores (1 powerful core, 5 high-performance cores, and 2 energy-saving cores). Qualcomm promises a 30% increase in CPU power compared to the previous SoC. As for the graphics circuit, it is an Adreno A32, which offers 28% more power.
The Snapdragon G3 Gen 3 can support displays with a refresh rate of up to 144Hz, hardware ray tracing (more powerful than software ray tracing), as well as Unreal Engine 5 Lumens which improve reflection and lighting systems in games. Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.3 are also included. Several consoles will be equipped with this chip, the famous Sugar 1 above, but also the new GamingPad tablet from Ayaneo.
This tablet integrates an 8.3-inch LCD screen (1440p) at 120Hz, a camera composed of a 50 MP wide angle and a 13 MP ultra-wide angle, and... no price yet.
The Snapdragon G2 Gen 2, which succeeds the first generation from 2023, also has 8 Kryo cores (1 powerful, 4 efficient and 3 economical). Qualcomm announces performance multiplied by 2.3 for the processor, and multiplied by 3.8 for the GPU. Finally, the Snapdragon G1 Gen 2, better suited to entry-level devices, also has 8 Kryo cores but in a simpler configuration: 2 efficient cores, 6 economical. The manufacturer claims 80% more performance than the Gen 1 from two years ago.
One might think that these chips duplicate other Qualcomm systems intended for smartphones. There are obviously similarities and overlaps between the ranges, but Android console makers don't necessarily need a modem or an NPU (chip dedicated to AI processing) unlike smartphone makers.
Source: Qualcomm
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