Zotac has officially launched the Zone gaming handheld, which is up for pre-order now, and it carries with it a design feature that gives it an advantage over other Windows-based handhelds.
Getting a new gaming handheld is already a battle between brands. TheSteam Deckleads the charge with an incredibly competitively priced product, while other options like the slew of devices fromAyaneo, theROG Ally X, andLenovo Legion Goall compete for a slice of the pie.
Zotac’s Zone gaming handheldwas announced months ago. Now the company revealed that the Ryzen 8840U-based handheld will be priced at $799, have a 7-inch, 120Hz AMOLED screen and 16GB of LPDDRX memory, as well as base storage of 512 GB, expandable via a MicroSD slot.
It all seems like the Zotac Zone has pretty much everything you would want out of a handheld, as well as something only the Steam Deck has done right: twinned trackpads beneath each analog stick.
The display and trackpads are what set the Zotac Zone apart from its closest rival, the ROG Ally X. The only other handheld that’s not named Steam Deck that has trackpads isAyaneo’s Next 2, which was announced two years ago, but has yet to materialize.
While both sport similar specs, no brand has yet usedAMD’s Strix Point APUin a handheld, which could offer a huge boost in performance over the 8840U, 7840U, and Z1 Extreme chipsets found in most other handhelds.
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So, if you’re interested in picking one up, it may be best to wait to see if Zotac has managed to implement its best selling points: The trackpad and the AMOLED display.
Sayem Ahmed was Dexerto’s Tech Editor in the UK team, leading hardware coverage globally. Sayem is an expert in all things Nvidia, AMD, Intel, and PC components. He has over 10 years of experience, with bylines at Eurogamer, IGN, Trusted Reviews, Kotaku, and many more.
