The MSI Claw 8 AI+ is the second rendition of the original Claw which was announced at CES 2024. The original featured a bigger battery compared to the Steam deck or the ROG Ally along with featuring the very first 14th Intel core Ultra processors. However, MSI themselves announced this new one just 3 months due to Intel releasing their new Lunar Lake chips.
A Noticeable Spec Bump
As mentioned before the new MSI Claw 8 AI+ features Intel’s new Lunar Lake CPU, a new GPU which is the Intel Arc 140V and an even bigger battery than its previous iteration. Other than those it also features a 8 inch FHD display of 1920×1200 with 120 Hz refresh rate and better grips than its predecessor.
It also features 32 GB of RAM, 1 NVMe SSD slot along with hall effect triggers and joysticks for precision movement and longevity and lots of AI powered bells and whistles to improve the gaming experience and battery life hence the name.
XeSS And AI Power Management
More on the AI powered bells and whistles, the Claw uses Intel’s response to Nvidia’s DLSS which is XeSS for similar amounts of frame generation while at the same time providing better optimization and thus longer battery life.
MSI also mentions that the audio quality has also been enhanced with AI to provide better noise cancellation and improved surround sound capabilities which no doubt does its fair share in immersing the player.
Comparing With Its Peers
When comparing with the Steam Deck OLED and ASUS ROG Ally the specs look amazing on paper, the Claw has better memory than the Steam Deck, a bigger screen than the Steam Deck, a slightly better battery life and ofcourse frame generation.
What is confusing is that the screen isn’t that comparable to the Ally or the Steam Deck as the Ally features an 8.8 inch 2560×1600 resolution screen with 144 Hz display and the Steam Deck features an OLED display both of which are better than a FHD.
This is confusing because the Steam deck is somewhat old at this point and MSI should’ve made the screen to also be comparable to its competitors. Especially considering its costs around 900 dollars dwarfing the cost of both the Steam Deck and ROG Ally.
In terms of performance it seems opting to go for Intel’s chips over AMD’s standard APUs have paid off as at 1200p resolution it manages to outperform the steam deck and ROG ally in a multitude of demanding games like Cyberpunk, Forza Horizon 5 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
Some Gripes About The Improvement
While there are certainly praises for choosing the Lunar Lake chips which are showing their performance across many games there are still limitations which its peers don’t have. There will be issues with new games not being compatible, for example the recent Monster Hunter Wilds, the benchmark for the game returned 27 fps as the best it can offer.
Some well known titles will require frame generation to be enabled to even be considered playable for example the newer Final Fantasy games. Another problem the public are is the fact that sometimes they experience periodic crashes on whatever titles they play which isn’t an issue with its peers.
The newer chip does perform well as it has shown but since it is a newer architecture support isn’t that apparent for new games, this degrades the experience and immersion one would get from newer titles when they choose to play it through the Claw.
Conclusion
This is no doubt an improvement over their predecessor but of course the upgraded chip comes with its own set of problems to deal with. Intel XeSS is relatively new compared to DLSS, thus users are more likely to experience bugs or crashes.
Moreover the screen isn’t comparable to its peers considering its eye-watering price tag. The bigger battery is certainly a positive but the end result is as high as one might expect. Overall it is up to MSI to work on providing regular updates on optimization and support to make sure that the Claw is able to keep with the Steam Deck and its alternatives.
