The MSI Claw will not have a VRR screen after all

The MSI Claw will beryllium 1 of nan first handheld gaming PCs pinch an Intel Core Ultra processor wrong — but contempt what nan institution told america astatine CES 2024, it won’t person a adaptable refresh complaint (VRR) screen. To my knowledge, nan Asus ROG Ally is nan only handheld pinch that move gameplay smoothing show feature, and it’s one of its biggest advantages. I’m disappointed nan MSI Claw won’t person it, too.

Instead, MSI trading master Anne Lee tells maine you’ll beryllium capable to manually group nan seven-inch 1080p, 120Hz surface to 48Hz aliases 60Hz if you want.

MSI claims that still counts arsenic “VRR” — but it doesn’t unless you’re taking nan building successful an exceptionally literal guidance I’ve ne'er heard a institution reason before.

VRR is nan generic shape of technologies for illustration Nvidia G-Sync and AMD FreeSync, which fto a screen’s refresh complaint dynamically lucifer nan framework rate delivered by your system’s GPU. That intends you don’t acquisition choppy gameplay aliases surface tearing conscionable because your graphics don’t hit, say, 60fps, because nan surface tin automatically show 59fps aliases 50fps aliases 48fps perfectly fine.

You tin often still manually group nan refresh complaint of screens without VRR. The Steam Deck lets you group arbitrary manual refresh rates of astir immoderate number nan show supports, and nan Lenovo Legion Go lets you prime betwixt 60Hz and 144Hz, for example. But to debar choppiness and tearing, your strategy still has to consistently present nan correct number of frames (which tin require framework limiters and a spot of tweaking).

The Asus ROG Ally’s VRR surface comes successful useful peculiarly erstwhile your crippled is moving betwixt 48 and 60fps, which are wrong its VRR range. A crippled moving astatine 48fps connected nan Ally will look smoother than 1 moving astatine 59fps connected nan Lenovo Legion Go, successful my experience.

None of nan MSI Claw’s different rivals advertise a VRR screen, and... neither does MSI, for that matter! The logic I reached retired to MSI this week was because its merchandise pages went unrecorded without immoderate mention of VRR, and I thought that seemed weird.

After I explained each of this to MSI, it continued to declare that nan instrumentality had a VRR screen.

I don’t cognize if MSI is backtracking connected VRR aliases if nan institution simply doesn’t want to admit that thing sewage mislaid successful translation. (No shame; it happens!) I do cognize that MSI told maine astatine CES that nan surface I saw wasn’t last and would beryllium replaced pinch a surface that added VRR.

The MSI Claw doesn’t person a confirmed merchandise day yet, but rumors propose it could get arsenic soon arsenic February aliases March.