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Emdoor EM-959-NM16ASH-1
Gaming Gear

This new AMD Ryzen AI MAX laptop calls itself a workstation, yet looks, sounds, and acts exactly like a gaming system

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  • Emdoor EM-959-NM16ASH-1 Ryzen AI MAX chip promises strong workstation power
  • Display refresh reaching up to 180Hz seems excessive for workstation needs, leaning toward gaming territory
  • At 2.45 kilograms, this laptop feels more like a desktop replacement than a mobile workstation

Emdoor, a company that has mostly kept a low profile since 2023, is now releasing another system that it calls a “high-end PC workstation with next-gen AI chip.”

The device, listed under the code “EM-959-NM16ASH-1,” comes with AMD’s Ryzen AI MAX processors, also known as Strix Halo.

The Emdoor EM-959-NM16ASH-1 features soldered LPDDR5X-8000 memory on a 256-bit bus, giving high bandwidth but preventing upgrades.


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A workstation or gaming laptop?

Although the memory is limited to a maximum of 128GB at purchase, the storage is more flexible with two PCIe 4.0×4 M.2 slots supporting up to 8TB.

The display is a 16-inch panel at 2560×1600 resolution, with refresh options of either 165Hz or 180Hz.

Such specifications may attract users looking for a video editing laptop, but they also blur the line between workstation and gaming hardware.

That impression is further reinforced by leaked internal file names tied to the design, which included the term “GAMES.”

At 2.45kg, the system is heavier than many of its rivals, with the likes of Sixunited’s XN77-160M-CS and HP’s ZBook Ultra G1a weighing less than 1.8kg.

Although bulkier construction may have been chosen to handle the 45–120W thermal design of Strix Halo, this weight might be acceptable only for a stationary workstation, as buyers seeking a business laptop may not find this design appealing.

It also includes a 99Wh battery that is claimed to last eight hours, but without independent testing, such claims remain promises.

Cooling is handled by a dual-fan setup coupled with triple heat pipes and a quad-exhaust system.

The company markets this system as a workstation, but the aesthetics, refresh rates, and naming history suggest gaming roots.

Since Emdoor acts as an original design manufacturer, the same model could easily appear under another brand marketed as a gaming system.

Whether this laptop becomes a reliable tool for professionals or fades into obscurity, as some of the firm’s past projects have, will only be clear once it reaches the market and real-world feedback emerges.

Currently, only a limited number of PCs feature the Strix Halo chip, with examples including the Asus ROG Flow Z13 (13.4″), the HP ZBook Ultra 14 G1a, and a handful of others.

In terms of pricing, these devices cost well over $2,000, and considering the specifications of the Emdoor EM-959-NM16ASH-1, it will likely cost more.

Via Videocardz

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AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB/8GB review: both are a good value
Product Reviews

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB/8GB review: both are a good value

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Why you can trust TechRadar


We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT: One-minute review

Having missed the initial AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT review cycle earlier this month for logistical reasons, I wanted to do more with this review than just try to play catch-up with my peers who got to review the 16GB card prior to launch.

Fortunately, doing this post-launch meant that I was able to get my hands on both 16GB and 8GB versions of the RX 9060 XT for a single review, and I’m honestly glad I waited.

Both AMD RX 9060 XT cards bring a compelling value, with the 8GB version starting at $299.99 / £269.99 / AU$569 and the 16GB versions starting at $349.99 / £329.99 / AU$689. This puts it roughly in the middle of the price pack for the best cheap graphics cards of the current generation.


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(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

Spec-wise, the only difference between the two cards is really the amount of GDDR6 video memory available, either 16GB or 8GB.

This matters, as that extra 8GB VRAM does improve the performance of the RX 9060 XT (and even makes modest 4K gaming possible), but the difference between the two isn’t so large that it overrides any consideration of the additional cost.

However, Nvidia’s RTX 5060 Ti 16GB and RTX 5060 (an 8GB card) offer better performance vis-à-vis the RX 9060 XT 16GB and RX 9060 XT 8GB, respectively. In the case of the RTX 5060, there’s no difference in price with the RX 9060 XT 8GB, so that is a much tougher call between the two for reasons I’ll dig into in a bit.

On the other hand, the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB offers better performance over the RX 9060 XT 16GB, but not so much better that it justifies the much higher price.

In the end, the AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB strikes the best balance of price and performance in this class, making it easy to recommend as the best graphics card in this segment for most people, and both are two of the best AMD graphics cards the company’s ever put out.

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT: Price & availability

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

  • How much is it? $299.99 / £269.99 / AU$569 for 8GB, $349.99 / £329.99 / AU$689 for 16GB
  • When can you get it? Now
  • Where is it available? Available in the US, UK, and Australia

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT starts at $299.99 / £269.99 / AU$569 for the 8GB version, with the 16GB version starting at $349.99 / £329.99 / AU$689.

There’s a much more direct comparison between the AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT 16GB and the RX 9060 XT 16GB, as both are very comparable spec-wise. In that regard, the RX 9060 XT is a slight price increase over the RX 7600 XT (about $20 in the US), but it’s not really large enough to ding its score.

The RX 7600 XT and RX 7600 are very similar, but there are differences beyond just their memory pools, so the RX 9060 XT is not quite as comparable to the RX 7600, meaning even though the RX 9060 XT is slightly more expensive (about $30 in the US), it’s much more reasonable given the comparably faster clock speeds.

Nvidia’s competing cards, the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB and RTX 5060, are more expensive ($429 / £419.99 / AU$799 for the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB) or about the same price or slightly more expensive ($299 / £269.99 / AU$599) for the RTX 5060.

Neither RX 9060 XT version has an AMD reference card, so you’ll need to buy one from a third-party manufacturer, such as Asus, Gigabyte, or XFX.

The same is true for Nvidia’s RTX 5060 Ti and RTX 5060, though, so it’s hard to knock the 9060 XT cards too hard for this, especially as we’ve seen fairly wide availability of MSRP cards for sale online that you can actually buy.

Fortunately, we also haven’t seen any real stock shortages of the RX 9060 XT cards, so finding stock at MSRP is fairly easy right now.

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT: Specs

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

  • PCIe 5.0
  • 16GB and 8GB VRAM

Swipe to scroll horizontallyAMD RX 9060 XT SpecsHeader Cell – Column 0

RX 9060 XT (16GB)

RX 9060 XT (8GB)

Process Node

TSMC N4P

TSMC N4P

Transistor Count (Billion)

29.7

29.7

Compute Units

32

32

Shaders

2,048

2,048

Ray Accelerators

32

32

AI/Matrix Processors

64

64

Render Output Units

64

64

Cache (MB)

32

32

Base Clock (MHz)

1,700

1,700

Boost Clock (MHz)

3,130

3,130

Memory Clock (MHz)

2,518

2,518

Memory Type

GDDR6

GDDR6

Memory Pool (GB)

16

8

Memory Interface (bits)

128

128

Effective Memory Speed (Gbps)

20.1

20.1

Memory Bandwidth (GB/s)

322.3

322.3

PCIe Interface

5.0 x16

5.0 x16

TGP (W)

160

150

Recommended PSU (W)

450

700

Power Connector

1 x 8-pin

1 x 8-pin

Both versions of the AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT have effectively identical specs, other than different memory pools and the slightly higher TDP for the 16GB version to account for powering the additional memory.

Otherwise, they use the exact same GPU die with identical clock speeds, so your decision between the two is really about whether that 8GB of additional GDDR6 VRAM is worth the extra investment.

The number of compute units, ROPs, and available cache on the RX 9060 XT is unchanged over the RX 7600 XT and RX 7600, so the RX 9060 XT is effectively an upgraded version of those cards using the new RDNA 4 architecture and faster game and memory clock speeds.

There’s also the issue of whether 8GB is enough for a modern graphics card, even at a sub-$300 price point. Given the performance I found while testing, an 8GB card can perform well right now, even at 1440p, on many games, so long as you don’t go anywhere near ray tracing. How much longer will that be the case? It’s hard to say, but 8GB cards are already starting to struggle, so even a 10GB card would have been better, much less a 12GB version for the lower-end 9060 XT.

Add to this AMD’s maddening decision to stick with a 128-bit memory bus for these cards, which unnecessarily constrains memory bandwidth and inevitably limits the potential performance of the RX 9060 XT. This alone knocks some points off, because if the Intel Arc B570 can use a 160-bit memory bus, there’s no reason why AMD or Nvidia continue to do so on their 60-class cards.

That simple widening of the bus could noticeably improve gaming frame rates, and it’s something neither AMD nor Nvidia has been able to explain to me beyond vaguely gesturing at cost constraints. If Intel can afford a 160-bit bus, so can AMD, and it makes me wonder how much better these cards might have otherwise been.

OK, end of rant.

  • Specs & features: 3.5 / 5

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT: Design

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

  • No AMD reference card
  • Good for SFF cases

There is no AMD reference cards for either of the RX 9060 XT versions, so the design of the card you get will depend on the manufacturer.

The two cards I tested, the Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB and the Asus Dual Radeon RX 9060 XT 8GB, are both fairly slender and compact cards.

Neither have any RGB lighting, so if you’re looking for something with more bling, other cards can definitely offer that.

Also, there are some cards from some manufacturers that use triple-fan designs, which seems overkill to me, but if you want a bigger-looking card for a specific build, you’ll definitely have that option.

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT: Performance

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

  • Big difference between 16GB and 8GB versions
  • RTX 5060 Ti 16GB and RTX 5060 offer slightly better performance than the two RX 9060 XT cards

A note on my data

The charts shown below offer the most recent data I have for the cards tested for this review. They may change over time as more card results are added and cards are retested. The ‘average of all cards tested’ includes cards not shown in these charts for readability purposes.

As far as performance goes, there’s a lot to like about both AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT cards, from their modest power draw to their solid 1440p gaming performance.

It’s not all positive though, as there are several points where Nvidia’s competing cards outperform AMD’s latest offerings, making the final assessment much closer than I initially thought it would be when I began testing these cards.

Across synthetic benchmarks, the RX 9060 XT and RTX 5060 Ti are more or less tied across resolutions, with Nvidia’s card only edging out AMD’s in ray tracing performance. The RX 9060 XT 16GB is only about 15% slower than the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB in synthetic ray tracing performance. While this is expected, it’s not as wide as it’s been in previous generations.

The RX 9060 XT 8GB, meanwhile, outperforms the RTX 5060 in 1080p (about 4% better), in 1440p (about 10% better), and in 4K (about 10% better), though the RTX 5060 does hold a slight lead in ray-tracing performance (about 3%).

In creative benchmarks, the RX 9060 XT cards are largely competitive against Nvidia’s GPUs in everything but 3D model rendering. Unfortunately, I can’t say more about this since Blender Benchmark wasn’t able to run on either RX 9060 XT card, so I can’t say how they’d fare against the Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti 16GB.

The RTX 5060, interestingly enough, couldn’t run Blender Benchmark either, so this will have to be an issue I’ll investigate further and update my results once I have them, but given that Blender Benchmark Cycles renderer is optimized for Nvidia CUDA (as is nearly all 3D modeling software), I am very confident that the RX 9060 XT cards aren’t going to be competitive on this workload, it’s really just a matter of how far behind the RX 9060 XT cards land in the end.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

Creative workloads aren’t what AMD Radeon cards are most known for, though. PC gaming is where these cards really compete, and in this regard, the RX 9060 XT 8GB comes in about 4% slower than the RTX 5060 in 1080p overall, while the RX 9060 XT 16GB comes up about 9% slower than the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB at 1080p overall.

Gen-on-gen, though, the RX 9060 XT 16GB outperforms the RX 7600 XT by about 44% at 1080p, overall, while the RX 9060 XT 8GB similarly comes in about 46% faster than the RX 7600 at 1080p overall.

At 1440p, the story is similar for the RX 9060 XT, with it coming in about 9% slower than the RTX 5060 Ti, overall. For the RX 9060 XT 8GB, the gap widens a bit as it comes in about 8% slower than the RTX 5060, overall.

At 1440p, the gen-on-gen performance improvement is even greater, with the RX 9060 XT 16GB outperforming the RX 7600 XT by about 53% overall, while the RX 9060 XT 8GB outperforms the RX 7600 by a massive 62.5% overall.

In terms of power consumption, the peak power consumption of the RX 9060 XT cards are in line with where the RTX 5060 Ti lands and slightly above the listed TDP for the two cards. The RTX 5060, meanwhile, comes in a good bit lower at peak, in my tests.

Temperature, meanwhile, will largely depend on the model card you end up buying, as they will all have different cooling systems. That said, the Sapphire Pulse RX 9060 XT 16GB stayed a few degrees cooler than the Asus Dual RX 9060 XT 8GB in my tests, buy your mileage may vary.

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)

In the end, the RX 9060 XT cards kept things pretty close to their respective competition from Nvidia, though couldn’t quite overtake them, even considering that I didn’t factor Blender Benchmark’s results into the final creative score for any of the cards tested, given that I wasn’t able to run it on three of the cards in question.

Had those tests run successfully and been factored into the final scores, the two Nvidia cards would have pulled further ahead, most likely.

But would they have pulled far enough ahead to justify buying them? In the case of the RX 9060 XT 8GB, the RTX 5060 simply offers you a better value given that both can be purchased for MSRP right now, but if you don’t want to give Nvidia your money, you’re not really losing anything by going with the RX 9060 XT 8GB instead.

For the RX 9060 XT 16GB, though, it comes within just a few points of the RTX 5060 Ti at a much lower price, making it the one I’d recommend to anyone shopping for a GPU in this price range.

Should you buy the AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT?

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)Swipe to scroll horizontallyAMD Radeon RX 9070 XT Scorecard

Category

Notes

Score

Value

Both RX 9060 XT cards offer great value for their price.

4.5 / 5

Specs & features

While the 16GB option for the RX 9060 XT is great, 8GB is just too little for a modern GPU.

3.5 / 5

Design

Since there’s no AMD reference card for either version of the RX 9060 XT, your design will vary depending on which card you get. The ones I tested were fine, but nothing spectacular.

3.5 / 5

Performance

Both RX 9060 XT versions are capable cards with fantastic gen-on-gen performance, though Nvidia’s competing offerings edge them out slightly.

4.5 / 5

Final score

While both RX 9060 XT cards don’t quite overtake Nvidia’s competing cards, they offer a very compelling value for gamers, especially those who are getting tired of what Nvidia has been offering lately.

4 / 5

Buy the AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT if…

Don’t buy it if…

How I tested the AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT

  • I spent about three weeks with the RX 9060 XT 16GB and 8GB versions
  • I used my complete GPU testing suite to analyze the card’s performance
  • I tested the card in everyday, gaming, creative, and AI workload usage

Test System Specs

Here are the specs on the system I used for testing:

Motherboard: Gigabyte X870E Aorus Elite WiFi 7 ICE
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D
CPU Cooler: Gigabyte Auros Waterforce II 360 ICE
RAM: G.SKILL Trident Z5 Neo DDR5-6600 (2 x 16GB)
SSD: Samsung 9100 Pro 4TB SSD
PSU: Thermaltake Toughpower PF3 1050W Platinum
Case: Praxis Wetbench

I spent about three weeks with both RX 9060 XT cards, using my standard suite of benchmark tests with industry standard tools like 3DMark, PassMark, PugetBench for Creators, and more.

For gaming, I use built-in benchmark tools in games like Black Myth: Wukong, Cyberpunk 2077, and F1 2024.

I also used both cards for about a week each as the GPU in my own PC at home where I used it for work, content creation, and gaming outside of formal testing.

  • Originally reviewed June 2025



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$200 GPU Face-off: Nvidia vs AMD vs Intel
Product Reviews

$200 GPU face-off: Nvidia RTX 3050, AMD RX 6600, and Intel Arc A750 duke it out at the bottom of the barrel

by admin



It’s a tough time to be a gamer on a tight budget. The AI boom has made fab time a precious resource. There’s no business case for GPU vendors to use their precious TSMC wafers to churn out low-cost, low-margin, entry-level chips, much as we might want them to.

The ever-shifting tariff situation in the USA means prices are constantly in flux. And ever-increasing VRAM requirements mean that the 4GB and 6GB graphics cards of yore are being crushed by the latest games. Even if you can still find those cards on shelves, they’re not smart buys.

So what’s the least a PC gamer can spend on a new graphics card these days and get a good gaming experience? We tried to find out.


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We drew a hard line at cards with 8GB of VRAM. Recent graphics card launches have shown that 8GB is the absolute minimum for gamers who want to run modern titles at a 1080p resolution.

PC builders in this bracket aren’t going to be turning on Ray Tracing Overdrive mode in Cyberpunk 2077, or RT more generally, which is where VRAM frequently starts to become a true limit. Even raster games can challenge 8GB cards at 1080p with all settings maxed, though.

We also limited our search to modern cards that support DirectX 12 Ultimate. You might find a cheap GPU out there with 8GB of VRAM, but if it doesn’t support DirectX 12 Ultimate, it’s truly ancient.

Within those constraints, we found three potentially appealing options, all around the $200 mark. The Radeon RX 6600 is available for just $219.99 at Newegg right now in the form of ASRock’s Challenger D model. Intel’s Arc A750 can be had for $199.99, also courtesy of ASRock. Finally, the GeForce RTX 3050 8GB is still hanging around at $221 thanks to MSI’s Ventus 2X XS card. We pitted this group against each other to find out whether any of them are still worth buying.

Raster gaming performance

We whipped up a quick grouping of a few of today’s most popular and most advanced games at 1080p and high or ultra settings without upscaling enabled, along with a couple older titles, to get a sense of how these cards still perform. We also did 1440p tests across a mix of medium and high settings (plus upscaling on Alan Wake 2) to see how these cards handled a heavier load.

Image 1 of 20

(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Toms Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)

The Arc A750 consistently leads in our geomean of average FPS results at 1080p. It’s 6% faster than the RX 6600 overall and 22% faster than the RTX 3050. At 1440p, the A750 leads the RX 6600 by 18% and the RTX 3050 by 25%.

The Arc A750 also leads the pack in the geomean of our 99th-percentile FPS results. It delivered the smoothest gaming experience across both resolutions.

Some notes from our testing: Alan Wake 2 crushes all of these cards, and you’re going to want some kind of upscaling to make it playable. Given the option, we’d also turn Nanite and Lumen off in any Unreal Engine 5 title that supports them, as they either tank performance (in the case of the RTX 3050 and A750) or introduce massive graphical errors (as seen on the Radeon RX 6600 in Fortnite).

Image 1 of 2

There’s supposed to be ground there… (Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)There’s supposed to be ground there… (Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)

The major Fortnite graphics corruptions we saw on the RX 6600 have been reported for months across multiple driver versions on all graphics cards using Navi 23 GPUs, not just on the RX 6600, and it’s not clear why AMD or Epic hasn’t fixed them. The RX 6600 is also the single most popular Radeon graphics card in the Steam hardware survey, so we’re surprised this issue is still around. We’ve brought it up with AMD and will update this article if we hear back.

⭐ Winner: Intel

Ray tracing performance

Let’s be blunt: don’t expect a $200 graphics card to deliver acceptable RT performance. 8GB of VRAM isn’t enough to enable the spiffiest RT effects in today’s titles; the visual payoff usually isn’t worth the performance hit, and enabling upscaling at 1080p generally compromises visual quality, even as it claws back some of that lost performance. It’s better to put other priorities first (or to save up for a more modern, more powerful graphics card).

Image 1 of 3

(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)

Even with those cautions in mind, we were surprised to see that the Arc A750 can still deliver a reasonably solid experience with RT on in older titles. Doom Eternal still runs at high frame rates with its sole RT toggle flipped on, and Cyberpunk 2077 offers a solid enough foundation for enabling XeSS at 1080p and medium RT settings if you’re hell-bent on tracing rays.

Black Myth Wukong overwhelms the A750 even with low ray tracing settings and XeSS Balanced enabled, though, so performance tanks. XeSS also introduces plenty of intrusive visual artifacts that make it unusable in this benchmark, and the game’s FSR implementation is no better. It’s modern RT titles like this where 8GB cards like the A750 are most likely to end up struggling.

The RTX 3050 does OK with the relatively light RT load of Doom Eternal, but it can’t handle Cyberpunk 2077 well enough to create a good foundation for upscaling, and Black Myth Wukong is also out of the question.

The RX 6600 has the least advanced and least numerous RT accelerators of the bunch, so its performance lands it way at the back of the pack.

⭐ Winner: Intel

Upscaling

The RTX 3050 is the only card among these three that can use Nvidia’s best-in-class DLSS upscaler, which recently got even better in some games thanks to the DLSS 4 upgrade and its transformer-powered AI model. DLSS is an awesome technology in general, and Nvidia claims that over 800 games support it; however, the performance boost it offers on the RTX 3050 isn’t particularly great. This is not that powerful a GPU to begin with, and multiplying a low frame rate by a scaling factor just results in a slightly less low frame rate.

Four years after its introduction, some version of AMD’s FSR is available in over 500 games, and it can be enabled on virtually every GPU. That ubiquity is good news for the RX 6600 (and everybody else), but there’s a catch: FSR’s delivered image quality so far has tended to be worse than DLSS and XeSS. The image quality gap appears set to close with FSR 4, but the Radeon RX 6600 won’t get access to that tech. It’s reserved for RX 9000-series cards only.

Intel’s XeSS upscaler can be enabled on graphics cards from any vendor if a game supports it, although the best version of the XeSS model only runs on Arc cards. XeSS is available in over 200 titles, so even though it’s not as broadly adopted as DLSS or FSR, it’s fairly likely you’ll find it as an option. We’d prefer it over FSR on an Arc card where it’s available, and you should try it on Radeons to see if the results are better than AMD’s own tech.

⭐ Winner: Nvidia (generally), AMD (in this specific context)

Today’s best Intel Arc A750, AMD Radeon RX 6600 and Nvidia RTX 3050 deals

Frame generation

The RTX 3050 doesn’t support DLSS Frame Generation at all. If you want to try framegen on this card, you’ll have to rely on cross-vendor approaches like AMD’s FSR 3 Frame Generation.

Intel’s Xe Frame Generation comes as part of the XeSS 2 feature set, and those features are only baked into 22 games so far. Unless one of your favorite titles already has XeSS 2 support, it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to turn on Intel’s framegen tech on your Arc card. As with the RTX 3050, your best shot at trying framegen comes from AMD’s FSR 3.

AMD’s FSR Frame Generation tech comes as part of the FSR 3 feature set, which has been implemented in 140 games so far. As we’ve noted, FSR 3 framegen is vendor-independent, so you can enable it on any graphics card, not just the RX 6600.

AMD’s more basic Fluid Motion Frames technology also works on the RX 6600, but only in games that offer an exclusive fullscreen mode. Since Fluid Motion Frames is implemented at the driver level, it lacks access to important motion vector information that FSR3 Frame Generation gets. FMF should be viewed as a last resort.

⭐ Winner: AMD

Power

The RTX 3050 is rated for 115W of board power, but it doesn’t deliver particularly high performance to go with that rating. It’s just a low-power, low-performance card.

The Radeon RX 6600 delivers the best performance per watt in this group with its 132 W board power. It needs 15% more power than the RTX 3050 to deliver about 14% more performance at 1080p.

Intel’s Arc A750 needs a whopping 225 W to deliver its strong performance in gaming, or nearly 100W more than the RX 6600. That’s 70% more power for just 6% higher performance at 1080p, on average. Worse, Intel’s card also draws much more power at idle than either the RX 6600 or A750 without tweaking BIOS and Windows settings to mitigate that behavior.

⭐ Winner: AMD

Drivers and software

Nvidia’s Game Ready drivers reliably appear alongside the latest game releases, and Nvidia has a history of quickly deploying hotfixes to address specific show-stopping issues. Users have reported that Nvidia’s drivers have been getting a little shaky alongside the release of RTX 50-series cards, though, and we’ve seen evidence of that same instability in our own game testing.

Games aren’t the only place where drivers matter. Nvidia’s massive financial advantage over the competition means that non-gamers who still need GPU acceleration, like those using Adobe or other creative apps, can generally trust that their GeForce card will offer a stable experience with that software.

The Nvidia App (formerly GeForce Experience) includes tons of handy features, like one-click settings optimization and game recording tools. Nvidia also provides useful tools like Broadcast for GeForce RTX owners free of charge. We don’t think you should pick the RTX 3050 for gaming on the basis of Nvidia’s drivers or software alone, though.

Intel has kept up a regular pace of new driver releases with support for the latest games, although more general app support may be a question mark. Intel Graphics Software has a slick enough UI and an everything-you-need, nothing-you-don’t feature set for overclocking and image quality settings. We wouldn’t choose an Arc card on the basis of Intel’s software support alone, but the company has proven its commitment to maintaining its software alongside its hardware.

AMD releases new graphics drivers on a monthly cadence, but some big issues may be getting through QA for older products like the RX 6600. Even in the limited testing we did for this face-off, we saw show-stopping rendering bugs in the latest version of Fortnite with Nanite virtualized geometry enabled. Users have been complaining of this issue for months, and it seems widespread enough that someone should have noticed by now.

The AMD Software management app boasts a mature, slick interface and useful settings overlay, along with plenty of accumulated features like Radeon Chill that some enthusiasts might find handy.

⭐ Winner: Nvidia

Accelerated video codecs

You probably don’t need a $200 discrete GPU for video encoding alone. If you already have a modern Intel CPU with an integrated graphics processor, you can already get high-quality accelerated video encoding and decoding without buying a discrete GPU.

That said, if you don’t have an Intel CPU with integrated graphics and you must have a high-quality accelerated video codec for transcoding, the RTX 3050 could be worth it as a light-duty option. If NVENC is all you want or need, though, the even cheaper (and less powerful) RTX 3050 6GB can be had for a few bucks less.

The Arc A750’s video engine supports every modern codec we’d want, and it offers high quality and performance. The high power requirements of the A750 (even at idle and under light load) make it unappealing for use in something like a Plex box, though. If accelerated media processing is all you need, you can still pick up an Arc A380 for $140.

The less modern accelerated video codec on the Radeon RX 6600 (and in Ryzen IGPs) produces noticeably worse results than those of AMD or Intel. It works fine in a pinch, but you will notice the lower-quality output versus the competition. If you’re particular about your codecs, look elsewhere.

⭐ Winner: Two-way tie (Intel and Nvidia)

Virtual reality

While VR hasn’t changed the world as its boosters once promised it would, the enduring popularity of apps like Beat Saber and VRChat means that we should at least give it a cursory look here.

The RTX 3050 and Radeon RX 6600 technically support basic VR experiences just fine, although you may find their limited power requires enabling performance-boosting tech like timewarp and spacewarp to get a comfortable experience.

Intel doesn’t support VR HMDs on the Arc A750 (or any Arc card at all, for that matter), so it’s a total no-go if you want to experience VR on your PC.

⭐ Winner: Two-way tie (AMD and Nvidia)

Bottom line

Swipe to scroll horizontallyHeader Cell – Column 0

AMD RX 6600

Nvidia RTX 3050 8GB

Intel Arc A750

Raster Performance

Row 0 – Cell 1 Row 0 – Cell 2

❌

Ray Tracing

Row 1 – Cell 1 Row 1 – Cell 2

❌

Upscaling

❌

Row 2 – Cell 2 Row 2 – Cell 3

Frame Generation

❌

Row 3 – Cell 2 Row 3 – Cell 3

Power

❌

Row 4 – Cell 2 Row 4 – Cell 3

Drivers

Row 5 – Cell 1

❌

Row 5 – Cell 3

Accelerated Codecs

Row 6 – Cell 1

❌

❌

Virtual reality

❌

❌

Row 7 – Cell 3

Total

4

3

3

Let’s be frank: it’s a rough time to be buying a “cheap” graphics card for gaming. To even touch a modern GPU architecture, you need to spend around $300 or more. $200 is the bottom of the barrel.

8GB of VRAM is a compromise these days, but our experience shows that you can get by with it at 1080p if you’re willing to tune settings. It isn’t reasonable to slam every slider to ultra and expect a good experience here. Relax some settings, enable upscaling when you need it, and you can still have a fun time at 1080p with just two Franklins in your wallet.

So who’s our winner? Not the GeForce RTX 3050. This card trails both the Radeon RX 6600 and Arc A750 across the board. You can’t enable DLSS Frame Generation on the RTX 3050 at all, and we’re not sure that getting access to the image quality of GeForce-exclusive DLSS 4 upscaling is worth dealing with this card’s low baseline performance. Unless you absolutely need a specific feature or capability this card offers, skip it.

Even four years after its launch, the Radeon RX 6600 is still solid enough for 1080p gaming. It trailed the Arc A750 by about 6% on average at 1080p (and about 15% at 1440p).

If it weren’t for this performance gap, the RX 6600’s strong showing in other categories would make it our overall winner. But not every win carries the same weight, and performance matters most of all when discussing which graphics card is worth your money.

That said, the RX 6600’s performance per watt still stands out. It needs 90 W less power than the A750 to do its thing, and it’s well-behaved at idle, even with a 4K monitor. If you have an aging or weak PSU, the RX 6600 might be your upgrade ticket.

AMD’s widely adopted and broadly compatible FSR upscaling and frame generation features help the RX 6600’s case, but they also work on the RTX 3050 and A750, so it’s kind of a push. The only real downsides to the RX 6600 are its dated media engine and poor RT performance. We also saw troubling graphical glitches in titles as prominent as Fortnite on this card that we didn’t experience on the Intel or Nvidia competition.

That leaves us with the Arc A750. This card delivers the most raw gaming muscle you can get for $200 at both 1080p and 1440p, but it comes with so many “buts.” Its high power requirements might make gamers with older or lower-end PSUs think twice. Intel’s graphics driver can be more demanding on the CPU than the competition, meaning older systems might not be able to realize this card’s full potential. And older systems that don’t support Resizable BAR won’t work well with the A750 at all.

Our experience shows that the A750 can stumble with Unreal Engine 5’s Lumen and Nanite tech enabled, and not every game exposes them as a simple toggle like Fortnite does. More and more studios are using UE5 as the foundation for their games, so there’s a chance this card could underperform in future titles in spite of its still-strong potential.

If you can’t spend a dollar more than $200 and you don’t mind risking the occasional performance pitfall in exchange for absolute bang-for-the-buck, the Arc A750 is still worth a look. If you want a more mature, well-rounded card, the Radeon RX 6600 is also a good choice for just a few dollars more. But if you have the luxury of saving up enough to get even an RTX 5060 at $300, we’d think long and hard about spending good money to get an aging graphics card.

Bottom line: None of these cards could be described as outright winners. Intel, AMD, and Nvidia all have plenty of opportunity to introduce updated GPUs with modern architectures in this price range, but there are no firm signs that any of them plan to (at least on the desktop). Until that happens, PC gamers on strict budgets will have to pick through older GPUs like these on the discount rack when buying new, or hold out for a used card with all its attendant risks.



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AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution slide deck
Product Reviews

Enthusiast hacks FSR 4 onto RX 7000 series GPU without official AMD support, returns better quality but slightly lower fps than FSR 3.1

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A Reddit user has shared on r/radeon how they were able to run FSR 4 on their Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XTX, despite not being officially supported by AMD. Currently, FSR 4 only runs on AMD’s 9000-series GPUs because it requires architecture that isn’t readily available on older CPUs. However, Reddit user Virtual-Cobbler-9930 said that the latest Mesa update for Linux allows the older GPU to emulate FP8 precision via FP16, which FSR 4 uses for its machine learning-powered upscaling. This means that the 7900 XTX can run it even without the necessary hardware — albeit, at the cost of some performance.

Virtual-Cobbler-9930 used the OptiScaler DLL injection tool to force games to support FSR 4, which modders previously used to enable it manually in games that only supported DLSS 2 or XeSS. After that, you only need a couple of commands, and you’re golden. According to the user, a stable release of Mesa is expected to arrive by August, so these patches should be automated with the driver by then — that is, unless AMD asks them to remove the feature.

Aside from the RX 7900 XTX GPU, the user also had an AMD Ryzen 7 7700X CPU set to a 65-watt limit and 128 GB of DDR5 RAM, running the Arch Linux operating system. They then tested three games with FSR 4 — Cyberpunk 2077, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, and Marvel Rivals. In general, FSR 4 was able to achieve a slightly better quality than FSR 3.1 in all titles and also provided better fps numbers compared to running the games in native 4K resolution.

FSR4 on RDNA3 (7900xtx) tests from r/radeon

The user says that the difference was massive with Cyberpunk 2077, especially as FSR 4 delivered better detail compared to regular FSR 3. However, this resulted in about a 33% drop in fps — from 85.06 average at quality preset to just 56.28 (which is still quite playable). He suggested enabling frame gen or lowering the quality if you want to get higher frame rates, as FSR 4.1 has no smirring and delivers better grass and bush texture for this title. We also get the same story with Oblivion — a drop in performance (this time from 46 to 36 fps) in exchange for slightly better quality. It’s only with Marvel Rivals that FSR 4 didn’t offer better visual quality to make the fps drop palatable.

However, FSR 4 on the RX 7900 XTX only makes sense when you’re playing at 4K resolution. If you scale down to a lower resolution, such as 1080p, you won’t get higher performance because of your hardware’s limitation. It’s likely for this reason, and the minor quality difference you get versus the performance hit you’ll take, that AMD did not implement FSR 4 in older tech. But if you’re one to push your gear to its limits, then you can try using this technique to run AMD’s latest upscaling tech on unsupported GPUs.

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An ROG Xbox Ally X and Ally shown during Microsoft's Xbox stream in June 2025.
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Microsoft announces new dream team partnership with AMD on a ‘portfolio’ of next-gen Xbox devices, all with backwards compatibility with existing games

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Xbox + AMD: Powering the Next Generation of Xbox – YouTube

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Microsoft has just dropped a video showcasing their plans for future Xbox hardware based on AMD technology. The main takeaways? First, Xbox will become a “portfolio” of devices including traditional console, PC and handhelds. Second, backwards compatibility with existing Xbox games is central to the new strategy.

Xbox President Sarah Bond has fronted a new video on the official Xbox YouTube channel, spelling out Microsoft’s plans for future Xbox hardware. Superficially, the big news is a partnership with AMD.

“We’ve established a strategic multi-year partnership with AMD to co-engineer silicon across a portfolio of devices, including our next-generation Xbox consoles in your living room and in your hands,” Bond said.


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What kind of devices, you ask? “That’s why we’re investing in our next-generation hardware lineup, across console, handheld, PC, cloud and accessories,” Bond explained. Notably, the new Asus ROG Xbox Ally devices flashed up in the video when Bond name-checked “handheld.”

Of course, Microsoft already partners with AMD on Xbox silicon and the Asus ROG Xbox Ally and Ally X handhelds have already been announced. So those elements aren’t necessarily news. So what is this video really about?

There may be some internal, inside-baseball dimension to all this for Microsoft. But for gamers, arguably, two issues stand out. First, Microsoft is further signalling Xbox’s transition from conventional console to a more amorphous platform.

That is most obvious in the video in the passage where Bond calls out “cloud” gaming, and a Gamepass cloud gaming interface is shown, with a large caption above that reads, “This is also an Xbox, by itself”. In other words, Xbox gaming needn’t involve Xbox hardware at all.

The other broad takeaway is backwards compatibility. Bond said the partnership with AMD will deliver the “next generation of graphics innovation,” but critically, it will do so “all while maintaining backwards compatibility with your existing library of Xbox games.”

That’s good news for existing Xbox gamers, even if it’s awfully vague. Does that mean all Xbox future hardware will be compatible with legacy Xbox games? Does it mean cloud services will do the heavy lifting when it comes to running old titles?

Ultimately, there are no specifics. Indeed, there are few specifics about anything. It’s not even totally clear if there will be any what you might call “pure” Microsoft Xbox devices, designed and engineered by Microsoft itself.

As we’ve reported recently, one narrative that’s doing the rounds is that Microsoft itself will move away from producing Xbox hardware itself in favour of partnering with third parties on devices, just as it has done with the new Asus ROG Xbox Ally.

Is this the last “pure Microsoft” Xbox console? (Image credit: Future)

In that scenario, even regular consoles would no longer be built by Microsoft. That story also suggested that future Xbox consoles would be more similar to PCs, in hardware terms, than ever before, something that certainly applies to the Asus ROG Xbox Ally, both versions of which use existing AMD silicon that wasn’t developed in partnership with AMD.

Whether some or all future Xbox devices will use generic AMD PC silicon, exactly what Microsoft’s partnership with AMD on silicon entails, all of this is unclear. It could mean custom chips, just like those in the Xbox Series S and Series X.

That would presumably mean x86-based CPUs, perhaps using the upcoming Zen 6 architecture, paired with AMD’s new UDNA graphics technology, maybe with some Xbox-only enhancements.

Or maybe it just means Microsoft and AMD making sure the latter’s mainstream PC silicon, including APUs, has a few features and optimisations to Microsoft’s liking.

It will likely be years before we find out. Going by past Microsoft leaks, any next-gen Xbox console probably won’t appear before 2027. But now you know it’ll run your old games, in some form at least.



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The Next Generation Xbox Consoles Will Be Powered By AMD In Multi-Year Partnership
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The Next Generation Xbox Consoles Will Be Powered By AMD In Multi-Year Partnership

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Microsoft has announced a multi-year partnership with tech giant and graphics card manufacturer AMD. The deal will result in AMD technology powering the next generation of Xbox hardware.

In a new video, Xbox president Sarah Bond explains that the partnership will see AMD co-engineer silicon for a range of devices, including the next generation of Xbox consoles.

“Together with AMD, we’re advancing the state of art in gaming silicon to deliver the next generation of graphics innovation to unlock a deeper level of visual quality and immersive gameplay and player experiences enhanced with the power of AI, all while maintaining compatibility with your existing library of Xbox games,” says Bond. 

 

Bond says this move reinforces Xbox’s mission to build a platform where players can take their games anywhere across multiple devices, such as handheld, PC, and cloud.

“The next generation of Xbox is coming to life, and this is just the beginning,” says Bond. “We can’t wait to show you what’s next.”

Of course, the big news here is Microsoft confirming another generation of Xbox consoles is in the works. Many have wondered what the future of Xbox as a console platform would be following the Xbox Series X/S’ weaker sales compared to the PlayStation 5 and Switch. Combined with the publisher’s increasing focus on its Xbox Game Pass subscription service and its recent initiative to bring its exclusive franchises to rival platforms, such as Forza and Gears of War, some have questioned the long-term viability of Xbox as a console ecosystem. 

Xbox’s deal with AMD is the second major partnership announcement this month. During Summer Game Fest, Microsoft revealed a partnership with Asus to produce an Xbox-centric model of the company’s ROG Ally handheld systems. We played the ROG Xbox Ally during SGF, and you can read our hands-on impressions here.



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Xbox announces AMD partnership for their upcoming generation
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Xbox announces AMD partnership for their upcoming generation

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In case you were wondering, Xbox does have plans for what comes after the Xbox Series consoles. Today, they revealed their collaboration with AMD, which shouldn’t come as a surprise. AMD has long been supporting console-makers, and will continue as we approach the next cycle. Check out the video released today with Xbox’s studio head Sarah Bond below.

This morning, Xbox announced a multi-year strategic partnership with AMD to to power next-generation gaming experiences across devices, including consoles, PC, handheld, and cloud.The collaboration aims to uplevel the player experience by delivering advanced graphics with enhanced visual quality, more immersive gameplay using the power of AI, and compatibility with player’s existing Xbox games library. Together, Xbox and AMD hope to enable play across devices in entirely new ways, delivering an Xbox experience designed for players – without being confined to a single store or tied to one device.At the same time, Xbox is continuing to work more closely with the Windows team to ensure that Windows is the number one platform for gaming. 

Stay tuned to GamingTrend for more Xbox news and info!


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Xbox strikes "strategic, multi-year agreement" with AMD, "powering the next generation of Xbox"
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Xbox strikes “strategic, multi-year agreement” with AMD, “powering the next generation of Xbox”

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Xbox has partnered with AMD to “power the next generation of Xbox.”

In a brief statement, Xbox president Sarah Bond said the companies were partnering to build first-party devices and cloud, “including future Xbox consoles.”

The “strategic, multi-year agreement” with AMD will be to co-engineer silicon across a “portfolio of devices” and AI-powered experiences, “grounded in a platform designed for players, not tied to a single store or device, and fully compatible with your existing Xbox game library.”

“At Xbox, our vision is for you to play the games you want, with the people you want, anywhere you want,” Bond said. “That’s why we’re investing in our next-generation hardware lineup, across console, handheld, PC, cloud, and accessories.

“I am thrilled to share we’ve established a strategic multi-year partnership with AMD to co-engineer silicon across a portfolio of devices including our next-generation Xbox consoles, in your living room, and in your hands.

“Together with AMD we’re advancing the state of art in gaming silicon to deliver the next generation of graphics innovation to unlock a deeper level of visual quality and immersive gameplay and player experiences enhanced with the power of AI, all while maintaining compatibility with your existing library of Xbox games,” she added.



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Xbox's AMD partnership sheds light on the future of the division's ecosystem
Product Reviews

Xbox’s AMD partnership sheds light on the future of the division’s ecosystem

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Microsoft has no plans to get out of the console business anytime soon. The company has been reiterating for a while that it’s going to make at least one more generation of Xbox consoles. It’s now been confirmed that AMD will power the upcoming hardware, as it did with the Xbox Series X/S.

Xbox president Sarah Bond made the announcement in a short video. Under the multi-year partnership, Xbox and AMD are “advancing the state of art in gaming silicon to deliver the next generation of graphics innovation; to unlock a deeper level of visual quality; and immersive gameplay and player experiences enhanced with the power of AI, all while maintaining compatibility with your existing library of Xbox games,” Bond said.

A leaked presentation from May 2022 (which was part of the massive Xbox leak the following year) indicated that Microsoft had yet to make a decision about the processor and GPU for the next Xbox console(s), suggesting in one slide that it planned to strike an agreement with AMD to supply those and in another that it yet had to make an “Arm64 decision.” As we now know, the company is doubling down with AMD.

Microsoft

On the surface, the AMD agreement is the main news coming out of Bond’s announcement. But, if you read between the lines, there are lots of other interesting details to tease out from what she said in the short video.

For one thing, the AI aspect of Bond’s carefully crafted statement lines up with details in the leak (and other developments) about Microsoft embracing artificial intelligence and machine learning in future Xbox games, including for things like AI agents. So the company is likely to keep going down that path.

Bond said that Microsoft and AMD will “co-engineer silicon across a portfolio of devices including our next-generation Xbox consoles, in your living room and in your hands,” implying that the company is planning more handhelds beyond the Xbox-branded ROG devices that are coming later this year. Those are also powered by AMD.

In addition, Bond said the next-gen of Xbox devices will maintain “compatibility with your existing library of Xbox games.” Xbox has made a commitment to backward compatibility, but that’s still welcome to hear.

Those are fairly interesting nuggets, no doubt, but there were two other things Bond said that I think are starting to shed more light on the future of the Xbox ecosystem. First, she said that her team is “building you a gaming platform that’s always with you, so you can play the games you want across devices anywhere you want, delivering you an Xbox experience not locked to a single store or tied to one device.”

That “single store” phrasing is a chin stroker, especially in light of the new user interface Xbox is making for the ROG handhelds. The Windows-powered devices won’t only allow users to play games from the Xbox PC app, Xbox consoles via remote play and the cloud. They’ll integrate games from other PC storefronts, such as Battle.net (which is run by Microsoft-owned Activision Blizzard), Steam, GOG and more. Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass users have long had access to EA Play games as part of their subscriptions. Ubisoft+ is on Xbox consoles too.

Microsoft

Perhaps this concept of not being “locked to a single store” will start to work in other ways. Valve said a few years ago that it would be happy to integrate Game Pass into Steam, for instance. Likewise, Microsoft has said it would welcome Steam and the Epic Games Store app onto its PC app store (though Valve and Epic probably wouldn’t want to give Microsoft a cut of game sales). Maybe we might finally see those come to fruition in the next few years.

But how might those integrations work on an Xbox console? Bond hinted at that too. She said Xbox is “working closely with the Windows team to ensure that Windows is the number one platform for gaming.”

Sure, that could be a reference to PC gaming. But Bond didn’t explicitly state that, which has me wondering if the next Xbox console might be more of a Windows PC that sits under your TV. That would align with comments made a few months back by Jez Corden of Windows Central, who said the next Xbox is “a PC, in essence, but with a TV-friendly shell.”

As with the likes of the Steam Deck and other handheld PCs, this would potentially give game developers a specific set of specifications to work with (though ensuring their games are optimized for as many desktop and laptop configurations as possible will still be a complex task). Perhaps the user interface Xbox is debuting on the Ally X devices is a sign of things to come on larger displays.

Moreover, the Xbox and Windows teams are stripping out unnecessary aspects of the operating system in the Xbox Ally handhelds to make them run more efficiently. What’s to stop them from doing the same in the next Xbox console? That could enable Xbox to offer a more unified ecosystem across all platforms, while streamlining things for developers who want to make games for both PC and Xbox. Don’t forget that Microsoft has been making a real effort to make Windows run more smoothly on ARM-based processors as part of its Copilot+ PC push.

We might have to wait two or three more years to get a fuller sense of Microsoft’s vision for the future of Xbox consoles. But it certainly has the opportunity to knit its platforms more closely together and make playing Xbox (and PC) games across devices a more seamless experience.



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Microsoft
Product Reviews

AMD to design processor for Xbox Next: Team Red extends long-standing Microsoft partnership

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In a rather unexpected turn of events, Microsoft on Tuesday announced that it had extended its hardware partnership with AMD to include next-generation Xbox game consoles as well as portable devices. The partnership is set to last several years and span across multiple generations of desktop and portable hardware. 

“I am thrilled to share we have established a strategic multi-year partnership with AMD to co-engineer silicon across a portfolio of devices including our next-generation Xbox consoles, in your living room, and in your hands,” said Sarah Bond, president of Microsoft’s Xbox business unit. 

The announcement is the first official confirmation that Microsoft is prepping a new generation of Xbox consoles for home as well as Xbox-branded portable gaming devices that will be a part of the Xbox ecosystem. As it turns out, all of these gaming systems will continue to use semi-custom processors designed by AMD that will offer considerably higher performance than the existing Scarlett system-on-chips (SoC) powering Xbox Series X while maintaining backwards compatibility. That backwards compatibility likely means continued reliance on Zen CPU cores based on the x86 instruction set architecture (ISA) as well as on AMD’s Radeon graphics processing units. 


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“Together with AMD we are advancing the state of art in gaming silicon to deliver the next generation of graphics innovation to unlock a deeper level of visual quality and immersive gameplay and player experiences enhanced with the power of AI, all while maintaining compatibility with your existing library of Xbox games,” said Bond. 

Microsoft did not reveal when it expects Xbox Next to become available, though typically the company makes formal announcements of next-generation consoles about 1.5 years before releasing them to market. For example, Microsoft announced its project Scarlett Xbox Series X at E3 trade show in mid-2019 and released it in late 2020. 

If the company follows the same release pattern, expect Xbox Next to arrive in time for holiday season 2026. Given the timing, it is reasonable to expect the next Xbox console to use an SoC featuring custom Zen 6 CPU cores and an RDNA 5 GPU, though we are speculating here. 

A particularly intriguing part of the announcement is a confirmation of Xbox-branded portable consoles. Although handheld PC gaming systems took off after Valve released its Steam Deck in 2022 and now there are half a dozen interesting competitors, these portable consoles are still a niche market. Nonetheless, it looks like Microsoft Xbox sees a strong potential for portable consoles and plans to release one of its own based on a custom processor.

“At Xbox, our vision is for you to play the games you want, with the people you want, anywhere you want,” said Bond. “That is why we are investing in our next-generation hardware lineup, across console, handheld, PC, cloud, and accessories. […] The next generation of Xbox is coming to life, and this is just the beginning. We cannot wait to show you what’s next.”

The announcement also highlights Microsoft’s ambition to support gaming on multiple platforms beyond traditional devices like consoles, handhelds, or PCs, which likely means expanded compatibility between Xbox and Windows machines going forward.

“This is all about building you a gaming platform that is always with you, so you can play the games you want across devices anywhere you want, delivering you an Xbox experience not locked to a single store or tied to one device,” added Bond. That is why we are working closely with the Windows team, to ensure that Windows is the number one platform for gaming.”

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