Learn extra at:
Why it issues: GPD has spent the previous 12 months updating its numerous ultra-portable PC fashions to AMD’s Ryzen AI chipset, considerably enhancing their gaming and AI efficiency. Though the corporate’s newest product, the MicroPC 2, as a substitute makes use of a low-power Intel Twin Lake CPU, it shares the GPD Pocket 4’s up to date design at half the value.
Pre-orders for GPD’s upcoming MicroPC 2 are actually open. With transport set to start in September, early-bird pricing for the 7-inch Home windows 11 PC with a swivel show begins at $495, round half the price of the corporate’s different 2025 handhelds.
Beginning with final 12 months’s GPD Pocket 4, the Hong Kong-based ultra-portable PC maker has quickly launched new fashions in a number of type elements that includes Ryzen AI 9 processors and Radeon 800M collection GPUs. Though the lineup gives better-than-Steam-Deck efficiency in variants resembling a Sony PSP or a nano laptop computer, they sometimes price over $1,000.
Customers ready for an replace to GPD’s sub-$500 mannequin from 2019 obtain a considerable spec improve with the MicroPC 2. Just like the GPD Pocket 4, it options numerous fashionable enlargement ports, a fingerprint scanner, and a touchscreen that turns 180 levels and folds over the keyboard, basically making it a pocket 2-in-1.
Though the brand new Intel N250 Twin Lake CPU maintains the unique MicroPC’s 4-core, 4-thread association, the enhance clock frequency will increase from 2.6 GHz to three.8 GHz, whereas the L3 cache expands from 4 MB to six MB. Based on GPD, the MicroPC 2 quintuples its predecessor’s Geekbench 6 Vulkan GPU rating and exceeds the older mannequin’s single-core CPU rating by greater than an order of magnitude.
Moreover, the newer mannequin helps as much as three 4K 60Hz exterior displays by an HDMI 2.1 port and two DisplayPort 1.4 USB-C ports. Two further 10Gbps USB 3.2 Gen2 Kind-A ports are additionally included.
The 1.08-pound, 6.74 x 4.36 x 0.92-inch pocket PC comes with 512GB of storage as customary and helps expansions by PCIe 3.0 NVMe SSDs and microSD playing cards. The one out there reminiscence configuration gives 16 GB of LPDDR5 RAM.
Though the MicroPC 2 ships with Home windows 11 24H2, it additionally helps model 6.14.3 of the secure Linux kernel, permitting customers to put in Android, ChromeOS, Ubuntu, Debian, and different distros.
GPD’s spec sheets in contrast the 2019 mannequin favorably to the unique Microsoft Floor Go, and the MicroPC 2 might need extra important benefits over the Floor Go 3. It has a higher-resolution contact display screen, 2-in-1 performance, and extra ports in a package deal that’s practically a pound and a half lighter and a whole lot of {dollars} cheaper.
