This Gigantic Handheld Fails at ‘3D’ PC Gaming

There comes some extent in each shopper tech author’s profession the place they should lie down on the railroad tracks and take the warmth for a tech class no one else believes in. For me, it’s stereoscopic, glasses-less 3D screens. So after I agreed to check the Abxylute 3D One, a tablet-sized handheld PC, it solely made my lust for stereoscopic screens develop ever extra heated.

The 3D One is a kitchen sink handheld that throws a lot stuff on the wall that one thing is sure to stay. Certain, it’s large and heavy—particularly at 2.45 kilos with the controllers hooked up—nevertheless it additionally homes an enormous display screen, detachable gamepads akin to the Switch 2, a keyboard that attaches to the underside like a Microsoft Surface Pro 12, and the horsepower of an Intel cell chip used within the stable MSI Claw 8 handheld. It misses out on something resembling good battery life for its dimension, regardless of its good efficiency. Past all else, the 3D One fails to ship on its important promise. Based mostly on my checks with a pre-production unit Abxylute despatched me for overview, you may get a 3D impact in all of your video games, however they weren’t playable by any stretch of the creativeness.

May the 3D One ever be my one handheld I take in all places? After all not. Take a look at the dimensions of that factor. In its plus-sized case, it will take up many of the room in my backpack, whereas a laptop computer and a controller would eat half that house. The “handheld” is up on Kickstarter now for an early-bird worth of $1,500, however it’ll promote for extra later. That is very cool tech, even when it’s costly. For largely egocentric causes, I’m hoping some updates will see the 3D One choose up steam. I don’t need the dream of 3D screens to die.

Handheld PCs preserve getting greater, not essentially higher

I first spied the 3D One at CES 2025 on a forlorn shelf inside Intel’s demo room. Again then, Intel solely described it as an effort with Chinese language video games writer Tencent on a 3D handheld. The 3D One sports activities an Intel Core Extremely 7 258V “Lunar Lake” CPU, which has proved a strong contender even with the latest AMD handheld APUs (accelerated processing items). The Lunar Lake chip contained in the 3D One presents simply sufficient juice to recreation on the machine’s max decision in some titles.

I’m not an enormous particular person. I not often maintain tech that makes me really feel small. Whereas different folks assume near-9-inch gaming handhelds just like the Lenovo Legion Go 2 are too mammoth for his or her miniature digits, you don’t know what a giant handheld appears like till you become familiar with the Abxylute 3D One. It contains an 11-inch IPS LCD show that runs at 2,560 x 1,600 decision with a 120Hz refresh fee, which is equal to many 14- and even 16-inch laptop computer screens. For comparability, the Legion Go 2 can go to 1200p, whereas most 7-inch units just like the $1,000 Asus ROG Xbox Ally X max out at 1080p and 120Hz refresh fee.

The show is first rate for a handheld of this dimension, although it might not be as vibrant as different LCD screens at its peak of 480 nits. The show can be slightly too reflective for taking part in beneath any vibrant lights, however video games find yourself seeming additional lovely when pushed to the system’s max decision, even ignoring the 3D impact. Audio-wise, there’s not a lot right here to set it other than some other handheld, large or small. Even when pushing the amount to its restrict, it gained’t fill a room with sound.

The case additionally comes with a controller attachment level for the 2 Legion Go-like detachable controllers. I might play from a snug sitting place even after I didn’t wish to prop the machine up with my arms on my lap. You simply should hunker near the 3D One to make use of it, or else hook it as much as a monitor. Regardless of the dimensions of the 2 detachable controllers, I discovered the face buttons to be clicky and responsive. I didn’t should reposition my hand that a lot to inch a finger round for the bumpers and triggers. The again ridges aren’t ergonomic sufficient to really feel form-fitted for my hand. In any other case, I might nonetheless use them as separate controllers or alongside the display screen. There are additionally two touchpads, one on every controller, although solely the precise one appears to supply any mouse controls.

The keyboard does a whole lot of the heavy lifting to make Home windows 11 usable on a tool that may usually should depend on the touchscreen or trackpads to get something accomplished. The keys on the machine really feel notably good and hit with a small although satisfying clacking sound. The keyboard’s touchpad isn’t my cup of tea and feels too tough and sticky regardless of its minuscule dimension. Hell, you possibly can deal with this as an overlarge, considerably janky laptop computer. I did get some work accomplished on the 3D One whereas on trip. Was it well worth the problem of dragging it round? Most likely not.

Whereas I might really feel protected in my efforts to make use of the 3D One like some other gaming handheld—albeit one which provides extra muscle on my shoulders holding it aloft—my determined makes an attempt to show it into a contemporary Nintendo 3DS went awry.

What’s up with the stereoscopic display screen?

Abxylute informed me it went with such a big show as a result of, of their checks, that is the display screen dimension wanted to indicate off the 3D impact correctly. The 3D One isn’t providing clients what many consider after they hear the phrase “3D display screen.” You gained’t see pictures come out at you want an annoying jack-in-the-box at a horror-themed carnival. As a substitute, the screens are primarily displaying an offset picture to your left and proper eyes individually. Your mind combines them right into a singular picture with the impact that makes some parts on the display screen pop. Cool, proper? Nicely, it will get much more attention-grabbing. The 3D One makes use of the built-in front-facing digital camera to trace your eyes. Even in case you’re off-center, it’s best to nonetheless be capable of see the 3D picture. It’s the identical kind of expertise employed by the Samsung Odyssey 3D I examined earlier this 12 months. That show was able to 4K decision with 165Hz, although it required a beefy pc to run video games with the 3D impact.

This display screen works for probably the most half, however in case you swim too quick out and in of view, the hand-held’s eye monitoring will wrestle to maintain up. You have to keep place when taking part in with the 3D impact, although you’re punished much less for shifting round. A single change close to the highest of the machine (you too can allow it by the system’s fast menu) allows you to swap between 2D and 3D modes. There are specific video games that Abxylute says help the stereoscopic display screen natively. In any other case, the hand-held will make use of an “AI 3D Mode” that takes a picture in 2D and transforms it into 3D. The corporate mentioned it hopes to finally help greater than 50 video games with native 3D rendering by Steam.

In my checks, the 3D impact instantly made video games run sluggishly, to the purpose they had been virtually unplayable. After days of going forwards and backwards with Abxylute, the corporate informed me I must play video games at particular settings, with out V-Sync and AMD’s FSR (FidelityFX Tremendous Decision) upscaling, and on the max decision to get the total 3D impact. These restrictions already hamper efficiency, however the 3D impact doesn’t appear to be impacting body charges particularly. In supported video games like Baldur’s Gate III, the body fee would stay above 30 regardless of it feeling prefer it was operating at 15. This may very well be as a consequence of latency or another issue from the system primarily duplicating the display screen for the sake of your eyeballs.

Efficiency was a constant challenge when making an attempt it out with video games like Hogwarts Legacy with native 3D help. Abxylute advised I strive a a lot much less intensive recreation, Trine 5: A Clockwork Conspiracy. That recreation runs a lot better on a handheld, and but I skilled comparable lag points that pressured me to show off the 3D each time. Even after I dropped the graphics settings as little as they’d go, lighter video games struggled to carry out. I additionally tried quite a few video games supported with a particular 2D to 3D mod. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Injustice 2 each grew to become utterly unplayable with the 2D to 3D impact.

How about films and 3DS emulation?

If I wasn’t simply focused on taking part in fashionable titles with 3D results, what else is there? I placed on Netflix to observe just a few reveals with the 3D impact on, and thru streaming, I discovered there was little or no lag. Animated reveals like Avatar: The Final Airbender could add a small, although noticeable, impact to come out pictures within the foreground, although it could actually make different pictures look extra blurry than they need to be. You gained’t get a lot of an impact in different media, nevertheless.

There are just a few different 3D methods on the market not made by Abxylute. Sadly, Samsung’s Actuality Hub software program created for the Odyssey 3D monitor isn’t appropriate with something however a Samsung machine. Russ Crandall from the Retro Sport Corps YouTube channel described utilizing the ReShade plugin to allow a local stereoscopic impact in unsupported video games. You have to pressure it to put in on particular video games and alter different recreation settings to create the double picture wanted for the 3D impact. I attempted forcing this on video games like Metaphor: Refantazio and Hades II. Sadly, the consequence nonetheless generated an excessive amount of enter lag to be playable.

Emulators for the Nintendo 3DS, like Azahar, additionally help a 3D impact to be used in video games.  Crandall reported in his video that 3DS emulation is particularly good on the 3D One, so rating one level for Abxylute. Though, spending upwards of $1,500 on a handheld appears excessive when you’ll be able to merely purchase an outdated 3DS and authentic recreation playing cards for a lot much less.

A powerful performer with weak battery life

Just like the MSI Claw 8, the Intel chip housed inside can match as much as and even beat the newest AMD Ryzen Z2 Excessive chip present in handhelds just like the Xbox Ally X—at the very least in some 3DMark benchmarks. That, mixed with the extra-large display screen buoyed with bountiful decision choices, means you may get a shocking variety of latest titles to run effectively.

The Intel chip makes use of the corporate’s Arc 140V GPU, which is a powerful contender greater than a 12 months after the chip was first introduced. When testing the 3D One at its highest 30W TDP, or thermal design energy, the hand-held beat the Xbox Ally X in 3D Mark’s Metal Nomad take a look at by round 100 factors and within the Time Spy take a look at by 200 factors. The 3D One carried out slightly below par within the Metal Nomad Mild checks. In Cyberpunk 2077, it will hit round 45 fps with Steam Deck graphics settings at 1080p, whereas the Xbox Ally X might do 52 fps at 35W TDP. That’s not a giant gulf contemplating AMD’s newest handheld chips squeaked into place on the tail finish of this 12 months.

When testing out our ordinary stack of benchmarking video games, I discovered I might obtain playable body charges on the max 2,560 x 1,600 with out a lot fuss, as long as I restricted graphics settings and relied on AMD’s FSR upscaling to push the needle just a few extra factors in the precise path. That was the case with Cyberpunk 2077 on Steam Deck settings and Shadow of the Tomb Raider on Medium.

Within the cautious balancing act between decision and efficiency, you could finally want to regulate down. For instance, if I wished to get a playable body fee in Horizon Zero Daybreak: Remastered at Very Excessive settings, I wanted to drop the decision all the way down to 1080p.

The tradeoff with any bigger display screen is that you’ll discover when the graphics don’t look fairly nearly as good as quickly as you drop your graphics settings. A smaller show does quite a bit to scale back any apparent graphical blemishes or muddy textures. That’s why Abxylute’s mandate for max decision for native 3D video games hurts all of the extra. You need these lovely foreground colours to pop, and whereas the display screen is sweet sufficient for it, the chip could not have sufficient energy to showcase the very best textures in Trine 5, even after they’re leaping off the display screen.

The opposite challenge is battery life. This 3D One has a measly 50Wh battery, which is much lower than the Xbox Ally X’s 80Wh. In most AAA video games set at max decision, I might barely squeak out greater than an hour of recreation time. Much less demanding titles would do some higher, nearer to 2 hours.

Why can’t we now have good issues?

The 3D One is usable, as long as you remodel your gamer life-style to suit Abxylute’s design. In the event you had the guts for it, you possibly can flip this right into a laptop computer, although with a horrible trackpad and a battery life that gained’t meet your expectations. The idea behind this machine is good. Based mostly on my checks, it simply doesn’t have the facility needed to satisfy these expectations.

Is it value $1,500 at minimal? Nicely, it’s a Kickstarter, in order that opening worth gained’t stick round for lengthy. Gaming handhelds are already means too costly, however there could also be someone on the market who imagines they want one thing this massive of their life, and that they need a display screen that’s equally bigger than life.

Not less than, we lastly discovered the right handheld for folks with Shaq-sized fingers.