MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ vs. Z2 Extreme: How Much Faster Is Intel's New Chip

Handheld gaming devices have been dominated by AMD chips for the past few years, but Intel is now stepping into the space with a processor built specifically for this category. The new MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ is the first device to carry Intel's Arc G3 Extreme chip, and Intel positions it as a step up in both speed and efficiency compared to what handhelds have offered before.

Claw 8 EX AI+ carries over an 8in 1200p display, which remains larger than what you get on the Steam Deck or the ROG Ally. It also keeps the same Hall-effect joysticks and triggers, which should last longer and avoid drift over time.

The shape has been reworked to be more comfortable to hold, particularly for players with smaller or medium-sized hands, though the unit remains fairly large and a bit heavier than the Steam Deck.

The biggest change in this release is the Arc G3 Extreme processor. MSI was also the first manufacturer to launch an Intel-based handheld several years ago, in a market that AMD chips had dominated up to that point.

The first Claw, built around the Ultra 7 155H, ran into driver-related issues. At the same time, the second-generation model with the Ultra 7 258V closed the gap, becoming competitive with AMD's Z2 Extreme.

Performance Testing Against the Z2 Extreme

We used several games to compare the two chips at their full 35W power setting. When Cyberpunk 2077 was played at 1200p with low settings and upscaling set to balanced, the Z2 Extreme averaged about 50 fps, with 1% lows close to 40 fps. This is workable, but not as smooth as the 60 fps target. Under the same settings, the G3 Extreme averaged about 80 fps and had 1% lows of close to 60 fps.

The same thing happened in God of War. With some settings changes, the Z2 Extreme could still be played, but the G3 Extreme went from 53 fps to 90 fps, a 70% improvement that makes the experience go from barely playable to comfortably smooth. 

When you compare performance mode upscaling options, the difference in average fps narrows to 22%, but the difference in 1% lows remains above 50%.

Sons of the Forest showed the Z2 Extreme falling short of 60 fps, while the G3 Extreme offered a more comfortable experience at around 70 fps. More aggressive upscaling helped the Z2 Extreme slightly, though on the G3 Extreme, it actually lowered 1% lows. In Ark Raiders, a lighter title, the gap remained clear.

Performance mode upscaling increased the results from 102 fps to 130 fps, while less aggressive upscaling nearly doubled the G3 Extreme's output compared to the Z2 Extreme.

Across every game tested, the G3 Extreme consistently outperformed the Z2 Extreme, and in some cases turned a game that was barely playable into one that ran smoothly. Beyond raw speed, the extra headroom gives you more room to tune power consumption for different situations.

Battery Life and Power Tuning

How long a handheld's battery lasts depends a lot on what you're playing. After about an hour and a half of full-power Cyberpunk 2077 use, the 80Wh battery dies, which is roughly the same as a Z1 model under the same load. We got 14 hours and 10 minutes of playtime in Stardew Valley, which runs at 60 fps with the power slider all the way down.

This is about 4 hours longer than the Z1 model can handle. You can expect results in the middle of those two ranges, depending on the game and power draw. The extra performance headroom also allows for lower TDP settings without sacrificing playability.

For example, if 60fps average with 1% lows near 50fps in Cyberpunk 2077 on the Z1 Extreme at full power is an acceptable target, the G3 Extreme can hit that same benchmark at just 18W, extending battery life to just over 3 hours, about 75% longer. If battery life matters more to you than peak performance, a bit of tweaking goes a long way with this chip.

Price is where the Claw 8 EX AI+ becomes harder to justify for some buyers.

This configuration comes with 32GB of DDR5 memory and a 1TB SSD, and it carries a starting price of around $1,699, a premium of around 60% over the Z2 Extreme-based Claw, ROG Ally, and Steam Deck OLED. That gap is large enough that most people currently using a handheld in the $1,000 range are unlikely to jump straight to this new model, especially with memory costs pushing up prices on other upcoming handhelds, regardless of chip choice.

If you want the strongest handheld currently available, the Claw 8 EX AI+ delivers nearly two full generations of improvement in a single release. An OLED display would round things out, though that remains the only real complaint. The redesigned shape makes it more comfortable to hold, the build quality feels more solid, and the G3 Extreme processor stands out as the defining upgrade,