Best Retro Handheld

Cavallino said:
Hmm interesting, with BT it supports BT headset?
Howabout performance? What emulation level does it go up to?
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I've never tried a BT headset as do not have one. Emulation performance is listed here - https://retrocatalog.com/compare/miyoo-mini-plus/trimui-smart-brick
Take with a pinch of salt though, N64 and Dreamcast is (so far) far from great. NDS is certainly not perfect either. Its top end is still PSX, with ok performance on PSP, Dreamcast, N64 and Saturn. - use of frameskip on harder to run games, tunring off options that sort of thing.

Ill try and find some BT headphones my partner has. Im sure she has some lieing around somewhere.

Yep, all good. A bit flaky in connecting (which will be OS as it improves) but do connect :)

t4vad7ch.jpg
 
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I tried the Brick with my AirPod pros and from initial testing it was not very positive - pairing was ok although after powering off/on they did not reconnect without re-pairing them.

Once connected I didn’t get any sound, plus when quitting a game I hard to hard power off, although this may not be directly linked to the AirPods.

Will see if I can try some other BT headphones, wouldn’t be surprised if Apple had done something “special”

EDIT: @Guest2 I missed part of your reply, did you get any audio once connected?
 
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I can't wait to get my hands on the TrimUI Brick. Much as I love the Miyoo Mini and the Anbernic devices, they all feel on the cheap side to me, they all feel like a toy. The one that doesn't is the Retroid Flip but that cost like 3x more.

Guest2 said:
I've never tried a BT headset as do not have one. Emulation performance is listed here - https://retrocatalog.com/compare/miyoo-mini-plus/trimui-smart-brick
Take with a pinch of salt though, N64 and Dreamcast is (so far) far from great. NDS is certainly not perfect either. Its top end is still PSX, with ok performance on PSP, Dreamcast, N64 and Saturn. - use of frameskip on harder to run games, tunring off options that sort of thing.

Ill try and find some BT headphones my partner has. Im sure she has some lieing around somewhere.

Yep, all good. A bit flaky in connecting (which will be OS as it improves) but do connect :)

t4vad7ch.jpg
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Is that MinOS ?
 
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IanAG said:
I tried the Brick with my AirPod pros and from initial testing it was not very positive - pairing was ok although after powering off/on they did not reconnect without re-pairing them.

Once connected I didn’t get any sound, plus when quitting a game I hard to hard power off, although this may not be directly linked to the AirPods.

Will see if I can try some other BT headphones, wouldn’t be surprised if Apple had done something “special”

EDIT: @Guest2 I missed part of your reply, did you get any audio once connected?
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Yep, was flaky connecting but ince connected i heard audio fine. It was gone after reboot though and needed to reconnect.
 
Raymond Lin said:
I can't wait to get my hands on the TrimUI Brick. Much as I love the Miyoo Mini and the Anbernic devices, they all feel on the cheap side to me, they all feel like a toy. The one that doesn't is the Retroid Flip but that cost like 3x more.



Is that MinOS ?
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Stock OS, MinUI is… minimal :D
 
Guest2 said:
I ordered another recently direct with Powkiddy and iit cane out cheaper that Aliexpress. I’ll expect it in about February :D
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I must admit I only ordered Retroid stuff direct from the manufacturer, mostly because I just go to Aliexpress because all these are made in China and then I get it from the one with free shipping usually.
 
I must admit I completely forgotten about the import tax thing on these retro handheld, mostly because they are all under £135 and even when I bought my Retroid Pocket Flip that came to $169, I never got taxed/VAT when it landed. That £45 added to the £200 makes the RP5 a bit too close to a Steam Deck v2 territory. Like it must going to be 50% of the budget.
 
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Raymond Lin said:
I must admit I completely forgotten about the import tax thing on these retro handheld, mostly because they are all under £135 and even when I bought my Retroid Pocket Flip that came to $169, I never got taxed/VAT when it landed. That £45 added to the £200 makes the RP5 a bit too close to a Steam Deck v2 territory. Like it must going to be 50% of the budget.
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I mentioned it earlier in the thread when I bought the RP4 pro (for $199ish iirc) that you should always pick 4px shipping if using the official retroid site. I did and it arrived fast and customs free! I can;t recall where I found the info (probably reddit) that 4px somehow avoid customs fees. Don't know how, and don't really care :)


rp2000
 
I reused the micro SD card that the SP came in to put MuOS on it as it wasn't a no brand one but KIOXIA (Toshiba?), with a Sandisk as the Rams card on slot 2.

1 week in....it wouldn't boot!

Put in another SD card that I have from the RGxx and it booted up fine.
 
Hi there I’ve got an urge to get into retro gaming and have looked back over this thread somewhat. If I got, say,a 40xxV what would you need to do next. Do you download the games from somewhere and do you need to set it up more than what comes on it? What can you play on it? Do you need apps or operating systems? Thanks
 
I'm asking this out of naivety, it's not a loaded question but why do people bother with all these myriad of Android devices just to play games? They could play on their phone or say get a steam deck which can play pretty much everything.

For example, there are literally hundreds of devices that can play super Nintendo and other 16-bit games. Like how many do you really need?
 
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ZXSpekky48k said:
Hi there I’ve got an urge to get into retro gaming and have looked back over this thread somewhat. If I got, say,a 40xxV what would you need to do next. Do you download the games from somewhere and do you need to set it up more than what comes on it? What can you play on it? Do you need apps or operating systems? Thanks
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The Anbernic devices all come with their own OS loaded full of ROMS and emulators pre-configured. Maybe a few iffy ROMS, and maybe some games you never heard of. but more than enough for you to sink your teeth into without doing anything extra (downloading/configuring etc). Off course after a few days, just like every OcUKer, you will start messing around loading your own OSes and emulators and new stuff., but thats all optional!

I think with the 40xxV you can go upto PS1 games with no issues, and any games higher than that will require faffing around to get working well (changing frameskip options and other complicated stuff!)

Noxia said:
I'm asking this out of naivety, it's not a loaded question but why do people bother with all these myriad of Android devices just to play games? They could play on their phone or say get a steam deck which can play pretty much everything.
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My first handheld was Linux based (Anbernic rg35xxh), and the 2nd was Android (Retroid 4 pro). For the linux one, it made sense, streamlined, dedicated OS, no extra faff and optimised, but these devices only go up to a certain performance level, for various reasons.

The Android device, I had similar thoughts to you, being an Android phone owner. But in the end the customisation of Android is what makes it good as a standalone device! In addition so many more power4ful CPUs available with the Android devices compared to Linux. Compared to my phone (which has a faster CPU than my retroid 4Pro!) I get:

1) dedicated controller, built in.
2) A somewhat optimised Android build, (no samsung/google apps etc, unless you choose to add them)
3) Most importantly, no 3g/4g/5g to hammer the battery, or interrupt my gaming session!
4) For most 16bit emulation you could also turn off the wifi to increase battery as well as its not used in those old gen consoles.
5) Sd card slots for making adding/swapping content easier (I think very few Android phones have sd cards these days)
6) Mainly it's just battery. It's a dedicated device, with not loads of background network stuff checking for new messages/calls/notifications, switching between cell towers and wifi networks and roaming (all can reduce battery life).


Steam deck I won't speak much about, as I don't know much, but instantly you are talking more money, more weight and more configuratiuon needed to get up and runnning (imo). If you want to play PC games as well it's [probably great, but for retro gaming its overkill.


rp2000
 
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Noxia said:
I'm asking this out of naivety, it's not a loaded question but why do people bother with all these myriad of Android devices just to play games? They could play on their phone or say get a steam deck which can play pretty much everything.

For example, there are literally hundreds of devices that can play super Nintendo and other 16-bit games. Like how many do you really need?
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I can and have played retro games on my phone through Delta, either using on screen input or with a BT controller.

However the attraction to these devices for me are

1 - Nostalgia factor. Whether your nostalgia is towards the Gameboy shape or the Game Gear shape. There is a console to get that feeling
2 - Quicker and more streamline to get into games.
3 - Separate dedicated device. No different than people wanting a separate MP3 player
4 - Why so many? It's tech, its collecting. Why do people have so many watches? Guitars? Shoes or Handbags. It's just something, like a hobby.
5 - The tinkering aspect. Each device can be endlessly tweaked, the way the OS behave, the way it looks on screen.

They also are constantly updating it and upgrading it. They started off quite janky and slow and not very good screen. Recently in the past 12 months it has got better in many ways from better joy sticks, better screen (it's all about the correct number of pixels to match the original games, either native or proportion), better design, material, ergonomics and even prices.

There is something to be said on holding a little console that plays games and only games that used to have to be played at home in front of the TV on the go with actual SNES colour buttons.
 
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