Best Retro Handheld

Kyle009 · 26 Sep 2025 at 12:21

I've ordered the Xbox Ally X this morning and will be loading it up with a full compliment of retro catalogues.

Absolute overkill and won't do much different from my steam deck in terms of retro but will share detail in here if people are interested.

Guest2 · 26 Sep 2025 at 13:05

Kyle009 said:
I've ordered the Xbox Ally X this morning and will be loading it up with a full compliment of retro catalogues.

Absolute overkill and won't do much different from my steam deck in terms of retro but will share detail in here if people are interested.

I've never even heard of an Xbox Ally. Is this the same / similar to ROG Ally X - https://rog.asus.com/gaming-handhelds/rog-ally/rog-ally-x-2024/

Is this the only difference 'Complete with impulse triggers for enhanced control.' - https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/handhelds/rog-xbox-ally

Are no it seems to be AMD Zen 5 and slightly different GPU and CPU clocks - https://retrocatalog.com/compare/rog-xbox-ally-x/rog-ally-x

Kyle009 · 26 Sep 2025 at 14:18

Guest2 said:
I've never even heard of an Xbox Ally. Is this the same / similar to ROG Ally X - https://rog.asus.com/gaming-handhelds/rog-ally/rog-ally-x-2024/

Is this the only difference 'Complete with impulse triggers for enhanced control.' - https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/handhelds/rog-xbox-ally

Are no it seems to be AMD Zen 5 and slightly different GPU and CPU clocks - https://retrocatalog.com/compare/rog-xbox-ally-x/rog-ally-x

Yeah it's a new XBox branded ROG basically. With a Zen 2 Extreme and some rumbly triggers.

Should be a decent upgrade over the Steam Deck.

Guest2 · 28 Sep 2025 at 10:00

1240 x 1080 Winlator Max Payne.

non working link

KraniX · 28 Sep 2025 at 10:09

Guest2 said:
1240 x 1080 Winlator Max Payne.

https://i.imgur.com/RY61jsC_d.jpg

Is this the right URL? I'm not seeing anything apart from viral Imgur pics.

Guest2 · 28 Sep 2025 at 10:29

KraniX said:
Is this the right URL? I'm not seeing anything apart from viral Imgur pics.

Imgur always changing the mobile app how links work

desktop generated link

1240 x 1080 Winlator Max Payne.

KraniX · 28 Sep 2025 at 14:31

Guest2 said:
Imgur always changing the mobile app how links work

desktop generated link

1240 x 1080 Winlator Max Payne.

How are the buttons, are they noisy/clicky?

Guest2 · 28 Sep 2025 at 17:18

KraniX said:
How are the buttons, are they noisy/clicky?

Not too bad, no where near as clicky and annoying as the RP mini and RP5 buttons but not my preferred RG Cube buttons. Slightly moreso than Odin 2 mini.

dacads · 28 Sep 2025 at 18:16

I'm guessing the blue and white lines aren't normal? Any idea how to resolve these? Also noticed some other artefacts . Emulator is M64plus fz

imgur.com

Discover the magic of the internet at Imgur, a community powered entertainment destination. Lift your spirits with funny jokes, trending memes, entertaining gifs, inspiring stories, viral videos, and so much more from users.

imgur.com

Update: Resolved this by choosing another emulation profile for the game, although the clarity/detail of textures are not as good in this profile.

Guest2 · 28 Sep 2025 at 22:57

Pretty retro. Glad to see my Win95 image and a few games are working well on the classic

Macky · Saturday at 11:50

Guest2 said:
GarlicOS was/is fantastic but doesnt offer support (or didnt in the past) for N64, Dreamcast and some other systems. That being said, I have the following on mine-

Amiga
Amiga CD32 - doesnt play well / testing
Apps
Arcade
Capcop CPS1, 2, 3
Doom ports
MS Dos
FB Neo (arcade)
NES
Gameboy
GBA
GB Colour
Gamegear
Jaguar - doesnt play well / testing
Lynx
MAME
Genesys (Megadrive)
Master system
MSX
Neogeo
Neogeo cd
Panasonic 3DO - doesnt play well / testing
TurboGrafx16
Pico-8
Ports
Playstation
ScummVM
Sega CD
SNES
Sega CD 32X
Virtual Boy
Videos
Sharp X68000

It boots up in less than 10 seconds from pressing the power button and powers off in less than a second.

Having a bit of trouble booting into sega cd games from the consoles section. I can get it to work from retroarch and selecting a different core. Is there anyway to change that to the default sega cd core? Also getting a "bios not found" on PSX games, though they are playing okay. Pretty sure I have all the bios that came with tiny best set in my bios folder!

Guest2 · Saturday at 21:58

Macky said:
Having a bit of trouble booting into sega cd games from the consoles section. I can get it to work from retroarch and selecting a different core. Is there anyway to change that to the default sega cd core? Also getting a "bios not found" on PSX games, though they are playing okay. Pretty sure I have all the bios that came with tiny best set in my bios folder!

90% chance it’ll be poor bios/roms. Best tiny set should be rebranded ‘terrible set’

Have a read of this and get the correct files

Recommended BIOS Files

These are the recommended BIOS files for RetroArch, AetherSX2, Duckstation, and more. Covering PS1, PS2, and other systems.

www.joeysretrohandhelds.com

Macky · 2025-10-05T07:54:00+0100

Guest2 said:
90% chance it’ll be poor bios/roms. Best tiny set should be rebranded ‘terrible set’

Have a read of this and get the correct files

Recommended BIOS Files

These are the recommended BIOS files for RetroArch, AetherSX2, Duckstation, and more. Covering PS1, PS2, and other systems.

www.joeysretrohandhelds.com

Nice one. Will investigate.

Damn this hobby, I've just purchased an RG40XXH as I was finding platform games a bit uncomfortable on my vertical 35. Totally didn't need another console though..

Guest2 · 2025-10-05T12:31:20+0100

Macky said:
Nice one. Will investigate.

Damn this hobby, I've just purchased an RG40XXH as I was finding platform games a bit uncomfortable on my vertical 35. Totally didn't need another console though..

Dont worry, before long you’ll be on your 10th handheld

I started out with a psp go which I found out could do psx properly and also basic emulation, then got an RG35XX, then went all out with a Steam deck. Then back to smaller handhelds.

RG35XXH was quite nice but always found the H700 chip & Mali gpu lacking for systems more demanding than psx (and if you want to upscale)

Snapdragon all the way for psx and above.

I would highly recommend the Retroid pocket classic 6gb / 128gb version (£106 delivered), though the buttons are quite loud which is a bit annoying and no analog sticks. 6 button means you can map 4 as a stick or use the touchsceen to play games.
Winlator it’ll run Max payne at 1240 x 1080 (native res) which is surprisingly playable with settings maxed out.

Virtua tennis 2 will upscale 2x (1280 x 960) and runs 60fps.

Snapdragon G1 gen 2 isnt great on the gpu front but is highly efficient and the cpu is really strong for the cost - PS2 runs native or 2x on some games which destroys more expensive devices like the RG Cube and 406H which I sold on.