At the IFA 2023 trade show, Lenovo has revealed its latest device: the Lenovo Legion Go. It’s a Windows-powered gaming handheld console just like the Asus ROG Ally, but has one additional trick up its sleeve: detachable controllers just like the Nintendo Switch.
The Legion Go is a mightily impressive looking handheld, thanks in part to its large 8.8-inch, 16:10 QHD+ (2560 x 1600p) IPS display that can push a refresh rate as high as 144Hz and a has a peak brightness of 500nits as well as 97% coverage of the DCI-P3 colour gamut. That’s a larger display than that of the ROG Ally and the Valve Steam Deck, along with a higher resolution and a higher refresh rate too.
Under the hood meanwhile you’ll find up to the AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme processor, the same silicon as the one powering the ROG Ally. This means up to an eight-core, sixteen thread CPU along with 12 RDNA3 compute units in its integrated graphics. That gets mated to 16GB of 7500MHz LPDDR5X RAM and up to a 1TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD, with Windows 11 Home out of the box. Keeping the lights on meanwhile is a 49.2Whr battery, while each controller on the left and right also pack a 900mAh battery in them.
The controllers have batteries in them because they’re detachable, just like the Nintendo Switch Joy-Con. They feature your standard array of shoulder buttons and triggers, ABXY keys, joysticks, D-pad and the right joystick even has a touchpad on it just like the Steam Deck. You can even remove the right controller and then attach it to a magnetic dock, allowing you to play first person shooters with it. It’s also perhaps worth mentioning that these joysticks use hall effect sensors for minimal joystick drift.
Other features of note include dual 2W speakers, six-axis IMU gyro controls, support for WiFi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 along with a 3.5mm audio combo jack, a microSD card slot and two USB-C 4.0 slots that can be used for power delivery and to output video via DisplayPort 1.4. Just like Armoury Crate SE in the ROG Ally, the Legion Go will come with Legion Space software, Lenovo’s own launcher to handle settings, games and launchers you’ll have installed.
There’s no word just yet on local pricing and availability details just yet, but Lenovo has stated that the Legion Go will be available in the US in October 2023 and in Europe some time in November 2023. It comes with a starting price of USD699 (~RM3,244.06) in the US, it has the same price tag as the Asus ROG Ally Z1 Extreme model there, while in Europe it will be start at EUR799.
