I’ve lost count of how many “retro handhelds” I’ve bought, but this one grabbed me hard, purely because of how it looks. Anbernic markets it as a “fighting handheld” built for FTG, but the button layout is obviously lifted from the SEGA Saturn pad. Which means it’s not just good for fighting games — it’s better suited to SEGA MD and Saturn titles. That’s the idea, anyway. Reality is another matter. When this thing launched, they pulled a sneaky one and split it into two versions: the single-OS ARC-S and the dual-OS ARC-D. Generally the whole “Linux and Android dual system” thing on these handhelds is pointless, but of course this one used it as a sales gimmick. The retro colorway everyone wants is exclusive to the dual-OS model, while the single-OS one only comes in “translucent black” and “translucent white” — the colors that love to crack. And the dual-OS version costs more, so players like me end up paying extra for a dual-boot setup we’ll never use, just to get the color we want. And in practice, this machine has way more problems than I expected.

The Devterm is a portable computer from Clockworkpi, modeled on the TRS-80, the first mass-produced personal computer in history. Not a 1:1 replica of course — a shrunk-down one. The full specs are on the official site, go look for yourself. Here’s a quick rundown of the config I bought: the A06 high-end core, which is really an RK3399 with 4G RAM and Bluetooth/Wi-Fi built in. As far as this device goes, that’s the top spec you can get. By the way, the core slots in as a module over a DDR2-SODIMM 200-pin interface, which means you can swap in other compatible cores yourself. I asked the official folks whether things like a Banana Pi or Orange Pi would work. They didn’t say Yes and didn’t say No — just that they only provide system compatibility for official hardware. Which I read as “it might run, but if there are driver problems, that’s your problem.” I bought this thing on impulse. I wanted a portable text-input device, ideally one you can hold with both hands. You might say plenty of mini Windows laptops can do that, but I don’t think they’re coool. Nothing is coooler than something like the Devterm, so on a whim I dropped 1600 on a top-spec, unopened unit on Xianyu.

A while back I was listening to a podcast from Aifou, and one line stuck with me: “I think the most impressive thing about Lei Jun is that he can push prices down so low that nobody else can match him.” In that context, judging by the standard of “pushing prices down,” Lei Jun really is impressive. Whether it’s Xiaomi or Redmi, they’ve definitely driven down the price of a lot of things. But is that what “impressive” really means—driving down the price of something expensive so it sells cheap? Shouldn’t it be the opposite? Isn’t it far more impressive to take something worthless and sell it at a very high price? By that standard, the “Big Monster Block Bluetooth Earphones” are a very “impressive” product.

2023 was a fairly significant year for me, and a busier one. The price of being busy is that I messed around with a lot of stuff but couldn’t be bothered to write up impressions. Half the time I’d tinker with something, list it on eBay, and then feel even less like writing. You can call me busy, you can call me lazy, or I can just say the thing had no highlights and wasn’t worth writing about. But it’s the end of the year, and I don’t want this year’s business spilling into the next. So here’s a summary looking back at what I messed with this year that’s worth mentioning, with some blunt takes and a recommendation ranking thrown in. These are all short notes, no screenshots. Anything that deserves a deeper writeup I’ll do separately.

In recent years the term “open-source handheld” has basically drifted away from what it originally meant. Originally “open-source handheld” referred specifically to retro handhelds running open-source systems. Some were commercial products flashed with third-party firmware, like the early Subor RG97; others were open by design from the start, like the later Odroid Game series. But what comes to mind now when someone says “open-source handheld”? Generic molds, RK3566 SoCs, and a pile of messy emulators. Lately Android comes standard. Never mind whether the shell infringes on anyone’s design—the SoC’s own attitude toward the open-source community is questionable. That’s why overseas these products were never called “Opensource Handheld” but “Retro Handheld.” A handheld for playing retro games, so retro handheld. Makes sense. Today I’m talking about two retro handhelds you could call “closed-source handhelds”: the RG35XX from Anbernic (Zhou-ge), and the Miyoo Mini Plus from Miyoo, Zhou-ge’s nemesis.

I keep seeing posts like this online: “Looking for a device to play Gal.” “Which tablet is good for eroge?” “This handheld is great, a perfect eroge-dedicated machine.” … Sometimes I’m confused too. The “Galgame” category has been a dying industry for ages, so why does it look like there are still so many fans online, willing to spend real money on a pricey dedicated device just for it? Actually, long-time readers of my blog probably know that about 10+ years ago I wrote a similar article. I briefly laid out some of my own views back then; some hold up now, some were incomplete. After all these years I’ve built up a fair amount of galgame experience and cycled through a lot of devices for playing them. Maybe we should sit down and talk about this again, and share some of my experience.

Preface: my history of buying Windows handhelds The first Windows handheld I bought was probably back in 2015 — also the industry’s first Windows handheld, the first-generation GPD Win. I backed it on Indiegogo. Honestly, I knew it was made by a company in Shenzhen, China, but I had no idea it would later go on sale in the domestic market. I paid in converted USD, and the shipping date was half a year out. What happened next a lot of people probably know already: GPD brought the machine into mainland China, put it up for preorder on JD.com, created a Discord group, and kicked off all kinds of shameless marketing. I was in the first batch of people to join the Discord group, and I even added the two founders on Discord — one was “Wangcai,” the other “Lao Zhu.” I told them I was an Indiegogo backer but physically in mainland China, so could they just ship domestically. Lao Zhu said no problem, and sent it by SF Express. The machine arrived quickly and I wrote a short review. I was actually fairly satisfied with it — mainly because it was small and had everything you’d expect. There were some QC issues, but nothing major. What dissatisfied me most was the screen’s severe color shift, basically no calibration, and the low resolution — a lot of Galgame couldn’t show the full picture. Later I backed the first-generation GPD Pocket. That product’s build quality was far better than the Win’s: all-metal body, genuinely nice to use as a tiny computer. But I have to say, for performance’s sake GPD set very aggressive power limits on many of its products, which made battery life pretty poor. After that I went on to buy GPD Pocket 2 MAX, Chuwi minibook, GPD Pocket 3, and recently even picked up an Ayaneo Air Plus at a low price… So I’ve used a fair number of portable Windows devices, and they always had something unsatisfying. Even with the GPD Win, I never actually finished a single game on it — too hot, battery life too bad, and too much fiddling required. Many times I’d spend a whole day getting one game to run, and by the time it worked I’d lost interest in playing. There was a time I thought Windows handhelds — or X86 handhelds in general — would just always be like this. Then I met the Steam Deck, and it got me to finish several AAA titles, even got me willing to spend a decent chunk of money buying games on Steam. It also cemented one belief and opinion of mine: The Steam Deck is currently the only X86 handheld worth buying.

A long time ago I used Logitech’s trackball line — the much-praised M570. For a while it was my daily driver; I bought several of them and even swapped in a fancier microswitch. Then… at some point I just gradually stopped using it. Maybe I got tired of cleaning the ball every day, or maybe it was the lack of Bluetooth, which always meant giving up a USB port — either way, “trackball” quietly dropped off my peripherals list. Later I heard Logitech had put out a new trackball with some kind of electromagnetic scroll wheel, but the price was absurd. Then came the M575. It’s the M570 with Bluetooth added and a slightly reworked shape, and that seems to be about it. Filling in the old model’s Bluetooth gap took Logitech at least five years. Impressive stuff.

Not long after I sold off my HP Chromebook X2 11, I regretted it badly. I couldn’t find a tablet that met my needs anymore. Sure, that knockoff Surface from HP had all sorts of crappy problems, but compared to Android tablets that can only play games and watch videos, its advantages were pretty obvious. Then I saw this thing on eBay: Lenovo Chromebook 10e Another Chromebook tablet. Performance-wise it’s about the same as the Duet, but the difference is it actually has a 3.5 mm headphone jack, and it comes with a keyboard cover that looks pretty solid. The only catch is it has no trackpad, but who cares—it’s a tablet, it has a touchscreen!

I’ve said before that ChromeOS tablets might be the future of “productivity”. But the Duet’s performance and RAM were just too weak, so I eventually sold it. Not long after, I saw this new product: HP Chromebook X2 11 A 3:2 screen, 8GB of RAM, a Snapdragon 7c processor, a detachable keyboard, a magnetic charging stylus… This was exactly what perfect “productivity” looked like. Doesn’t that seem cool… I forgot the rest.