Possible Decent Powerbank/Handheld Combo. Q88 Metal 1:1 Aspect 240x240

[thin quest]

Might end up being decent since it does 15W wireless and 20W wired along with the 240 x 240 1:1 aspect ratio and can do through 32Bit. I ahve one ordered and will do the usual unboxing first look when it arrives.

https://rh-go.link/Q88

[zinc anvil]

This is probably gonna be kinda jank but I am SO interested in it. Looking forward to the review lol

[kindred pulsar]

oh look an sd card slot

already better than the ones that came before it

[lofty timber]

It's great to have options

[near sleet]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1K4qnKU1A8

I think it's the same one that's shown up under the Subor brand in China

[grim violet]

Suspiciously doesn't look too awful, though I assume the chip is underpowered ewaste

[vestal pond]

what a cute lil guy

[hollow moth]

I ACTUALLY SAW IT ONCE

Hold on, let me check my photos

I don't have it for some reason

Oh I think I know where I found info of it

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1hGC2YYECo

This vide

The only one I actually found at Huaqiangbei is the Q8, the quasi-Famiclone

[flint vapor]

I do like the little smiley face

[zinc anvil]

Very pow kiddy of them

[flint vapor]

Worst case scenario, the 5000mah battery should give a lot of NES time

[vestal pond]

I wonder what chip is in it

[hollow moth]

I wonder if it's even Linux running under the hood

Could be an ancient uCOS

[storm grail]

A mini, stickless, 1:1 device?!

[hollow moth]

240x240 though

and since there's no scaling options, gba is stretched full screen

[vestal pond]

eeeesh

https://tenor.com/view/for-those-reasons-im-out-shark-tank-mark-cuban-gif-16319251

[flint vapor]

If it's the kind of chip that is normally in these things, GBA may be a stretch in more than one way....

[lavish fjord]

SF3000 will be better than this device especially since the L1 and R1 are essentially unusable.

[hollow moth]

Watch the video. Seems like Dragon Ball Advanced runs good

[flint vapor]

Oh, I missed that there was a video.

Also, I am dubious about the integrity of this lanyard charger.

You know, I started following this thread for the memes.

But I actually am sort of curious if this is a decent buy now.

I mean, 240p, everything stretched 1:1....it'll be a bit jank.

But stuff like the cable doubling as a lanyard, sort of suggests they have put some thought into the design here, right?

Metal case as well. Interesting....

The real question is...would I trust this thing to pump charge into my phone at 20w

Ok, fine, pink one bought. We'll see 🙈

A metal pink 1:1 mini powerbank with a charger that doubles as a lanyard is just too weird not to check out.

[flint vapor]

Will this be using the same screen as the Funkey/nano/q36 mini?

[zinc anvil]

nope, those are 1.54 inches, but this one is apparently 3.0 inches

so approx 4x the viewing area, slash 1/4 the pixel density 🥴

[flint vapor]

Oh, I thought it was smaller than that

Not too bad though, I only really want it for Gameboy/game gear anyhow, so it's all good.

It'll play NES and Master System, but doesn't technically have enough pixels, so that's fun

[lavish fjord]

Why not just get the sf3000 though I know it has about half the battery of this one but it just seemss more usable over all?

[flint vapor]

I've bought 3 datafrogs, all as gifts though

To be honest, I am really interested in this device as a powerbank first, and gaming device second.

[lavish fjord]

That's fair

[flint vapor]

Oh, wait, you said sf3000. I've got no use for that size/powered device to be honest.

I like my RP flip, and can't see why I would use the sf3000 over that.

[lavish fjord]

yeah trying to compare apples to apples as much as possible since this is a one to one screen

[flint vapor]

Sf3000 is a 16:9 isn't it?

[near sleet]

16:9 screen and can't run any 16:9 games

[zinc anvil]

what's ironic is this thing only has USB-C ports so it's not gonna be capable of charging a huge portion of retro handhelds that don't support C-to-C

[zinc anvil]

a.k.a. "hey I found this screen"

[flint vapor]

Nice for GBA/media.....but yeah, it's a choice.

[lavish fjord]

Yeah it's the main shortcoming on that one imo at least

[near sleet]

yeah i suppose it does have its use as a video player with the kickstand and all

[near sleet]

one of the sf2000-hardware power banks is like that too. so you can't charge the sf2000 off its relative

[flint vapor]

Ha, I hadn't thought about using it to charge other handhelds. But yeah, it'll charge my RP flip, but not my V90.

[lavish fjord]

I was mostly just curious on peoples thoughts for this over that one but good too see we are finally geting some useful powerbank/ gaming devices

I had hoped on thee E5 but the E5 plus if they give us functional buttons with be a good choice at least on paper

[near sleet]

E2 is my favourite one so far I think. It is just another data frog-like but it has an IPS screen which most of the others don't

[lavish fjord]

Yeah I saw that one but couldn't get anyone to give me an option on it as it's looked okay and usable as well

[near sleet]

i have an E5 as well but the integration between the console and power bank sides seems really sloppy. like you can charge it to full according to the power bank indicator and the console will report low battery. and it seems to drain itself really fast when not in use

when i first got it i got it stuck in a state where it had enough power to turn on but not boot and i had to let it run down again

[flint vapor]

I'm not expecting it to be amazing or anything. It's not much more costly than a normal 5000mah metal wireless 15w/20w powerbank.

If it's just a little powerbank that can play Gameboy games as a novelty, I'll be happy with it.

[lavish fjord]

My main complaint on that was that I can't seem to find a reviewer that liked the buttons or dpad at all

[near sleet]

the d-pad is weird yeah. i dont think the buttons are bad really

[lavish fjord]

Yeah I'm not expecting my SF3000 to be amazing either but thought it would be okay for GBA and only mod I plan on doing is to increase the battery size

capacity*

[flint vapor]

That's cool. These things are what they are really. Don't cost much, don't expect much

[zinc anvil]

Why am I so close to buying this instead of a CubeXX

[flint vapor]

Because you could buy two of them for the same price, and have 10,000mah of battery

Also, I am dumb, I've only just realised the cable doubles as a lanyard because they want you to use it as a powerbank, and you need the cable for that.

I mean, hey, someone somewhere sat down and came up with that solution to the problem, and I respect that.

Being a powerbank handheld is kinda of funny. It ends up being super low powered, but the same battery capacity as the Odin 2 mini and RP5.

[cinder light]

They make another model (Subor Q8 vs. this is the Q88) with "proper" 4:3 (presumably 320x240) screen. Without scaling, that'll work better than 240x240. But it's still probably eWaste (unless you're actually in need of a wireless battery bank, but even then, why this? 😂).

Here's a quick overview video (shows off how thicc chungus this thing actually is):
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1021146642192528

Chinese storefront (approx ~$27.88 USD):
https://www.smzdm.com/p/118318813/

[near sleet]

that one is basically a famiclone

but it does have an SD card slot and you can load your own roms with limited mapper support

i have one

so it's interesting but not as capable as this new one

[flint vapor]

Just noticed my pink one is a "gradient colour".

We'll see what it actually is

@thin quest do you know when yours is arriving?

Mine says it's coming on the 12th, but AliExpress dates usually mean nothing for me, they just turn up when they turn up.

Sometimes sooner, sometimes later.

[thorny crest]

im sorry 240x240??!!!!!?

[flint vapor]

Rg Nano/Funkey resolution.

But on a 3" screen.

Basically, this isn't one for integer scaling purists.

But if you just want a powerbank that plays games ok....we'll see.

[muted bloom]

I played pico 8 on the funkey s and despite the fact that the screen would theoretically need 8 more pixels on reach side that was actually great. there problem is that this one probably can't play pico 8...

[flint vapor]

Chip unconfirmed.

But a metal $30 power bank handheld....I doubt it

[thin quest]

It says Nov 10th

[zinc anvil]

@thin quest bonus points if you can figure out what SoC this thing has! If it runs ARM Linux... Pico-8 may be possible with a little hackery

[golden totem]

Choice marketing copy

[flint vapor]

Do you know of any other handheld that can gently paste though?

[zinc anvil]

Why do I listen to you

[flint vapor]

I've been to into this hobby for too long. I don't even register the word salad of hype text any more.

[flint vapor]

I'll be honest, my knowledge of powerbank gaming handhelds is pretty shallow.

What is the best powerbank handheld currently, that 16:9 E5 non plus thing?

They are all a bit rough, right?

[gilded hearth]

if only it used 2-3 18650's in parallel (like a diy powerbank) and at least an rk2366

[flint vapor]

5000mah is a fair size, it can fully charge my phone from 0% and still have battery left over for gaming

As for the SoC.....we don't know what it is yet. Given the price point, battery size and metal case, I assume that's where a "compromise" will have been made, but we'll see.

It mentions GBA, and shows a picture of it with a list of PlayStation games....

But realistically, on a 240x240 screen I doubt you'd want to play anything more demanding than SNES. It's a lot of pixels not shown otherwise.

The Funkey and rgnano showed it could be done on a 240x240 screen....but the screen being 4 times the size will make it more apparent that you are missing a lot of pixels.

I definitely wouldn't want to tinker with PSP on this, put it that way

[sleek saffron]

technically most handhelds can be used as a powerbank if you try hard enough

5000mah for a powerbank like this isn't going to be a ton, especially with magsafe since the conversion rate with qi charging is usually awful, and it looks to be about as thick as some magsafe 10k mah powerbanks

i did really wish they put some decent soc on one of these things though

[zinc anvil]

I ordered one… fingers crossed it’s actually Linux based

[sleek saffron]

and what if it's like rtos or something

[zinc anvil]

I’d like to hack on it

[sleek saffron]

[zinc anvil]

I’m not smart enough for anything but Linux

[sleek saffron]

i'm hoping they could at least put an ingenic chip on this

4843cesadcateatpaw

i have a powerbank handheld and bobby barely uses it

[flint vapor]

I dunno. My RP Flip is greedy. It takes charge from my phone instead

5000mah is alright, it's a bigger battery than my phone has no idea about wireless charging, never owned anything that uses it.

[sleek saffron]

you have to try harder

use a usb-c to usb-a adapter

and plug your phone into that

https://tenor.com/view/brain-gif-338783462287106063

[flint vapor]

You can't make me, you're not my real dad.

[sleek saffron]

but i am a cat

[sleek saffron]

when buying a powerbank, you also have to consider the capacity lost while the power is transferred (confusing i know), some of the power from the battery will be converted into heat usually

so that 5000mah could look more like 2500mah for example if 50% of the power is lost when transferring

high quality powerbanks have a conversion rate about or above 80%, though that will also depend on a lot of factors, and then it just falls after that

[flint vapor]

I'm sure this is a super high quality powerbank.

[sleek saffron]

well it is twice the price of a normal powerbank of it's capacity and featureset

[flint vapor]

But do normal powerbanks have a cable that doubles as a lanyard?

I think not

[sleek saffron]

only some

and they're not lanyards

joesad~1

they're just cables stuck to the back

actually some are lanyards but they're not the same ones in this powerbank

some of them are cables soldered directly into the powerbank

and there's rubber inserts or whatever they're called holding the cable to the powerbank

[flint vapor]

Not going to lie, I dig the aesthetics of this as well. 1:1 pink metal with a smiley face. It just looks so dumb.

[sleek saffron]

it is very beautiful

i find the curved sides on the back interesting

[flint vapor]

Let's it fit the "cyberpunk" backside.

I forgot about the back of it.

God this thing is so weird looking, I love it already

[sleek saffron]

chinese product design can be so beautiful sometimes

the l and r buttons are kind of ridiculous and the buttons might make this handheld uncomfortable behind my phone but woah

[flint vapor]

The l and r buttons are definitely comical. You would have thought either shoulder buttons or a 6 button ABC xyz would have been better. Or at least put them ABOVE the start and select

But whatever. I just want this for Gameboy really. Maybe a bit of game gear/nes.

Nothing that really requires me to use those buttons anyhow.

Basically, I have low expectations, but also, I'll be happy with a pretty minimal level of performance here.

[sleek saffron]

i'm hoping this exceeds my expectations

[flint vapor]

Well, look at it this way. Retroid was charging about $50 extra for the metal RP2S variant. Just for the different shell. And they didn't have fun colours.

Compared to that, this seems good value

[sleek saffron]

https://tenor.com/view/cat-wtf-oh-hell-nah-gif-4183712492046775434

yo i thought rp was supposed to be a value brand

[flint vapor]

Definitely got more pricey since the t618's.

Mostly pretty good value for what they are.

The metal 2S for $150 was a bit much though. I get that limited quantities bump up the price and stuff.....but if this dumb powerbank handheld can do a metal shell....

[zinc anvil]

https://tenor.com/view/nod-cat-hyper-gif-9540792418684483949

Bobby’s getting a power bank handheld and hacking together a custom build for it?

[flint vapor]

I wonder what the OS will be like on this thing.

It's not like it'll need to do very much I guess.

[sleek saffron]

would look good on my resume

trolley

[flint vapor]

Should get Stubbs on board with this, meme it into being the new datafrog

[zinc anvil]

we need this smiley as an emoji for the server

[flint vapor]

Clearly the handhelds most important feature

[sleek saffron]

maybe people in china are just depressed

so they put smiley faces everywhere

[wide echo]

"decent" 1:1 240p

[zinc anvil]

1:1 240p can be good for some systems tbh… if we can unlock some scaling options it’s pretty great for SNES

[sleek saffron]

that's if the soc can even run it properly

[amber gorge]

If nothing else, this at least looks interesting. I really like the colors

Shame it’s only 5000mAh, though

[flint vapor]

5000mah is massive for a handheld of this size, Odin 2 mini sized.

There are 6000mah powerbank handhelds, but they are much bigger (and jank).

Mines in the country! Might arrive sooner than expected, we'll see.

[amber gorge]

Oh yeah, I just mean as far as a power bank goes

[flint vapor]

Oh, sure, there's a compromise there compared to a larger powerbank. But size constraints mean that bigger would have its downsides, and quickly becomes not pocketable, particularly when you add the game playing stuff on.

And hey, as a device that will put some charge into your phone relatively fast, it's cool.

[amber gorge]

Very true!

[flint vapor]

It mentions PS1 on the listing, I think the weakest systems that can play playstation to any extent is stuff like the V90.

Assuming it's V90 levels of "power", SNES should be playable for all games, if dropping frames on things like Starfox and Yoshi's island.

Or it might be more powerful.
Or less if the firmware is bad.

I dunno. We'll see.

If we are now getting no-brand powerbank handhelds with V90 levels of performance....that's pretty impressive.

It would be great if it was the same allwinner v3s that was in the other 240x240 handhelds, the Funkey and RG nano. That handled even SNES fine.

[zinc anvil]

Now THAT would be sick

[flint vapor]

Hell yeah.

Really anymore power than that would be pointless anyway, with a screen this low res

[zinc anvil]

What, you don’t wanna upscale the internal resolution of your PS1 games to 640x480 only to downscale them to 240x240?

[flint vapor]

I mean, when you put it like that.....

[amber gorge]

I’m interested to see how the reviews do for this

[flint vapor]

Absolutely. Couldn't care less how well this thing does with playstation, I'll never use stuff like that on this thing.

But how good is the d-pad? There's something that does matter.

We await deadfreds views

[flint vapor]

That said, my threshold for an acceptable d-pad on this is pretty low, given I only really want this for Gameboy games.

As long as it's not awful, it's fine 😄

[flint vapor]

So, I can't see the listing on AliExpress anymore. Is it still there for other people?

[near sleet]

it's showing as unavailable in my location (UK) now, it was available before

[zinc anvil]

I still see it (US)

[flint vapor]

Yeah, I am UK based as well. Weird.

Evri have it, so it is coming....no idea what's going on with the listing if it still shows to US customers

[flint vapor]

If mine does arrive today (and it's not overly difficult), I'll try and work out what the chip is.

Guessing somewhere between V90 and GKD pixel power, but we'll see.

[flint vapor]

Looks like no delivery today. The mystery of the chip continues....

Hurry up Evri, process it at your hub!!!

[zinc anvil]

First thing imma do is make a copy of the SD card. I wonder whether (and hope that) it contains the firmware on the card and not on some difficult-to-access internal storage

Mine apparently arrived to my local airport… but whether “local” actually means “local” or just means “somewhere in the US” is impossible to say at the moment

[amber gorge]

Yeah, like when it says it’s with the “local delivery company” just means it’s out of customs and being transported

[flint vapor]

Well, mines with the delivery hub, somewhere in the UK....which can't be that far, we only an island

[thin quest]

https://rh-go.link/Q88

https://rh-go.link/Q88

[flint vapor]

Haha, sale already, good stuff.

Still not available to UK buyers as far as I can see. Which is odd, as it definitely was available, mine should be arriving today.

[flint vapor]

It's actually really nice feeling. No idea what the music videos it comes with are though

The lanyard cables sort of click in, and are actually quite sturdy feeling.

The back does look pretty sweet

Chip is the SW6201s.

Helpfully the back of this thing is transparent, so you can just see the chip

Oh wait, that might just be a powerbank thing, rather than a chip to run games?

I dunno, anything here looks familiar to anyone?

[flint vapor]

I think this thing is pretty weak to be honest. Refuses to play Yoshi's
Island or Starfox. Will play super metroid.

Despite the Ali listing, no sign of playstation games.

It's also got some really odd pirate games, like a Pokémon platformer

I like it. But I was only after a powerbank that plays Gameboy, so I had a pretty low bar for it to get past

[zinc anvil]

Yeah I mostly just want gb and gbc on it

What’s the SD card contents look like?

[flint vapor]

You mean file structure wise?

[zinc anvil]

Yeah

Also if you could show what the sd card partition structure looks like in Disk Management that would be helpful

[flint vapor]

The photos folder has waifu pics

[zinc anvil]

hmmmmmmmm this does not bode well for tinkering. Looks like the actual OS is on internal storage. Thanks for sharing the screenshots!

the "apps" folder may be an entry point though

also WILD that the SD card thinks it's a 256 GB

[flint vapor]

Apps is just these two folders I am afraid.

[flint vapor]

That's just because I transferred it to a sandisk I had lying around. I don't trust the ones they come with at all

It works fine with the sandisk, so at least it's not as picky as the datafrog

[flint vapor]

Incase anyone is wondering about the size, here it is on a 3DS XL.

It has 3 times the battery capacity of the 3DS, and nowhere near the power

[grim violet]

How's the dpad?

[flint vapor]

Feels nice. Probably harder to hit diagonals that some, but that's more of a preference I guess, you need to roll into it.

Diagonals work fine on r-type or something.

Passes the contra test well, but may not do great on the shoryukenable test.

All context I guess. It's a much better d-pad than on the datafrog or V90, and I don't feel like it's worth opening up to anything to it like I immediately did with those.

Buttons also nice and clicky.

Build quality is better than expected to be honest.

221g, which is a lot of the size of the thing.

But, well, it's all metal and battery, and my phone is bigger and heavier

I'll see how I feel about it over the next week or so.

But I think this will be fine as my new chuck in pocket when unsure if I will play games device.

Quick blasts on Gameboy.

Finally, something to replace the V90.

[sleek saffron]

looks like it’s just an ic that handles fast charging

you might need to break the thing to see whatever powers it

[flint vapor]

Yeah. It doesn't have any external screws, I am not breaking into this thing

[sleek saffron]

dw I’m a cat, I’ll break it for you

https://tenor.com/view/cat-glass-knocking-over-glass-gif-5270740

[flint vapor]

One cool thing about it I didn't realise, it can charge things up at 20w, but also charge itself at 20w. Which is pretty quick for this level of device.

[flint vapor]

It's a kind offer, but no thanks

[sleek saffron]

for a device like this, that’s actually pretty good

the dy19 is always inputting/outputting at 5w

[kindred pulsar]

so based on what I'm hearing it's a better battery bank than handheld but still one of the best handhelds you can get for $30 lol

I'm surprised at how enticing this is

[flint vapor]

I mean....you can get a miyoo A30 or RG28xx for $30. I don't want to oversell this thing, it's a worse handheld than those two by a long way.

But I just wanted a slim small tough device that plays simple games and is a powerbank. It does both those tasks very well.

[kindred pulsar]

hmm I forgot those are that cheap

so yeah forget I said that lol

[flint vapor]

The $30 handheld market has changed a lot in the last 6 months

I would look at this as a great $20 handheld. More depending on how much value you add to it being metal, and more again for the useful powerbankness.

Well worth it for me.

[kindred pulsar]

there's not enough competition in the dollar store handheld market 😔

[flint vapor]

The chicken nugget isn't far off

I doubt there will be any CFW on this.

But that's ok.

I have taken off all the jank videos and games it came with, and put my top 20 Gameboy games on it.

It'll probably stay that way forever. No messing with CFW updates, no fiddling with retroarch settings.....it's set up, done, and I can just pick away at old Zelda and mario games when I am waiting for a friend to arrive or whatever.

[sleek saffron]

if I buy this, its probably going to be stuck on my phone’s back

[flint vapor]

Oh, and here's one for the dumb engineering work around files.

It doesn't have a battery indicator in its software.

But it does have LED's in the back to indicate how well charged it is.

Which only come on when it's charging, not in gameplay

[sleek saffron]

oh dear

that’s the same kind of shit they did on the dy19 but at least you could click the button

is there any sort of button on this device?

[flint vapor]

I can confirm it is magnetic 🧲

[sleek saffron]

most MagSafe powerbanks come with a button to turn the wireless charging functionality on

[sleek saffron]

yay

[flint vapor]

Not as far as I can find.

[sleek saffron]

wtf it just charges when you put your phone on it?

[flint vapor]

I have no magsafe devices to test I am afraid 🤷‍♂️

[sleek saffron]

https://tenor.com/view/banana-cat-banana-cat-crying-gif-15062598587219580285

[flint vapor]

The cable lanyard thing is nice though

[sleek saffron]

it’s always the underground aliexpress powerbanks that consider this edge case stuff

[flint vapor]

It's a thoughtful and snug design. Nice way of keeping a cable with you.

I can loop it around a finger, and if I am playing this while standing waiting for something and drop it, I am confident it will stay attached.

It's a nice touch.

[zinc anvil]

I’m still excited for this even though I’m probably not gonna be able to do much tinkering with it. Depending on what those emulator mod files are though it may still be possible 🤔

I wanna take a 1:1 family picture with my RG Nano and RGB30 once this and my CubeXX arrive

[flint vapor]

Yeah, no idea what the mod files are

I tried deleting them to see if the system would just not show the other emulators. That didn't work.

I assume this thing sort of just is what it is really.

Which is fine. It's a cool little 1:1 device.

Yeah, I am sold. V90 will be going on eBay soon. My little pocketable has finally been replaced.

[flint vapor]

Yup, automatically charges wirelessly

[sleek saffron]

I wonder what they’re doing to achieve that

or why most powerbank companies don’t bother to do this

stoinks

maybe they’re pretending to be an apple official magsafe powerbank

[flint vapor]

No idea. Just another odd quirk to add to the list for this thing

[flint vapor]

Oh yeah, it's a bit difficult to tell in the photos, but the pink is actually only pink on one side, and fades into a light purple on the other side. Just incase that matters to anyone

[sleek saffron]

The photos make this effect look a bit subtle

[flint vapor]

Aye. It looks nice enough.

The best pink purple console around

[zinc anvil]

@flint vapor This may be weird but think you could check whether one of those .mod files can be opened in a text editor?

[flint vapor]

Like notepad?

[zinc anvil]

Yup

[flint vapor]

They are all like that

[zinc anvil]

Thank you! So now we know they are actually ELF files. So… once again not something easily hackable, but it’s still possible…

[sleek saffron]

turns out santa wasn’t stuck in the chimney after all…

[thin quest]

Yeah it under $30 this is a lot better than the E5

[sleek saffron]

you got yours?

[golden totem]

Oh no I kinda love it 🙈

I’m not going to buy one (no more 240p devices for me, especially when Game Boy is a priority) but if someone wanted to upload the non-rom contents of the sd card I wouldn’t be able to help myself from doing a little data mining 😅

[amber gorge]

The pink to purple gradient looks really nice. I also really like the skyblue color

I might actually pick this up

[flint vapor]

I'll be picking up another one as a Christmas present.

The powerbank option means it's a great way to get people who won't use it for games much to bring it with them. And then play games.

Also UK peeps, the original link is still dead for some reason, but a few other stores have it now.

https://a.aliexpress.com/_EGtaJjr

[flint vapor]

Looking forward to the review.

[flint vapor]

I can do that....

[flint vapor]

I have no idea what that means...but good, I guess

[golden totem]

Nice. It’s late here but I’ll take a look sometime tomorrow.

[flint vapor]

No rush. This thing isn't going anywhere

[flint vapor]

https://mega.nz/folder/UP92VDxD#Rm7L4e6kTd4NVcSr7IAxFA

All roms removed. Just mod/sft files.

[sleek saffron]

it's santa's little elfs

santa and his elfs are inside the machine and he needs to get out

well not the elfs they will have to be sacrificed

[flint vapor]

Elf sacrifice. Very metal.

And appropriate for a metal powerbank handheld 🤘

[sleek saffron]

imagine if the powerbank had lead weights or something

that would be heavy metal

🤘

[flint vapor]

Slight design "flaw". The power button is big and on the front. It needs to be pressed for 3 secs to turn on, but if you have tight pockets, it might turn on by accident.

I don't have tight pockets, so I am all good

[golden totem]

So this looks like an sf2000 situation where the "cores" are compiled for bare metal instead of for Linux (based on pulling strings from gba.mod). Which means cfw is unlikely.

Looks like it's using the same chip as the Trimui Model S and V90 (ARM926EJ-S).

If this had had Tina Linux on it I wouldn't have been able to resist. Glad I dodged that bullet 😅

[flint vapor]

Cool, thanks for looking. Interesting to know about the chip.

And yeah, not that I've tested too much, but the level of performance does seem similar to my V90.

Which is fine. It's my Gameboy device really

Crazy we are now getting V90 performance in powerbank handhelds.

One funny moment I had was playing worms on GBA on this thing. It actually handles it better than my RG35xx does, which always had slowdown

But that was specifically an emulator issue (whatever garlic used by default) rather than a power issue, this is clearly a weaker handheld than the RG35XX.

[golden totem]

Yeah, iirc garlic defaults to mgba which is much more demanding than gpsp, especially older versions of gpsp (which is probably what’s being used here).

[flint vapor]

Aye, I just always thought it was funny I needed to run the PlayStation version of worms (which ran fine) instead of the GBA version

[thin quest]

So no way to get retroarch on it is what you're saying

[flint vapor]

Also, if it's using the same chip as the V90, I wonder if the guys that made the Miyoo firmware on the V90/bittboys would be interested...

More generally......I can't believe my V90 replacement has ended up with the same chip as the V90

[flint vapor]

I know nothing about this stuff, so take my post for what it is.

But the Miyoo 2.0 firmware on the V90 does use retroarch. And if this is using the same chip....

[golden totem]

Same chip is one thing but you also need to worry about drivers for all the other hardware including screen and input and whatever weird electrical engineering compromises they had to make to manufacture this at low cost and it’s a guaranteed headache for anyone without oem sources .

[flint vapor]

Ahh well. Still a great GB device

[zinc anvil]

bare metal instead of Linux

🇫

[flint vapor]

Wooo. Definitely the metal 1:1 powerbank handheld of the year

[flint vapor]

For real though, been enjoying some great Gameboy today. Micromachines has a 2 player mode where one person controls the car with the d-pad, and the other controls the other car with the buttons. Great fun.

[zinc anvil]

So, does it look like these .mod files are standalone emulators themselves, or are they (libretro?) cores? Let’s say someone with the knowhow did compile an executable to run on the bare metal of this device - could they then drop it in place of one of these .mods to run custom code?

[golden totem]

I’m at the bounds of my knowledge here but I’m almost certain they are standalones. Retroarch cores are libraries. When I say bare metal I mean no std libs, no libs at all (at least not as we think of them on Linux and certainly not as convenient)

[ornate mural]

Does anyone know how gba titles looks like on this screen ? I play mostly GBA titles but I’m quite interested in this device partly because of its powerbank capabilities

[lavish fjord]

Do we know what the chip is that it's using yet? As I'm wondering if it's a mips chip which may mean we'd nedd to hit up the data frog throng on modding this device.

[golden totem]

Running strings on the emulator files suggest arm. #1301668922067521536 message

[dim epoch]

pretty terrible I imagine, since it's gonna be 3:2 stretched out to 1:1

[flint vapor]

They stretch 1:1.

On the plus side, the screen is actually able to display all the pixels GBA needs

I put some multiplayer games on here with GBA for the kids. Turn based and stuff both can play at once. Which is fine. They play.

But for most, I doubt a 1:1 stretched GBA with l and r buttons under start and select is the best way to play

If you're not fussy, and just want to play games, it's fine.

[muted bloom]

There was no world where it could happen, but that's too bad that this thing can't do pico 8.

[flint vapor]

Kinda. It would have been a great Pico 8 device.

But then it also would have cost more, and I only wanted it for Gameboy

Just put my now replaced V90 on eBay. We've had a good run. I did not expect that dumb thing to be my small pocketable device for this long

Pour one out for one of the greats.

[zinc anvil]

The world it could have happened was the world where it actually ran Linux

[dim epoch]

do we know what chip is inside it?

[zinc anvil]

#1301668922067521536 message

[dim epoch]

wonder if we'll be able to chuck MiyooFW on it with a little work

[flint vapor]

#1301668922067521536 message

[amber gorge]

If the OS is on internal storage, CFW is gonna be difficult, if possible at all

[flint vapor]

OS is definitely internal.

[golden totem]

I wonder if its nand is read only.

[thin quest]

Who would like to see anbernic turn the rg28xx into this metal and everything

[zinc anvil]

RG28cubeXXM

@golden totem don’t suppose you saw how it sets the screen resolution when you were digging around in gba.mod huh?

[golden totem]

Nope. I only ran strings -n 8 gba.mod on it. Just now I pointed Cutter at it and as expected there's nothing Linux-y (for lack of a better word) about it. No standard symbols, no notable paths. Someone more familiar with bare metal stuff might be able to make heads or tails of it but that's not me 😅

[thin quest]

Are there a llms that can look at code and tell you what it is like can chat gpt4 look at this and answer it or is that what color is

[flint vapor]

Pity about the software on this. The buttons, d-pad, metal shell, power bank features, all great. It has the hardware to do more.

But that said, on a 240x240 screen.... whatever really. It's an awesome little Gameboy/nes powerbank

[amber gorge]

Damn, this actually went up $4 on Ali for the 11/11 sale lmao

[flint vapor]

And its disappeared again for the UK (including the new sellers that popped up).

Either there has been more demand than expected, or their production capacity sucks.

Or both I guess.

[amber gorge]

I might just pick this up anyway since it’ll contribute towards a better coupon, so the full price instead of the sale price isn’t a big deal

[flint vapor]

I think it's a good buy.

Even ignoring all the cool quirky stuff about it....if you just want a nice 1:1 machine that's smaller than the 4" screened ones, but larger than the (impractical) 1.54" screened ones...this is your only option really.

Or just a 1:1 that is bigger than the Funkey/rg nano, and doesn't have sticks

[final orbit]

There’s no trigger buttons right?

[flint vapor]

Gosh no. It doesn't play any systems that use triggers

[zinc anvil]

Purtyyyy

[flint vapor]

The power bank age has begun

I held off until the 11:11 sale to buy another one. Then it disappeared from the UK selling Ali stores.

No 11:11 sale for me.

[amber gorge]

It's not on sale for 11/11 anyway. It went back up to full price, at least for the US

[flint vapor]

Yeah. I would be happy if it was just being sold right now

[amber gorge]

I'm gonna wait for an actual sale on it tbh

[flint vapor]

At this price....I dunno. I can't be bothered to wait around and maybe save £5 down the line.

Plus this stuff just stops getting made without warning. Don't want to miss out on that sweet, sweet charging cable lanyard

[iron island]

What a cool device. If Anbernic makes one of these with an h700, there would be a marketing frenzy on TikTok and Temu

[zinc anvil]

🤩 agreed #1301668922067521536 message

[thin quest]

https://youtu.be/VQ169z1FYQM

[flint vapor]

Fair review.

It's a great handheld, as long as you get what it is. Ok software, great build quality (for the price) and a nice powerbank, as well as lots of nice touches.

[zinc anvil]

I like how ‘lil it is. @thin quest if I may make a suggestion for next time, I would love to see more size and/or weight comparisons between devices in your videos! Keep up the interesting content 🤘

[flint vapor]

It is indeed little

[zinc anvil]

Kinda hilarious they have the same size controls basically

[flint vapor]

Yeah.

The sticks are where little devices are really found lacking against the big ones with full sticks.

But this thing gets around that by....not having sticks

Comically, the d-pad is actually better on this than the legion go

Buttons are buttons. They can be bad (too mushy), but past that I don't really care. Good on both devices.

[tribal jacinth]

this thing is so interesting to me, just arrived

the size and shape is a lot more to my liking than i expected

and it uh, does indeed work as a fast wireless charger for my phone so that's kinda neat 😅

[flint vapor]

It's the first ARM device I have bought for myself since the RP Flip. So....yeah. I guess that means something.

A niche product for sure. But it's the only thing in the niche

[sleek saffron]

does it start charging automatically?

[tribal jacinth]

yeah, as soon as you slap it onto the back

anybody else able to get the SD card to show so you can add games?

looks like mine surprisingly didnt come with games

that's normally what i'd prefer but it looks like my pc isnt detecting this, it has a pretty shoddy looking card

should i swap in another of my own or does it need files off the SD card

ohh, you connect it via usb

that's my bad

nevermind that doesn't actually work

this is a weird first

is there a specific folder structure for adding games? or is mine a complete dud because of a faulty sd card?

[tribal jacinth]

not sure if any of this applied with yours

[tribal jacinth]

ooooohhh sorry to be a bother again but thank you so much for uploading these!

[tribal jacinth]

didn't need to flash it but threw it onto another cheap sd card (not as cheap as the one it came with, lmao) and then copied the folder structure from your screenshots and it now works as intended

[thin quest]

I'm finding myself using this more and more

[lavish fjord]

So will be seeing more and more GBC and GB games in your reviews then?

[tribal jacinth]

it's a cute little thing, struggles at most things above gbc i threw at it but i like it for what it is

would say it's a genuinely safe to pocket handheld without needing huge pockets

just above that funkey / rg nano / q36 mini / gkd pixel size bracket

but it seems a bit compromised compared to one of those funkey os devices

[zinc anvil]

Mine just came in today, and I haven't gotten to mess with it too much yet but I will say it was handling Mega Man 2 on NES pretty well (and it looked pretty good too, I barely noticed the stretch)

[tribal jacinth]

the core(?) had text issues in shiren gb2 during "cutscenes"

of text just not appearing

tbf that's a japanese game tho so pretty rare case, but i noticed it gets a bit choppy in general depending on the game

where gambatte on a nano i cant even think of an instance it'd dip under 60

[flint vapor]

Haha, glad it helped.

Mine worked fine, and came with games, which I deleted and replaced with my own like I always do

Haven't even tried to connect via usb to by honest, I just take out the SD card through habit at this point, I've found cheaper devices disconnect easily, so it's not worth the hassle of trying.

[tribal jacinth]

fair point yeah

i tried taking it out first and it just wouldnt get detected so i'm glad swapping for your own works just fine

[flint vapor]

Sounds like you got a lemon to be honest.

My SD card detected first time, no issues there. So what you did should have been fine.

Can't speak to how long term it is, as the first thing I do is copy them onto a SanDisk or whatever I have lying around.

[tribal jacinth]

genuinely glad you did or i'd basically only have an (admittedly cheap) portable wireless charger

[flint vapor]

Happy to help.

Luckily the stuff on the SD card you need is just the emulators, the file structure, and a few other teeny files, so it's no hassle to just leave online, as it's not very big.

[lone pelican]

there is no 3.5mm jack, so does it got USB-C out audio?
Or the only way to play silently is muting the device?

[flint vapor]

I think just muting the device.

[tribal jacinth]

yeah

if it's any consolation, it has no way of booting straight into a game so as long as you turn off your keysounds it will always boot silently and then let you drop your volume

so if you're in a situation that your only concern is making noise you can keep it quiet

[flint vapor]

Those key sounds got turned off straight away on mine

[tribal jacinth]

yeah they were dramatic lol

i appreciate that it did actually have that option, i think there are a rare few that miss it

one other tiny gripe i have is that at least in my experience it can't actually save games ingame

save states do work well, though

[flint vapor]

Datafrog you needed to use the community software stuff to turn it off, as I recall

[tribal jacinth]

i'm a pretty nervous guy around save-state only because i am the KING of managing to find ways to corrupt my save states lmao

[flint vapor]

It only lets you save one state per game right?

Seems like it should be fine.

[tribal jacinth]

as far as i could tell yea, which is true

i tend to only do 1 save state

or 2 technically with the auto save but yea

[flint vapor]

There's an auto save? I just use the save state, I didn't notice.

[tribal jacinth]

oh no not on this device, meant for my general habits sorry

[flint vapor]

Ahh, I see.

I normally just use a save state and ignore other stuff, so it took me a while to notice that the in-game saves were not working

[zinc anvil]

Square gang rise up

[amber gorge]

I caved and ordered the blue one with a $9 off code

[flint vapor]

It does sit quite well in the more pocketable than rgb30, but not teeny like the nano size.

[flint vapor]

I still can't order a second one, still not available to UK buyers.

Good thing I jumped in early!

[amber gorge]

Definitely!

I just hope someone figures out how to get CFW on this

[flint vapor]

Seems doubtful to be honest.

Which is fine. It does what it does ok.

[tribal jacinth]

yeah in terms of shoddy stock firmwares and how limited the performance is i'm actually pretty content with it haha

high up the list considering how bad it could've been

i'm still shocked this isnt a famiclone like every other power bank + game combo

[flint vapor]

Indeed.

You can load your own roms, you can turn the key sounds off, it comes with a movie player, music player, and ebook reader.

These software things might sound pretty standard to people used to Anbernic and powkiddy.....but in famiclone powerbanks, it's really not to be taken for granted

[zinc anvil]

Shaun would hate the controls on this thing… not sure what exactly triggers it but sometimes inputs get eaten or interrupted 😬

That said it’s still pretty good for strategy or slower puzzle games

Some of the better dome switch buttons I’ve used

[flint vapor]

I've only really done Gameboy on this, and all the games there tend to be slowed down, due to the original screen ghosting/being small so needing to see what was going on without a backlight. So not noticed any missed inputs so far. But that might be different if I was playing higher end systems.

[tribal jacinth]

i probably picked a bad snes game to test with assault suits valken but i figured with the bigger dpad i should give a try to something more action-y

big mistake, very laggy lol

other than just several gbc games

survival kids lagged a bit once the game opens up after the start, which i've just never seen in gbc emulation before lol

[chilly ivy]

https://rh-go.link/Q88

ordered one!

Seems like a a pretty solid option for the price range

[flint vapor]

Weird, must be a firmware issue I guess. No way is this playing GBA, but lagging on GBC.

[flint vapor]

Purely as a handheld, there are better options for the price.

As a powerbank and handheld in one, it's great.

Also has an odd niche, being the only 3" 1:1 screen around, and probably the cheapest metal handheld ever!

And hey, if rh give a review, in addition to deadfreds review, and this picks up a bit of traction, maybe a bit of datafrog style customising from the community isn't off the cards after all....

[tribal jacinth]

im glad to have it as a bit of history

i feels like the kind of thing my mom could've ordered on accident as e-waste but if i had something like this as a kid i'd absolutely be in love with it

[flint vapor]

Hell yeah. If I had this when I just a Gameboy with about 4 games, it would have been amazing!

[hollow tundra]

not available in europe 😭

[flint vapor]

Aye. I am UK based. It was for a few days after deadfred started this thread, then it went away, came back for a day and went again.

I assume it will be be back eventually....

But I want to buy another as a Christmas present, and still can't right now

[hollow tundra]

it looks cute with this smiling face on the left side, I want it

[flint vapor]

Yeah. Honestly, it's got dumb colours, metal, smiley face, a lanyard charging cable, unusual sized 1:1 screen....it's got a lot of odd personality traits

[amber gorge]

Yep, that’s exactly why I bought it. It might not be anything super amazing for the price, but it’s unique and I love that

[hollow tundra]

its so bad it's good handheld xD

[zinc anvil]

Yeah I think the emulators are just wildly inconsistent in their quality and optimization, haha. I would think if it’s doing NES and GBA as well as it is, it should be able to handle GBC

[tribal jacinth]

gba has some hilarious audio hitching in advance wars

it sounds like the kind of dragging the kid in whiplash got yelled at for

this is a lot better than what i got in snes though i will say

[zinc anvil]

Oh see I have been playing with the volume off during work zoom meetings so I haven’t noticed

[tribal jacinth]

that's the best application for these handhelds

desk workers dodging the secret spy mics that
companies probably use

cant prove it myself, tho, with how many coworkers i've heard with kids and pets barking and whatnot

[flint vapor]

I'll never use the sound on this. And that's fine. It'll be like my V90, used in public in short bursts.

[tribal jacinth]

something else funny i noticed is that this is constantly slipping down my desk

it's a little too sleek for its own good

nothing else i put on my desk starts moving

but i guess there must be the slightest of tilt that only it can't grip against

[tribal jacinth]

I think this handheld's emulators dont play well with translations or romhacks...

Was trying ayakashi no shiro for gameboy and it crashes every time you get into your first fight

[flint vapor]

Playing warioware inc on the GBA to unlock 2 player for the kids.

Looks like L and R are mapped to the X and Y buttons.

Which, given where the L and R buttons are on this thing, is probably for the best

[flint vapor]

Plus side, it's back on sale in the UK (and maybe this works for EU as well?)

https://a.aliexpress.com/_EvxMqo1

Negative side, it seems to have gone up in price a lot. Maybe a code can bring it down to make it better though.

Difficult to judge if it's still worth it or not to people, as vouchers change things depending on what you have available.

And this thing is an odd niche. If you want a good powerbank handheld.....this is all you have really

Plus, even now, it's not exactly hundreds of pounds.

[tribal jacinth]

oooh that's almost double the price

i'm glad i jumped on when i did lol

i wonder if it was a price error before or if they just realized they actually have something people are interested in on their hands

[flint vapor]

Dunno. I suspect the latter.

People seeing the first decent powerbank handheld ever and snagging it.

If it were just a price error they wouldn't be turning up in different shops after being unavailable for days, they would just change the price I guess.

[tribal jacinth]

ah, true enough

[flint vapor]

I found a bulk supplier

https://m.globalsources.com/Handheld-game/Handheld-Game-1220657408p.htm

[tribal jacinth]

oh is this like a drop shipping type deal

jeez lol

[flint vapor]

It's nice to have the option of ordering 1000 of them at once

[tribal jacinth]

i figured something like that existed but never really thought about how that would work tbh

[hollow tundra]

Its the first time I see an item without a fake discount, maybe thats the reason for the higher price?

they will discount it by 70% or sth during black friday sale?

[flint vapor]

Who knows, this thing seems to be all over the place, in price and availability

[zinc anvil]

Lmaaaaaaaaao in the “SMD” section there’s a game labeled “Crash Bandicoot”

It’s just freaking Taz Mania lol. Not even a title screen hack or anything

[amber gorge]

Sounds about right

[analog flume]

My little blue boy is out for delivery today. I jumped on it mainly for the size and the 1:1 screen. If someone got Pico-8 running on the Funkey is there any possible way it might run on this little guy?

[amber gorge]

The Funkey S could have cfw, this most likely can’t, so without that, no

[zinc anvil]

Native pico 8 is almost an impossibility, because 1) pico-8 is closed source, so the only operating systems it can run on are those officially supported by its devs, 2) this device does not run Linux, but the emulators look to run directly on the hardware, and 3) there is no version of pico-8 that can run on bare metal

Emulated pico-8 through a fake08 standalone is more of a possibility, if someone can compile it to run on this thing? But I have literally no idea what difficulties they might face in attempting to do so, with no OS and no standard libraries or anything to rely on

[flint vapor]

To be honest, even the V90, which has the same chip and has had years of dev work on it, only does Pico 8 "ok". On some of the games.

So I doubt this will ever be a good Pico 8 device.

[amber gorge]

Pretty much everything about this would be awesome for pico 8 if it weren’t for the chip and software

[flint vapor]

Yeah, it's a pity.

Just bought my second one as a present, AliExpress takes so flipping long sometimes, I have to order now to ensure it gets here by Christmas

The firmware might not be amazing, but it's cool for someone who isn't in this hobby. Zero settings to mess up

[flint vapor]

FYI, just tested out how long you can play GBC games (links awakening) on this thing.

The answer is...20 hours.

On MAX brightness.

Might do another test on minimum brightness just for the fun of it.

Minimum brightness on this thing is still way more than the OG GBC displayed anyhow....

[thin quest]

Wow that's amazing

[flint vapor]

The added bonus of being a powerbank handheld. If you go out not wanting to use it as a powerbank....it's a Gameboy beast with the battery size of an Odin 2 mini

[tribal jacinth]

20 hours is nuts

You could probably clear several entire games with that much life wow

that is kinda the main reason i had an interest in those power bank handhelds previously

[flint vapor]

The speed run record for Pokémon blue is a few hours or something.

Imagine how many times you could complete Pokémon blue on low brightness

I'll start a test to see how long it can go on low brightness tonight.....it might be a while before I report back with the result

[flint vapor]

AliExpress seller cancelled my order for my second one. No other sellers seem around that deliver to the UK.

At this rate I am going to have to just give my unit as the present, and buy myself one later on

[amber gorge]

Mine came in yesterday! Gonna be messing with it either today or this weekend

[flint vapor]

Ace. One of the nice things about the limited feature set is that it doesn't take long to set up

Also, if anyone is struggling to find these on AliExpress (like me) eBay sellers seem to have them now. Just search for "q88 console".

[amber gorge]

Interesting. The SD came with only about 9 NES games, all of which seem to be modified to fit the 1:1 aspect ratio

[zinc anvil]

Oh weird, I think I got a lot more NES than that. I wonder if the cards are curated by the individual sellers? Also I think they just stretch everything to fit the screen, don’t think the Roms themselves have been modified. I could be wrong though

[amber gorge]

These definitely aren’t stretched. They’re definitely scaled well and look normal. Lemme take a picture

[zinc anvil]

Yeah between “nes” and “fc” I have like 3500 Roms from the stock card lol

[amber gorge]

Oh, so those 9 NES roms are on the internal storage. The SD isn’t showing any roms at all?

If I take the SD out, those 9 show up. Nothing for any other systems.

With the SD in, there aren’t any roms or anything at all.

But here’s the scaling on one of those roms

[near sleet]

pal mode gives 240px vertical already & maybe the squash from 256px wide to 240 is just too subtle to be noticeable? they definitely havent cropped off any of the background

what are the other games on it btw? its fairly common for these cheap devices to have a few legal-ish games built in for plausible deniability

i'd guess your SD card is bad if it isn't showing anything with it inserted

[zinc anvil]

Roms on internal storage?? Interesting…..

[amber gorge]

Edacity Snakes
Penguin
Play Cards (Solitaire)
Radish Field (Bensheng 4 in 1)
Rockeman
Seaman
Shoot (Track & Field for NES, skeet shooting portion only)
Silent Hunter
Stub Game
Undersea

Edacity Snakes is from some plug and play system

Some of these I couldn’t find any information on

Might have to grab the SD files from someone so I can put that on an SD that isn’t dead. I haven’t tried viewing it in my PC yet, though

[flint vapor]

This is how mine arrived. With thousands of roms as well, but I took those off for this upload.

https://mega.nz/folder/UP92VDxD#Rm7L4e6kTd4NVcSr7IAxFA

[amber gorge]

Awesome! I appreciate it!

[flint vapor]

I just tried turning mine on without the SD card in. And yeah, I get these weird NES games.

So it looks like your SD card just isn't working at all.

[amber gorge]

Hmm, I’ll check it in my PC this weekend out of curiosity, but I’d be switching to a new SD anyway

[flint vapor]

Yeah, it's the usual trash tier SD card. I moved the files over to a SanDisk immediately.

Weird it comes preloaded with different games internally though. I've never seen that before

[flint vapor]

I failed on the low brightness battery test.

It gave out when I was asleep.

So I know it lasts for somewhere between 24 hours and 32 hours.

I'll do another test and be a bit more accurate

[tribal jacinth]

Just got back home from a hike and found it slipped itself off my desk and landed face up like it was set on there lol

what an absolute brick

can't trust it to stay still for anything though it must be trying to do a retro handheld toy story

[flint vapor]

It eventually gave out after 29 hours of Gameboy (low brightness). So you get almost 50% more battery going from the highest to the lowest brightness.

[tribal jacinth]

wewwwwwwwwwwwwww