The Lenovo Legion Go S Is the First Non-Valve Handheld With SteamOS

Lenovo is going for broke connected its Legion Go lineup. The company’s archetypal handheld was perfunctory, though innovative, and the all-new Legion Go S volition beryllium overmuch much acquainted to anybody who has utilized a Steam Deck of a similar handheld.

It’s inactive an 8-inch handheld truthful that large-screen lovers tin rejoice. The Legion Go S volition travel successful aggregate flavors, 1 with a modular AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme APU that’s truthful salient with the Asus ROG Ally and Legion Go, oregon an all-new, exclusive AMD Ryzen Z2 Go. We don’t cognize however it performs compared to the competition, though Asus is beefing up the Legion Go’s representation with 32 GB of 7500Mhz LPDDR5X RAM. If you were hoping it mightiness athletics the 80Whr artillery of the Asus ROG Ally X, cognize the Go S is sticking with the 55 Whr battery.

Specs are specs, and what’s present seems solid. However, what’s astir breathtaking astir the Legion Go S is that it’s 1 of the archetypal non-Steam Deck handhelds you tin bargain that comes with the Linux-based SteamOS. If you can’t basal Windows connected a tiny screen—and if each your PC games are connected Valve’s platform—this whitethorn beryllium the easiest, astir console-like acquisition you tin person extracurricular of Valve’s ain hardware. Variations with the AMD Z2 Go, 16 GB of RAM, and 1 TB storage, including the SteamOS version, volition outgo $600 and up to $730 astatine the configuration with the higher-end APU. The Windows mentation should beryllium retired successful January, though the SteamOS handheld is slated for May this year.

The Steam Deck already has an AMD CPU, truthful porting SteamOS to the Legion Go didn’t instrumentality excessively overmuch effort. The aforesaid fastener that usually goes to Lenovo’s Legion Center bundle volition alternatively enactment arsenic the Steam Deck’s “Steam” button. Valve representatives told Gizmodo that SteamOS volition enactment the “Verified” tag connected SteamOS platforms extracurricular the Steam Deck. These verified tags volition person a antithetic acceptable of parameters depending, and Valve volition person to show for its ain and Lenovo’s handhelds going forward.

It would already beryllium a important merchandise if that was each determination was. Lenovo has much successful store. The OEM showed disconnected the archetypal renders of a Legion Go 2. The afloat sequel to the 2023 handheld includes the 8.8-inch display, but it’s afloat OLED this time. As each the rumors suggested, the adjacent Go volition athletics the Ryzen Z2 Extreme processor supporting AMD RDNA 3.5 and up to 32 GB of RAM.

It’s besides a large handheld with artillery and retention options. It comes with a 2 TB SSD and a 74 Whr battery. With the OLED display, it seems similar the Legion Go 2 is edging to go the astir premium—and apt expensive—handheld around. The $900 MSI Claw 8 AI+ presently sports immoderate of the champion show with an 8-inch surface and an Intel chip. We’re excited to comparison the latest Claw and the caller duplicate Legion Gos for 8-inch supremacy.

What’s astir breathtaking is the redesigned ergonomics. The archetypal Legion Go was blocky and uncomfortable, thing Lenovo acknowledged with the designs of some the Go S and Go 2. The alleged Truestrike controllers present person rounded corners but inactive detach successful a Nintendo Switch-like manner to relation arsenic idiosyncratic sticks. The caller mentation volition inactive fto you usage 1 controller, similar a rodent for first-person shooters, but it whitethorn consciousness acold much comfy this time. There’s nary pricing oregon merchandise day for the Go 2 yet, though Lenovo said it volition person much to stock aboriginal successful 2025.

If you person nary attraction for handhelds, past astatine slightest Lenovo’s Legion marque hasn’t skimped connected laptops. There’s a wholly redesigned mentation of the Lenovo Legion Pro 7i, one of our favorite laptops of 2024. A caller support connected the backmost includes the company’s “Legion Coldfront Vapor,” which should hopefully support things chill astatine up to 250W TDP. Otherwise, it doesn’t stray excessively acold from the 2024 exemplary with per-key RGB. It includes up to an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX arsenic portion of Intel’s caller lineup, positive the all-new Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070.

Gizmodo is covering each the coolest and weirdest tech from the amusement level at CES 2025 in Las Vegas. Follow our unrecorded coverage here.