Hello folks! **Techdad** here!

Here to provide you an honest review from my "user persona" perspective (working dad, loving simplycity over complexity, seeking hassle-free devices) of the GPD Win 5. 

Since this is my first written review here, just a style presentation. I'll try to be as much **simple** as possible, focusing on some "**key parameters**" which I think are meaningful for personas type like mine. I will focus more on **usability** **over techy numbers** which might be interesting for some but not for others. 

Hope you'll appreciate my job and will support me by following since more is about to come!

***Let's go to the review!***
***I will consider the review still in progress so to update it also according to your feedback in case you would like me to focus on specific aspects***



***Introduction:***

I've had my unit for almost a month now. Started using the stock Windows then I've installed Bazzite as I use to do in almost all my handhelds. Version I'm using is the 395+ and 32Gb RAM and has been bought from a quite famous reseller of GPD products all over the world. 



***Form factor - how it feels:*** 

Usual "line/bar" shape. Feels good in the hands due to the ergonomical grips. Not as good as the Xbox Ally X which inherits the fantastic Xbox controller form factor but it works quite well. It's a weighty unit (around 600g without battery, around 950g with the battery). But the grip is good so the weight feels not so heavy.   
Compared to the LeGo and LeGo2 (more or less same weight) I've felt the Win5 better to be hold in hands and I have not small hands for sure. 
The triggers are wide and confy and there's a small switch to changw the LT RT run from long to very short (a click - for FPS) like in the Xbox Pro Controller. 

It has an external battery which can be attached just in the back of the handheld or kept separate while still linked to the main unit with a property cable which is shipped with the product (on this we will spend a couple of words in the Pros and Cons section). When the battery is not directly attached to the main unit but linked via the cable, the weight of the main unit is really incredibly light which makes for me that is another one for the positives!



***Usability and usecases - how it performs:***

The performances are making this device the current Best in Class. I've owned and tested a lot of handheld devices and I should say that I've been never satisfied completely with current handheld devices performances... until now. 

My typical usecase is like: "Oh, I got a few minutes, let's play something quick out of my library". And my library is made of all types of games, from lightweight titles to modern AAA. 

I can't really stay behind settings and configurations and the out of the box experience of the Steam Deck was offering me an unbeaten way to replicate that seamless console experience which I was looking for. But the Steam Deck is now very old and struggles to run most modern games.   
Being extremely transparent the main issue with these handhelds is how much compromise you'll be able to accept. Decent FPS, low graphics, poor battery life. 

The GPD Win 5 with all the power given by the AMD Ryzen Strix Halo 395 AI Max+ and the 8060S Graphics is very capable to run quite everygame with almost no compromises to accept apart from the battery life which is anyway something to manage. 

BUT... having a detachable battery, you'll be able to have spare battery and continue playing (do not expect an hot swap, but I think it's anyway a very good feature). 



***Pros and cons:***

*+ Performances without compromises*

*+ Form factor and grip*

*+ Detachable battery\**

*- Pricepoint not for everyone*

*- Being very picky some position of some ports might have been better placed (USB-C)*



***Final words - who's this for?:***

A device with currently best in class performances. More than double or triple the power of the current Z2E family present in most of the devices.   
Pricepoint not for everyone for sure. Buying (or non) depends really on your budget and what is this for you, your usecases. If your budget is limited, this is really an expensive piece of tech.   
Is anyway a piece of tech very worthy to be considered if not recommended if you were already looking to devices in the 1.3k - 1.4k (€/$) range since, by putting something on top of that, you'll have almost the double (if not) the triple of the performances of devices currently in that pricerange. 

Techdad Review - GPD Win 5