Zotac is back already with a new version of its Zone handheld gaming PC. Sporting a new white color scheme, the Zotac Zone 2025 (Zotac doesn’t seem to have called it the Zotac Zone 2) appears to have already upgraded from the Ryzen 8840U to AMD’s latest.
The original Zotac Zone is one of the better examples of Windows-based best handheld gaming PC competitors, aping some of the best features from Valve’s Steam Deck. However, it landed just that bit too late to make for meaningful competition to existing alternatives.
Along with the fact that hardly any stock has ever been available, this is why you won’t see it popping up on many top handheld gaming PC lists. As such, it’s no great surprise to see Zotac has gone back to the drawing board in the processor department. As reported by TechPowerUp, Zotac was showing off the next version of its handheld at CES 2025.
The clearly labeled prototype will come with a nearly identical set of specs to the existing model but is ditching the Ryzen 8000 mobile chip for an AI 9 HX 370. This nets the handheld a jump up in both CPU and GPU specs, with the new CPU sporting 12 cores and its GPU jumping from the RDNA 3 Radeon 780M to the RDNA 3.5 Radeon 890M, which nets a reported 20% boost in gaming performance for the new chip.
This new AMD chip is the same one found inside the recently launched OneXPlayer F1 Pro and is set to be featured in a host of other handhelds, including the Lenovo Legion Go 2.
Another upgrade for the 2nd-gen Zotac Zone is a move from 16GB of RAM to 32GB, which puts it in line with other new 2025 gaming handhelds. While that may seem a lot for a handheld, keep in mind that this total system RAM is also used as the VRAM for the integrated GPU, so a fair amount is needed for modern games. We saw the ROG Ally X’s 24GB help its aging Z1 Extreme chip beat out the regular ROG Ally, for instance.
Zotac is sticking with the crisp AMOLED panel from the first device, as well as taking a page out of Valve’s Steam Deck playbook, when it comes to controls, with it including dual trackpads.
Storage also sees an increase to 1TB from 512GB. Plus, it uses a “full-size” 2280 M.2 SSD, rather than the shorter 2230 size found in the Steam Deck and other handhelds.
There’s no word on the launch date or pricing yet, but according to folks at the Zotac CES booth, it is slated for this year.
Option for handhelds and even mini gaming PCs have flourished this year at CES, with a host of new devices and amazing new processors to power them. While Nvidia might have been the talk of the town with their RTX 5000 announcements, seeing the low-end chips go from strength to strength brings a lot of excitement for those looking to game on the go.