Acer's shiny new "AI-powered" handheld gaming PC, the Nitro Blaze 7, is a little unoriginal in specs, as we pointed out in a previous story, but it turns out this might apply to its design and build too.
According to tech YouTuber ETA Prime (via GamesRadar), the Acer Nitro Blaze 7 is suspiciously similar to the Terrans Force Handle 5. At first glance, the comparison is undeniable. Buttons are in the same place, and the curves of the machine appear to be identical, from what I can see. The only real differences, aesthetically, are Acer's model has a Nitro button down the bottom left and it has a few more decals around the thumbsticks, D-Pad and corners.
As ETA Prime points out in the video, Terrans Force had plans to launch a Handle 7 device, with a Ryzen 7 8840U chip. That is actually a little different to the 8840HS found in the Acer Nitro Blaze 7. That said, the U-series chip makes more sense than the HS model, given it is designed for more power-intensive devices with an up to 5 W lower TDP.
Outside of this, the display is the same size on both handhelds and both offer the same refresh rate at 144 Hz. The battery for both devices is exactly 50.04 Wh, too.
However, an Acer representative told me "We have no business relationship with the company mentioned in the article. This is an Acer design that comes with Acer Game Space software for a seamless gaming experience."
Though we don't know the inner workings of a company like this, both companies could have potentially bought this same design from a third party, effectively allowing both companies to work around the R&D costs of designing their own build. We don't yet know how both companies ended up with such similar designs.
It's worth noting that innovation in the gaming handheld space, in regards to specs has slowed down, as of late, with many of the best handheld gaming PCs functionally having very similar specs and doing similar things.
Most of what sets others apart is how it is built, how it looks, or what price it comes in at. Part of this is that handheld gaming PCs are a convenient bit of tech, so relying on experimental builds could cost that user experience. Another is that there really aren't many handheld-friendly chips to choose from, though AMD is working on the Ryzen Z2 chip right now. This is why it's not too strange that Acer's upcoming device emulates most of the most popular handheld gaming devices right now.
This could soon change as early testing suggests the HX370 found in the Radeon 890M could be a good handheld gaming chip too.
We still haven't received the price point yet for the Acer Nitro Blaze 7 but the Terrans Force Handle 5 sells for close to $1,000. It will need to approach half of that to really capture my attention, though.
