GPD XD, an RK3288 gamepad that doesn't cost too much

A few months ago, we reported about a clamshell Android gaming handheld called the GPD XD that had pretty good specifications and a fairly low estimated price. Now, the device had finally materialized and is currently on pre-sale for a decent price of $159.99.

The GPD XD is made by the company GamePad Digital, who have also made other Android gaming handhelds like the GPD G5A and GPD G7. The design of the device clearly mimics that of Nintendo’s popular NDS and 3DS handhelds, with the exclusion of the iconic second touchscreen. The bottom face of the device houses a normal set of action buttons and a d-pad, along with a pair of analog sticks and two buttons next to the analogs. Speakers are located at the bottom of the front, and appear to be stereo speakers. There’s also a cluster of buttons in the center of the device, which should be easily mappable to any game that you would play.

Gizchina News of the week

Join GizChina on Telegram

On the rear, there’s 2 standard sized shoulder buttons, along with a pair of smaller shoulder buttons as well. The ports on the rear compromise of a microSD card slot, a HDMI-out port, a microUSB port and a DC charging port. Upfront, there’s the display and some rather thin bezels.

The GPD XD will ship with the RK3288 chipset with a Mali-T764 GPU, 2GB of RAM, 16GB/32GB of internal flash storage, expandable memory, a massive 6000mAh battery, Android 4.4.4 Kitkat and a 5-inch 1280x720p HD IPS display. The device also supports HDMI-out, 802.11ac Wifi, microSD cards upto 128GB and USB OTG. The 16GB version device is currently on pre-sale for $159.99, comes in blue and black, and is expected to ship out to consumers in July.

Disclaimer: We may be compensated by some of the companies whose products we talk about, but our articles and reviews are always our honest opinions. For more details, you can check out our editorial guidelines and learn about how we use affiliate links.

About the author
Airyl
Enjoying life as a student, gently flowing in the stream known as life. Likes playing the piano, isn't very good at it. Likes playing games, is good at it. Constantly sleepy. Also does some tech stuff, but who cares about that?

- - Muhammad Yasir
    June 20, 2015
- Joe mont
  June 20, 2015
  I have to agree, if they went to developing ARM consoles like the Ouya and this handheld they would have a huge collection of games that are easily portable to mobile.
  - David Košič
    June 21, 2015
    Most of those games would never get the Nintendo seal of approval, so they wouldn’t even appear on the console, besides the the 3DS is killing it why would they need to change when they are making a ton of money.
June 20, 2015
If only it could make phone calls…
Make sure to buy it from GEARBEST SCAMMERS.
Nope…
- hahaha here you go again!
- Chico Migraña
  June 20, 2015
  don’t worry, if you have a bad experience it’s ok to tell other about it
- Adam Irvine
  June 20, 2015
  Eh, what’s that all about? I’ve purchased from GearBest loads of times now without any issues, I find them really good…
Steven Fox
June 20, 2015
I thought everyone gave up on those android consoles?? There are no hardcore games on Android, just casual stuff you can play on your phone that you already have.
- Chico Migraña
  June 20, 2015
  they aim to emulator world, there is a lot of people playing like old days haha
  - Steven Fox
    June 20, 2015
    But their phones can easily emulate DS and older system, and most of these “consoles” have horrible screens and build quality.
    - Airyl
      June 20, 2015
      Yes, phones can emulate as well, but on-screen buttons are incredibly annoying when playing games like Megaman or Mario, and having a separate device for games really helps your battery life.
      As for build quality and screen, that really only applies to older models from rubbish brands, like JXD from 3-4 years back. The recent ones like the GPD G5A have really good build quality, almost like an Xbox 360 controller.
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  There’s emulators, then there’s a lot of really good Android games that benefit from the buttons as well. Games like A Bard’s Tale and stuff like that.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  June 21, 2015
  You didn’t so people playing MMO’s under the shower & spending lots of money on Android & iOS like I did & that is real hard core.

MaxPower
June 20, 2015
Interesting device.
It’s a new market, other companies believe in this potential (Nvidia in primis).
Personally I believe in this project as long as there’s a good software support.
Never had a good experience with Rockchip, Allwinner,Amlogic due to poor software support, but hopefully this will change.
There’s really few Android games out there worth mentioning but it’s a growing market for sure, plus being a retrogamer I would use it with Retroarch and then you have a huge selection.
Hey Airyl, no mention about the sensors on board?
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  GPD has been pretty good with software support so far. They directly contact ROM developers like Skelton for feedback, so most of the time the devices have pretty good software.
  There’s only a gravity sensor in it as far as I know, which is a shame.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  June 21, 2015
  Rockchip & Amlogic are mostly OK Allwiner is horrible.
  You should look at this as not bad portable game console even there won’t be any games out of usual ones on Google play. The real potential however lies in using it as setop box as with Kodi it will be able to grinder all including Hi H265 (10 bit) videos in 1080p (possibly even 4K suport before end of the year) with Dolby digital & DTS. ?
  - MaxPower
    June 21, 2015
    I’m not a Hifi video user so my RPI2 with Kodi satisfy all my needs.
    There are several STB with RK3288 out there. Of course, you can buy this one and use it as mediacenter when you need it.
Krys-001
June 20, 2015
3ds+android=??????????????????????????????????????????????
ufg
June 20, 2015
Looks cool, I’m doubting the credibility of those photos though. the screen looks photoshopped in to create the illusion of a small bezel. It has real analogue sticks though! Looks great for PSP emulation
- Joe mont
  June 20, 2015
  Its running a promotional image of Diablo 3 and God of war, would you ever believe it wasnt “photoshopped” in?
  - Airyl
    June 20, 2015
  - ufg
    June 29, 2015
    I was talking about the bezels, not the fact the actual screen contents were photoshopped in. All the manufacturers do that lol
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  It’s definitely fake. The actual product’s screen will be more like this prototype’s picture, with a small deadzone around the display.

Guest
June 20, 2015
- Joe mont
  June 20, 2015
  I have to agree, if they went to developing ARM consoles like the Ouya and this handheld they would have a huge collection of games that are easily portable to mobile.
Yetimania
June 20, 2015
If only it could make phone calls…
Make sure to buy it from GEARBEST SCAMMERS.
Nope…
- hahaha here you go again!
- Ricardo A.
  June 20, 2015
  don’t worry, if you have a bad experience it’s ok to tell other about it
- Adam Irvine
  June 20, 2015
  Eh, what’s that all about? I’ve purchased from GearBest loads of times now without any issues, I find them really good…
Steven Fox
June 20, 2015
I thought everyone gave up on those android consoles?? There are no hardcore games on Android, just casual stuff you can play on your phone that you already have.
- Ricardo A.
  June 20, 2015
  they aim to emulator world, there is a lot of people playing like old days haha
- Steven Fox
  June 20, 2015
  But their phones can easily emulate DS and older system, and most of these “consoles” have horrible screens and build quality.
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  There’s emulators, then there’s a lot of really good Android games that benefit from the buttons as well. Games like A Bard’s Tale and stuff like that.
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  Yes, phones can emulate as well, but on-screen buttons are incredibly annoying when playing games like Megaman or Mario, and having a separate device for games really helps your battery life.
  As for build quality and screen, that really only applies to older models from rubbish brands, like JXD from 3-4 years back. The recent ones like the GPD G5A have really good build quality, almost like an Xbox 360 controller.
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  Yes, phones can emulate as well, but on-screen buttons are incredibly annoying when playing games like Megaman or Mario, and having a separate device for games really helps your battery life.
  As for build quality and screen, that really only applies to older models from rubbish brands, like JXD from 3-4 years back. The recent ones like the GPD G5A have really good build quality, almost like an Xbox 360 controller.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  June 21, 2015
  You didn’t so people playing MMO’s under the shower & spending lots of money on Android & iOS like I did & that is real hard core.

MaxPower
June 20, 2015
Interesting device.
It’s a new market, other companies believe in this potential (Nvidia in primis).
Personally I believe in this project as long as there’s a good software support.
Never had a good experience with Rockchip, Allwinner,Amlogic due to poor software support, but hopefully this will change.
There’s really few Android games out there worth mentioning but it’s a growing market for sure, plus being a retrogamer I would use it with Retroarch and then you have a huge selection.
Hey Airyl, no mention about the sensors on board?
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  GPD has been pretty good with software support so far. They directly contact ROM developers like Skelton for feedback, so most of the time the devices have pretty good software.
  There’s only a gravity sensor in it as far as I know, which is a shame.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  June 21, 2015
  Rockchip & Amlogic are mostly OK Allwiner is horrible.
  You should look at this as not bad portable game console even there won’t be any games out of usual ones on Google play. The real potential however lies in using it as setop box as with Kodi it will be able to grinder all including Hi H265 (10 bit) videos in 1080p (possibly even 4K suport before end of the year) with Dolby digital & DTS. 😉
- MaxPower
  June 21, 2015
  I’m not a Hifi video user so my RPI2 with Kodi satisfy all my needs.
  There are several STB with RK3288 out there. Of course, you can buy this one and use it as mediacenter when you need it.

ufg
June 20, 2015
Looks cool, I’m doubting the credibility of those photos though. the screen looks photoshopped in to create the illusion of a small bezel. It has real analogue sticks though! Looks great for PSP emulation
- Joe mont
  June 20, 2015
  Its running a promotional image of Diablo 3 and God of war, would you ever believe it wasnt “photoshopped” in?
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  Lol.
- Airyl
  June 20, 2015
  It’s definitely fake. The actual product’s screen will be more like this prototype’s picture, with a small deadzone around the display.
- ufg
  June 29, 2015
  I was talking about the bezels, not the fact the actual screen contents were photoshopped in. All the manufacturers do that lol
Marius Cirsta
June 20, 2015
I like this one but it’s a bit more than I’m willing to pay for a game console. At $100 it would have been a nice thing to get.
Marius Cirsta
June 20, 2015
I like this one but it’s a bit more than I’m willing to pay for a game console. At $100 it would have been a nice thing to get.

An Tran
June 22, 2015
Would be nice if they released a stronger version later on with more RAM and one of the newer Rockchip SoCs. This one doesn’t look like it would offer better performance than my Shield Portable, so I have no reason to get this. I really like their analog stick solution though, despite having L3 and R3 being separate buttons from the sticks, and would like to see a stronger device taking advantage of that design.
- CupCakesDragon
  June 25, 2015
  uhm, this uses the newest rk3288. I have a gpd Q9, same chipset, and in t-rex 3d benchmark it was actually 66% faster than a samsun galaxy s6 edge which costs 1000 euros (it is 115). Same GPU, with 4 instead of 8 cores but still a mali-t760, coupled with lower resolution screen made sure of that. It also offers opengl es 3.0 which the portable does not, it can do teh same gamestreaming with moonlight (Reverse engineered, free, works just as well).
  Having said that, the advantages are small so I understand you won get one 😀
  Also Sinon is baddass and how and awesome :3
An Tran
June 22, 2015
Would be nice if they released a stronger version later on with more RAM and one of the newer Rockchip SoCs. This one doesn’t look like it would offer better performance than my Shield Portable, so I have no reason to get this. I really like their analog stick solution though, despite having L3 and R3 being separate buttons from the sticks, and would like to see a stronger device taking advantage of that design.
- CupCakesDragon
  June 25, 2015
  uhm, this uses the newest rk3288. I have a gpd Q9, same chipset, and in t-rex 3d benchmark it was actually 66% faster than a samsun galaxy s6 edge which costs 1000 euros (it is 115). Same GPU, with 4 instead of 8 cores but still a mali-t760, coupled with lower resolution screen made sure of that. It also offers opengl es 3.0 which the portable does not, it can do teh same gamestreaming with moonlight (Reverse engineered, free, works just as well).
  Having said that, the advantages are small so I understand you won get one 😀
  Also Sinon is baddass and how and awesome :3
sunny
June 24, 2015
I know the geekbuying online store is available.
sunny
June 25, 2015

RK3288 powered GPD XD Android gaming handheld on pre-sale for $159.99

Gizchina News of the week

Airyl

Today in Home