For the better part of the past month, many of us have been infatuated with a retro handheld that offered a new experience. Now, the MagicX XU Mini M is making headlines for a completely different reason, and it’s not a good one.

Recently, sleuths on the Retro Handhelds Discord found that the XU Mini M is actually powered by the RK3326. What makes this problematic is that it was sold as relying on the previously unused RK3562. As it turns out, the “RK3562” is really just an overclocked version of the RK3326.

Detectives in our Discord have discovered the MagicX XU Mini M’s CPU to be a “low binned” rk3326 instead of the advertised rk3562. MagicX appears to be just as shocked as customers, saying this is a deception from their 3rd party development company. They have now severed ties. pic.twitter.com/QhZzEMZeaL

— Retro Handhelds (@RetroHandhelds) August 31, 2024

If you’ve been in the retro handhelds scene for a while, then you’re likely no stranger to the RK3326. Despite being released more than two years ago, it still makes an appearance in different handhelds, such as the Kinhank K36 and Powkiddy V10. Needless to say, the excitement was warranted when MagicX announced the XU Mini M, complete with a new processor in tow.

Further confirmation of this was provided by Gamma (aka TheGammaSqueeze), who has been actively working to bring GammaOS to the Mini M. However, they also discovered that the Mini M is using the RK3326, even going so far as to confirm that you can boot ArkOS onto the handheld “without kernel modifications.”

XU MINI M…
Be me, hacking the kernel for 2 weeks and not working on anything else since you think you can unlock more peformance.

Turns out that the RK3562 (Mali-G52) on this is actually a RK3326 (Mali-G31).

🤡 pic.twitter.com/QY8Ej6Bs2W

— Gamma (@TheGammaSqueeze) August 31, 2024

Immediately, it was assumed that MagicX was attempting to pull the wool over the eyes of the community. Something like this wouldn’t be all that surprising, as it’s not exactly an uncommon practice in today’s world. However, what made this immediate assumption so head-scratching was that a member of the MagicX PR team, Sean, has been quite active.

As has been documented both here on the website and in Discord, MagicX is already working on a new lineup of devices. It’s even reached the point where it feels like MagicX is dedicated to making a device that’s practically created “by the community” based on feedback.

Adding even more fuel to the fire, we recently reported that MagicX is already planning to drop its current chip supplier. The company couldn’t come to an agreement with its previous supplier, but a deal was struck to rely on Allwinner chips for future devices.

So what’s next? Well, according to posts made by Sean in the RH Discord, MagicX will offer a $15 coupon to purchase the XU Mini M+. This handheld is expected to arrive within the next couple of months and appears to be a better overall version of the Mini M, processor scandal notwithstanding.

Furthermore, MagicX also appears to be committed to developers, as Sean states “All new Magicx products are sent to community developers for evaluation or development (if community developers agree) before release. If there are any issues with the chip, screen or buttons, it will not be released until all issues are resolved.”

Sean also shared that anyone who has “participated” in the software development of the Mini M can reach out in order to “obtain the first batch of m+ engineering machine development or testing in advance.”

This entire situation is unfolding before our eyes and is extremely fluid. New information is constantly being revealed, which is to say that it’s still too early to make any definitive claims one way or another.

That being said, as new information is revealed and confirmed, we’ll be sure to update this post with any pertinent changes. In the meantime, you might want to hold off on buying the XU Mini M, and just hang tight until the Mini M+ is ready to go.

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