The race for power comes at a price, and gamers who were eyeing Acer’s new handheld console just got a pretty brutal example of this. Barely marketed in the United States, the Predator Atlas 8 sees its price increase by $150 at the Best Buy store. A novelty that seriously calls into question one of the main commercial arguments of this machine: its performance-price ratio compared to competing models.
An increase of more than 10% in a few days
Released in early November at a price of $1,299.99, the Predator Atlas 8 quickly attracted the attention of gamers. Its main asset lies in its Intel Arc G3 Extreme processor, associated with a particularly ambitious graphics part for a device of this format. A solid technical sheet and correct pricing quickly led to a shortage of stock.
But as of November 11, Best Buy’s product sheet suddenly showed a price of $1,449.99. It’s an additional $150, without any modification to the initial configuration. Acer has not yet explained this price change: it is also possible that an error occurred in the dealer’s display, especially since the product was again reported as unavailable.
RAM and storage, two important concessions
This price increase occurs in a difficult context for computer equipment manufacturers, who face rising memory and storage costs, not to mention high customs taxes specific to the American territory. However, it cannot be said that this situation directly explains the decision observed at Best Buy.
The American configuration of the Atlas 8 includes 24 GB of RAM and a 512 GB SSD. This is less than the 32 GB of RAM and terabyte of storage offered by the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+, which however has the same Intel processor. Acer had precisely reduced these capacities to offer a more aggressive launch price… but you have to believe that the tensions on the components are even greater than the commercial decisions.
With this increase, the price difference in this product range narrows and the interest in a Predator Atlas 8 becomes a little less obvious. RAMgageddon could have reshuffled the cards… at least in the United States. : in fact the same machine is offered at 1299 euros in France.
