- A Redditor has turned their phone into a desktop PC, sort of
- This involves jamming the device between two hefty CPU coolers
- The results are seriously impressive, including running PC games at playable frame rates on a Linux desktop
Have you ever thought about using your phone as a PC? A creative hardware modder has taken this idea very literally, actually turning their smartphone into a makeshift PC by jamming the device inside a custom case, sandwiched between a pair of beefy desktop CPU coolers.
Wccftech spotted a Reddit post with a title that provides a succinct summary of the achievement here: “I turned my Nubia Z70 Ultra into a desktop PC with TWO CPU coolers – 99% stability, Linux desktop and 1080p Ultra Windows gaming.”
To break this down, what the Redditor (‘ntsow’) has done is take the Nubia Z70 Ultra, an Android phone, and remove the screen. The display was transferred to the front of a custom-made acrylic case, and the phone itself was placed between two big old processor coolers, as mentioned, with direct contact on the Snapdragon chip’s shielding (for the maximum cooling effect – which is why the screen must come off).
On the software side, the Redditor explains: “I’m running a full XFCE Linux desktop through Termux, with GPU acceleration, plus Windows apps/games. The goal is basically to use the phone as the whole PC.”
Quite a few Redditors are asking how this system runs PC games, and the answer is via Wine and Box64, or in some cases, using GameNative, an Android emulator.
Given the cooling, this mobile Snapdragon chip can be pushed pretty hard, and more importantly, it can keep that up with sustained and taxing workloads.
The phone-turned-PC can run Windows games surprisingly well as a result – and the 24GB of RAM on-board doesn’t hurt either (which is, of course, a pricey proposition on a PC these days).
What kind of frame rates does the Redditor get? We’re told that The Witcher 3 runs at 20 to 30 frames per second (fps) at Full HD resolution and with ‘ultra’ details.
Analysis: devilishly daring
Remember, this is an Android phone playing Windows games, and to do so at a playable enough frame rate (it even goes over 30 fps at times) is impressive. What’s also noteworthy is that the Snapdragon phone CPU used here isn’t Qualcomm’s top-tier mobile silicon. It’s an older Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, and as the Redditor points out, you’d get more pep from the newer Gen 5 processors (4.6GHz vs 4.3GHz).
Among the admirers, there are some alarms raised about the temperature recorded in The Witcher 3 screenshot. The Redditor explains that this is because it was grabbed with the phone running in ‘Diablo Mode,’ which pushes the components at full power with overclocking. If that isn’t on, then the CPU doesn’t get as toasty – although presumably you’re not going to get over the 30 fps mark, either.
Still, this is a very nifty piece of work, and as one commenter on the thread remarks, it is: “One of the most insane things I’ve seen on Reddit in months.”
I’ve got to agree, and while this is obviously a very extreme angle on modding, it may point the way to the future where phones are increasingly used as our computing devices.
