AYN Thor and Odin 3 ditch UFS 4.0 for UFS 3.1 storage as components get more expensive

Last month, AYN increased the prices of its two top handhelds — the dual-screen Thor, and the flagship, Odin 3. The price increase was originally scheduled to take effect in April, but had to be brought forward to early March. Unfortunately, AYN is now back with more bad news.

In a post on its Discord channel, AYN has announced that the rising costs of components have also affected the storage used for the Thor and Odin 3 handhelds. According to the manufacturer, the supply shortages and significant cost increase has made it impossible to sustain the use of UFS 4.0 storage in both devices. Thus, it has made the decision to switch to the cheaper but slower UFS 3.1 storage for the two handhelds.

The change in storage type affects the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2-powered version of the Thor. This includes the Thor Base with 8GB RAM and 128GB of storage, the Thor Pro with 12GB RAM and 256GB of storage, and the Thor Max with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. The Thor Lite which has a Snapdragon 865 processor already uses UFS 3.1 storage, and will continue to do so.

For the Odin 3 which is powered by the Qualcomm Dragonwing Q8, the switch to UFS 3.1 affects all four models which includes the Base with 8GB RAM and 128GB storage, the Pro with 12GB RAM and 256GB of storage, the Max with 16GB RAM and 512GB of storage, and the Ultra with 24GB RAM and 1TB of storage.

AYN has also stated that the switch to UFS 3.1 takes effect starting from the next batch of pre-orders for both handhelds. For the Thor, that will be Batch 6 pre-orders, while for the Odin 3, it is Batch 7 of pre-orders. AYN hasn't yet announced when it will begin accepting these new batches of pre-orders, but says it will be soon. However, AYN's website says shipping of Batch 6 pre-orders for the Thor and Batch 7 pre-orders for the Odin 3will begin in mid-June.