Handheld Companion – Release Notes

0.32.2.0 - Joystick Response Curves, MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ Support & Stability Improvements

This release focuses on three major areas: performance, stability, and device support, while also introducing one of the most requested features: configurable joystick response curves. In addition to numerous fixes throughout the application, this update significantly reduces CPU overhead, improves reliability during sleep and resume, expands hardware support with the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+, and resolves a regression affecting custom HID communication on several handhelds.

Highlights

• Configurable Joystick & Axis Response Curves: Handheld Companion now supports customizable response curves for analog sticks and trigger/axis inputs. Adjust how physical input is translated across the full movement range to create more gradual, linear or aggressive response characteristics depending on your personal preference or the type of game you're playing.
• MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ Support: Added initial support for the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ (CG3EM), including: Fan control, RGB lighting, TDP management, Back button support. Gyroscope support is still under development and will be introduced in a future release.
• Lower CPU Usage & Better Responsiveness: A broad optimization pass reduces CPU usage and garbage collection pressure across the application. IMU processing has been reworked, several race conditions have been eliminated, and numerous initialization paths have been optimized for smoother operation.
• Custom HID Regression Fixed: Resolved a regression introduced in the previous release that affected custom HID communication on several handhelds, including: ASUS ROG Ally family, GPD Win 5, MSI Claw, ONEXPLAYER X1, Zotac Gaming Zone.
• Improved Reliability: Large portions of the application's event subscription, disposal and resource management logic have been refactored. These changes reduce duplicated events, stale handlers, resource leaks and improve long-term stability, particularly during sleep, resume and device transitions.

What Changed

New Features

• Added configurable joystick and axis response curves.
• Added support for Flyout UI elements in gamepad navigation.
• Added the ability to disable virtual controllers directly from profiles.

Device Support

• Implemented support for MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ (CG3EM) with: Fan control, RGB lighting, TDP management, Back button support
• Legion Go (1 & 2): Fixed detachable controller settings not restoring correctly at startup.
• AYANEO Flip DS: Fixed looping second-screen summon button inputs.
• ASUS ROG Ally family: Fixed default MainWindow summon hotkey bindings.
• Steam Deck: Fixed controller mode (Hybrid/Exclusive) persistence and default button mappings.
• OneXPlayer APEX: Tentatively fixed gyroscope axis handling.

Performance

• Reduced CPU usage and garbage collection pressure.
• Reworked IMU sensor matrix processing.
• Improved platform logo caching and initialization.
• Various performance optimizations and cleanup.

UI / UX

• Improved Profile and Layout pages with layout names and descriptions.
• Improved profile notifications and toast messages.
• Improved Welcome Window workflow and OEM software handling.
• Improved Hotkey Settings experience.
• Improved narrow-width QuickTools layouts.
• Updated LED colors immediately when values change.
• Fixed GoBackToSleep checkbox behavior.
• Various UI performance improvements and bug fixes.

Improvements

• Improved static manager event subscription and disposal routines.
• Improved non-static manager event subscription and disposal routines.
• Improved IDevice event subscription and disposal handling.
• Updated SDL3 to 3.4.12.

Fixes

• Fixed retrieval of available display refresh rates.
• Fixed DevicePage subscribing twice to Controller Manager events.
• Fixed phantom touchpad inputs generated by virtual controllers.
• Fixed phantom controller inputs and rumble persisting after sleep and resume.
• Fixed endless AltGr keyboard injection loop.
• Fixed virtual gyro updates flooding input reports and waking devices from sleep.
• Fixed foreground profile detection after QuickTools page unloads.
• Fixed custom TDP profile values visually affecting other profiles.
• Fixed layout update logic.
• Fixed screen resolution changes occasionally not applying from QuickTools.
• Fixed Intel Graphics Software Service detection.
• Fixed startup race condition causing duplicate system routine checks.
• Fixed HotkeysManager first-start detection.
• Fixed platform detection for processes already running when HC starts.
• Fixed installer deployments preserving obsolete files from previous installations.
• Fixed Welcome Window reappearing after restart.
• Fixed OEM stack disabling not applying on first use.
• Fixed LibreHardwareMonitor cleanup during shutdown.
• Fixed UI race condition that could occasionally cause hangs.
• Fixed KX.exe incorrectly returning -1 on successful operations.
• Fixed crash when loading Layout Templates under specific SmartApp and Steam-HID conditions.
• Fixed update notifications stacking on the Settings page.
• Fixed LED settings not applying until restart.

Full Changelog: 0.31.3.1...0.32.2.0