TL; DR
- Hands-on time with ASUS ROG Ally revealed more about the experience.
- Ally appears to be less of a Steam Deck competitor and more of an excellent alternative.
- The price of this laptop is still unknown.
ASUS is starting to let people get some hands-on time with the long-awaited ROG Ally. Based on the reports, the portable gaming device looks like an impressive device. It also seems that ASUS is aiming to make its console an excellent Steam Deck replacement rather than a direct competitor.
the edgeMonica Chen got some time to show off an upcoming ASUS gaming product. While ASUS didn’t allow details like battery life, GPU power, and more to be mentioned, Chin paints a picture of an incredibly capable machine.
Just like YouTuber Dave2D said in his hands-on video, the Chin The Ally describes it as flatter, lighter, and quieter than the Steam Deck. It has an Xbox controller-like configuration for the controls. And the mobile device has LEDs – like the ROG Phone 7 – surrounding the joystick, which can be changed.
One of the main advantages of the device is the fact that it runs on Windows 11 instead of Steam OS. Chin mentions that Ally works almost like a mini computer, and has a taskbar, startup menu, desktop icons, and so on. This makes it compatible with platforms like GeForce Now, Battle.net, and Steam right out of the gate.
Another distinguishing factor is display performance. The screen has a resolution of 1080p, offers 500 nits of brightness, and a variable refresh rate between 30Hz and 120Hz. By comparison, the Steam Deck has a resolution of 1280 x 800, delivers 400 nits of brightness, and runs at 60Hz.
Chen notes that she was able to play Moving Out and Ghostrunner during her playtime. Both experiences were reportedly very smooth. This may be attributed to the graphics processing unit (GPU), which is said to be an AMD RYZEN Z1 series chip.
According to benchmarks published by AMD, the RYZEN Z1 Extreme is capable of up to 8.6 teraflops of GPU performance. This puts the chip at nearly 2 teraflops below the PS5 (10.28 teraflops). On the other hand, Steam Deck only comes in at 1.6 teraflops.
Moving on to the user interface, it looks like Armory Crate will be the main way users interact with their game library. However, it will use a joystick-friendly version of the user interface called the Armory Crate SE.
Some other specs were also revealed. This includes up to 16GB of LPDDR5 dual-channel RAM, upgradeable up to 512GB of PCIe Gen 4 storage, dual front-facing speakers with Dolby Atmos, Wi-Fi 6E, and a UHS-II microSD slot.
All in all, the device is shaping up to be a beast of a handheld device. The biggest concern is the fact that ASUS has been very cautious about the price of the Ally. We also don’t know much about battery life, but ASUS claims it’s comparable to Steam Deck. If this is true, then battery life may be the only thing Steam Deck can compare with.
Given what we know about the ROG Ally now, it looks like it’s going to be a rather expensive device. As mentioned earlier, ASUS may be looking to make Ally a premium alternative rather than a direct Steam Deck competitor. But the question is, how long can it be before it’s no longer worth buying?