I've had it for 10 months now. I love it. I'm mostly playing older games I missed over the years - like all the Souls games. But while travelling in Pakistan I used it to play new releases like Starfield and Baldur's Gate 3.
Just FYI. If you set the joysticks to a static color you can make the color something that isn't as bright. In my case I made them white, but in Armoury Crate it's set to a color that is closer to dark grey. The result is a very dim white ring around the joysticks. This will also work with colors by selecting a darker version of the color.
@@JosephSeed at max value it wouldn't be more than 1% of the power draw. 90% of the draw is the APU so anything you can do to mess with that is a give and take. I have had no issues with battery life.
Picked up the Ally from a Best Buy Black Friday sale...all I can say is "wow." This thing is amazing. Having a high refresh rate with VRR on the go...playing PC games i never dreamt of playing in a hand held form factor...the speakers. Good Lord, the speakers are some of the best I've ever heard! Something to add, though. Was super paranoid about the SD card issue...so, I have a massively aggressive manual fan curve. While it may be loud - it keeps things running cooler and so far no issues.
@@shadow45acnot sure how much they got it for but for me the base model (base Z1 cpu, 500gb storage) is $400 at best buy. I plan on picking one up this weekend
Love my ROG Ally! I was thinking of getting a steam deck just before the Ally came out, but I’m not a big PC gamer. When the ally came out and i found out i could use Xbox game pass on it, i was sold.
Quick PSA to those who are thinking of getting a open-box, please check them in-store if you are able to, some of the open-box ones have critical defects such as the triggers or buttons not working properly or at all, i experienced this twice and just opted for a new one, not all of them are returned because “people don’t know how to work Windows”
@@Precise_Ant76 my excellent quality open box had someone else's windows logged into it still no charger no stand and right joycon wasn't working. My local best buy did all they could to try and fix it. It was honestly their after to make it right and the light experience I had on the faulty device that made me exchange for new as the open box was a a gift. I'd say it's deff worth a shot just prepare to be disappointed, hope to be amazed. Some ppl are returning just cuz it's windows.
I have never been able to convince myself to Buy open box Electronics. There are some places where I just don't trust what other people have done with things before they decided to return it.
Picked up the Z1 Extreme on the Best Buy $100 off Black Friday/Cyber Monday deal. Also a Steam Deck owner. I like the Steam deck, but I love the ROG Ally! I appreciate the smaller form factor, modern look, more power and familiarity of Windows 11. Looking forward to a lot of gaming enjoyment on it.
@@cdiff07And not be able to play everything like the lcd model 😊 The deck is great if your vested in the steam ecosystem,but I'd not get a ally cause you have more options where to play and get games and run them at a higher resolution ! So you get more options aka more playable games at a higher fidelity.
@@youngjustin82Windows is a horrible handheld experience, not to mention, I have my 7950X3D, RTX 4090 Strix PC for my main gaming rig. I do own around 800 games on Steam. Point is though, the steam deck will last longer as a TRUE handheld and just work seamlessly, more so than the Ally!
@@youngjustin82I’ve been getting back into multiplayer games and a lot of games I play now is on epic or gog. Wasn’t an issue when I was just playing steam games. They say the steam deck is more user friendly but I’d say not really with all the extra steps you have to go through
@@youngjustin82 I'm vested in the steam ecosystem on my main rig Got the ally because I like good performance lol. Unfortunately the Deck just isn't quite there imo. I like being plugged in with cpu boost and playing games like monster hunter world on a handheld at good frames and decent settings...being able to use mods, the whole nine. The ally is just simply better in this regard. Not to shit on the deck, it was the best gaming handheld for a while there but now we've got actual computers that can play triple a titles in the form of a handheld. Could never pick OG deck (lets be real they are both OG...) over these. Now obviously Steam will have an answer, an actual answer (better performance and resolution) to the Ally and the GO. But I think the people who bought the oled must be playing old/indie games because theres no way I could deal with the lower performance of the device when we have something like the ally for basically a similar price. Saying all that with the big caveat that I am 100% plugged in player. I wouldn't want to play any handheld at 15w with the performance hit today. So being plugged in, for the price, id just rather have the performance.
One of the things I appreciated in this video is you talking about pricing. Lot of ppl only talk about retail price and not about fluctuations which can effect the value of something.
The SD card issue is solved from R8 units, bad solder apparently has been the issue. Mine has been repaired and has been very strong since. (Repair overall went really well)
I've owned the Ally since July when it came to the Philippines. It's so good ngl for my emulation and Genshin Impact handheld gaming, and thankfully the updates have really made it better.
I returned my ROG Ally Z1 Extreme. Didnt enjoy being tethered to an outlet. The battery is terrible. I bought the AYN Odin 2 Max after watching your video on it.
I have in and picked up a ROG Ally (open-box) from Best Buy. After tweaks and updates I got this thing just where I want. Playing triple games on this thing is great! The Z1 extreme is amazing and I am glad I have this in addition to the LCD Steam Deck. Great 6 month review
I love that they added an anti-deadzone setting in armorycrate. The armorycrate software has been sigificantly more stable since i bought my ally back in june. Havent had any issues in a while with it freaking out. I also love being able to calibrate the triggers and sticks now. Command center used to get pretty buggy like armorycrate and they both work great now.
I was going through updated reviews for this device up until yesterday. I went on a flight with my Steam Deck OLED and was totally sold on just keeping it and moving on from research on the Ally. Now here comes this video! Im back into research mode, lol. I still think the battery life of the Steam Deck OLED is the most important thing for someone who has to travel as much as I do.
It depends on what you like and what fits your needs. SD Pros: Linux, easy to manage games and device, track pads, OLED (90hz), and battery. SD Cons: Compatibility with Anti cheat and windows games, difficulty rises if you want to install games outside of Steam. Non oled touch screen responsiveness. Ally Pros: Game compatibility, 120hz screen with VRR, super responsive touch screen. Ally cons: Windows isn't handheld friendly, battery life, requires some knowledge of windows not plug and play like a switch. Personally I prefer the Ally to my OG SD. I was worried because I though not having a trackpad to nav windows would be an issue. I would still love a touch nub like my GPD win 4 had. However, the responsiveness of the touchscreen makes up for it. Armory Crate works surprising well and if you set some one the hot keys as window management like f5, alt + enter, F4, etc it makes navigating the ally a ton easier. I would also argue if you know how to limit the TDP properly and settings that the Ally got similar battery as the steam deck with the option to add more power. However, the OLED model has improved battery drastically. You can still get a good boost plugged in that you can't on the SD.
Go to a best buy they will have a rog display. Personally the display they had made me go with the steam deck the build quality is super poor compared to the SD.
@@Madblaster6 I think I’m just going to keep the OLED SD. The performance boost isn’t as important to me as the battery life. I went through a full 2+ hour flight playing and had 44% left. I didn’t have to think about anything. No software issues, no battery worries, no heat temp concerns. It’s a perfect handheld gaming PC for me. I’m not sure I’d really take advantage of the power boost.
@@DieHardEddieEdwards That's totally understandable. I've been itching to get the OLED model myself but I don't use my original as much since the Ally but I'm by a plug most of the time. There were also games I couldn't play on the SD that bothered my like COD and NFS Unlimited.
@@Madblaster6 Yeah, I get that. I always want the most powerful thing. But that flight sealed it for me. I have consoles to play those games comfortably. I guess it depends on whether or not you really take these on the go. I can’t wait til someone balances the power and battery life.
So I went with the Ally Z1 because I was able to find one for only $300 and for my use case it’s fantastic. I mostly play retro/indie games on the go but even games like Cyberpunk still work well albeit with adjusted settings. Also, being able to get full controller support including gyro for Xbox Cloud gaming makes up for the lack of horsepower. Just because the Extreme is better does NOT mean the z1 is a bad system; at the end of the day it’s a portable PC and at $300 or lower it’s a steal.
i gave 2 allys to my nephews for their birthdays. watching them play together made me think of the days when we use to pin a sheet to the ceiling to play split screen. Kids will never understand what we had to go through to get to these levels lol
My Ally has become my most used device. I even use it to browse windows with the analog stick mouse cursor and I find that it feels incredibly comfortable to use this way. I only use my desktop to watch RUclips now.
Just got my tomtoc ROG Ally case, and I'm loving it! It's super slim, the design is pretty, and it's impressively durable. The cutouts for the sticks are fantastic too!
The device is nice it’s not bad at all. I got an open box one and it was flawless. But I switched back to the steam deck and the ease of use and constant updates and having games played better than they did a year ago made me just take the rog back. It’s not bad I just prefer the simplicity of the deck and the dedication they have to constantly making it better.
Seriously, why this channel is not in the million subscribers yet. This channel reignated my interest on gaming and introduce me to retro gaming and emulation. Really love the detailed reviews of handheld devices.
Honestly, the fact that I can go out to a shop and get the Ally really makes a huge difference to me. Being in Aus it’s not impossible to get a steam deck but the extra steps are just too inconvenient. The fact the Ally is an awesome unit also makes the decision a lot easier
Not to mention you get the warranty that won't come with the Steamdeck (in Aus). I haven't looked into it too much but I assume Valve wont accept returns if you live outside the markets they sell to.
Yeah, 2+ years after Deck launched and Valve still refuses to officially sell/support the Deck anywhere outside US/Canada/Europe/those four East Asian countries. Asus sells the Ally EVERYWHERE, from Australia to Brazil you can find it and get decent support.
13:49 I liked my 3080 XG Mobile so much, I used the money I got from selling desktop, for a 4090 XG Mobile. It’s quite significantly more powerful, slightly bigger, and much quieter. But both of these models have been transformative for me as well, it’s amazing how much space the setup saves, and how portable everything is.
I would definitely say don't wait. If one of these devices has all the features that you need. Just pull the trigger. I play more games now and have completed more games just by having my Steam Deck. The quick sleep resume lets me pick up my Steam Deck and play 5-10 minutes here and there. I didn't even know I needed that feature in my life. Originally I bought a Steam Deck just because I was traveling around North America on my motorcycle and I still wanted to play some games occasionally. There will always be newer devices with, better and more, features. But you can't get back the time. Playing a fun game for a few minutes is way better then reading through the same reddit posts and refreshing the same web pages hoping for a new article. 100%, if one of these devices has all the features you need right now and you have the cash, don't wait. If there are some features that you absolutely need and none of the devices work for you, then save your money so that you have the cash on hand when a device does have everything you need.
@@ninemilli1266 Plenty of other devices on the market where the SD card works just fine if that's a must have feature for someone. As I said, if there is a device that has all the features you need now, don't wait around for a next generation device with unknown features and released at some unknown future date.
As a Legion Go user i’m happy that the Ally is doing well ! It’s always a pleasure to see gamers enjoy their devices :D Also it shows how well the Z1 Extreme can be optimized thanks to software updates, it gives hope for the future of these handhelds.
I am too way too many steamdeck fanboys bashing both the Alley & Legion Go claiming the Steamdeck is more powerful and better which really isn't true in terms of raw power. They always point too SD card reader problems which the steam deck had its own version of problems which the fanboys pretended never happened while bashing the Rog Alley.
@@Elknkam Can’t agree more ! The handheld market is still niche and has not a lot of players in it; i don’t count Aya Neo and GPD since they are underdogs against the big names like Lenovo, Asus or Valve; who seems to get the most attention out of the gaming community. But by being niche, it’s still prone to errors and mishaps even by big names like i quoted above, until it isn’t niche anymore. Like i love to say, our handhelds that we have today will lay the foundation of the ones we will have tomorrow, let’s be patient and love our machines ✨
It's not just handheld market - Asus is different even in gaming laptop market. I think the people working in this company are all geeks who are passionate about making better products. People at Dell, Lenovo, HP, Razer, etc - they don't care about feedback from customers. I first noticed this aspect about Asus over 10 years ago while making a Hackintosh. There's an Asus laptop that was very popular with the hackintosh community, Mac OSX ran perfectly on it except Bluetooth which was missing a driver. A software engineer from Asus actually wrote a Mac driver for this bluetooth hardware and posted it at the Hackintosh forum. You will never see such a thing from any other company. Companies like HP or Dell are run like a faceless corporation, Asus has a very different culture.
I bought mine back in June and I returned it in like 15-20 days, amazing system but was not optimized and a lot of bugs. Glad to see it's been rectified, I may get it again or wait for a refresh
Great review as usual, Russ! Honestly, it seems like you can't go wrong with either the ROG Ally or Steam Deck. I do like the fact that you mentioned the Ally being available at Best Buy so you can just swing by and grab one, see if you like it, and return with little trouble if it doesn't suit you. I picked up a Steam Deck last year and have not regretted it for a minute. I do really like the console-like experience it provides. It is very easy to set up and start gaming!
With each update Asus slightly edges over for me. Gotta hand it to Asus, they've been on top of it with the updates. My faith in the company has gone up significantly.
I've owned the steam deck legion go and odin 2 and i keep coming back to the ally (although the odin 2 is a amazing device in it's own right) ROG Ally is literally everything I ever wanted in a handheld!.
After going back to my PSP recently I think removable batteries are the answer to these handhelds. Battery goes flat, pop in a new one. It's not like this is a waterproof device that needs to be sealed.
I love the fact that the gentleman in the video states he does not have space for a desktop, but has a huge CRT TV in the background. This speaks to a healthy set of retro-oriented priorities.
Trust me the ally has a very good screen just adjust the colors a bit on the Radeon settings and it very close like 95% there. You are only missing the viewing angels which is the main downside of ips panels
@@kickconnection83 apparently vrr is not noticeable and worthless as per the legion go fanboys. I got both and I can clearly see the difference. Apparently the fanboys got both too and cant tell the difference. I wanna know what they are smoking lol?
@soldierplays4616 how funny. Digital foundry already demonstrated the difference. Disabling VRR by setting the ROG to 60hz - you will feel the frame drops...but, switch back to VRR/120hz - any drops you probably won't even notice and will feel far more smoother. BIG difference.
just got one open-box during black friday. the review was spot on. my only additional complaint is the secondary function of the back M1 and M2 buttons. there are so many instances where i accidentally hit these button while pushing a button.
Of course all these awesome features drop after I sell my Ally and went back to my Steam Deck. My issues though were a combination of the hardware (mainly the SD card failure) and all kinds of weird software quirks. I couldn't start a AAA game many times without restarting the unit or I'd have terrible performance. Despite being limited to Steam games (without going into the OS that is) the Deck is just a smoother handheld experience and that was my focus.
It’s funny this releases the same day my brother informed me his Ally just stopped accepting inputs and needed a clean install of Windows. He learned this an hour before a 12-hour flight.
Had a common bug where my steam deck needed to run first time setup like 3 times. I couldn't use it on the 4 hour drive to the airport, but luckily the airport had fast wifi. Just handheld things.
The asus Rog ally left a mark in the portable pc world. Before it was the onexplayer, ayaneo, gpd that were competing with each other now all those companies are competing with the asus rog ally. Had this portable pc since it came out and still love it that's rare because with the ayaneo, akzoe, gpd win 3, steam deck, onexplayer I sold them not to long after purchasing them.
I personally received my Ally about a week ago, after seeing it for 100€ off on Amazon, and have been enjoying it so far. I obviously knew about it`s issues going in, but I`ve still been somewhat cought off guard by the battery life, though I`ve really only been using it in bed so far, and the charger is plugged in and ready to go on a moment`s notice, as well as my phone`s 65w charger, if necessary. Regarding the screen, I have 3 observations : it feels a bit smaller than I was hoping (more real estate than my red box switch for sure, but I found myself wishing it were just a bit bigger, at least when playing racing games specificly, especially given the bezels. Probably just a me thing though), the colors seem to pop less than I was expecting ( might have more to do with the games I`ve tried than the screen itself, and my main point of comparison in terms of games is my pc monitor, which I believe is in it`s most vibrant mode), and in the one or two games I tried playing with uncapped framerates, I still noticed the stuttering and variation in framerates more than I was expecting given the internet`s depiction of VRR (admittedly I was trying to find a good graphics setup for Tdu2 and NFS heat at 10w, which meant fairly big stutters despite framerates mostly in the 30-40 fps range with the settings I was trying with NFS heat, and Tdu2 is known for running inconsistently and generally pretty poorly on just about anything). With that said, the addition of CPU boost options is great, and will hopefully help with battery life. Regarding the SD card slot, I do wonder if it really was only early units that were affected, and I`m honestly kind of afraid of breaking mine. I might buy a fairly cheap card and use if for some stuff I`ll only occasionally want to access, and save all my propor games instals for when I upgrade the Ssd, hopefully within a couple of months By the way, if all you intend to ever run is steam, you won`t ever really need to interact with the desktop or windows for gaming, since armory crate opens on startup, and you can launch steam from there (it`s pre-installed if I remember correctly), which opens in big picture mode. From that point all you have to do is set a macro in armory crate for the Xbox button (since steam sees the ally as an Xbox controller), set steam to also launch in big picture mode on startup, and basicly never look at or interact with windows again (other than all the times you`ll still need to interact with windows for things like updates, managing devices, smiting a particularly uncooperative game or task, and other amin stuff). The lower right bitten will bring up and minimize armory crate, allowing you to switch between it and steam, and you can use both steam and the control center to turn off the ally. That being said I personally find navigating windows and the web to be perfectly serviceable for casual use, with a combination of the right stich and RB and RT as the mouse in desktop mode (with the dpad as arrow keys, A as enter, and having set the left stick as the scroll wheel), the touchscreen (windows will be in tablet mode which works well enough IMO), and the on screen keyboard in the reduced floating windows mode, so that you can reposition it where it bothers you the least. Oh, and here in Europe the legal minimum warranty is 2 years, as stipulated by EU law, so I guess i`m not that worried if the SD card reader does fail, as annoying as it would be to get it fixed
Ally gets overlooked for I dont know why reasons. Since I got mine my gaming habits have change for the better. Is so flexible as a full pc functionality and great gaming on the go and even better when docked. I forgot my deck once i got the ally
Are most/all of your games on Steam? Are you fine with 30/40fps games? Get a deck. Any other situation get an Ally. I owned both and found that tinkering in Linux desktop to get non-steam games to work was a nightmare, and prefer to play at 60fps, or at close to it as possible
@@kylerclarke2689 I have come to the conclusion that I need to see for myself to be able to decide 😂 there are many different opinions each of them valid and I don’t know which one applies to me. I dont mind the 40-45 fps on big games but what I don’t like is the 800p resolution of the deck. I would love to have a console like experience and a long battery life and I would like to avoid windows as much as possible. I have games all around the place but they can be played on steamOS too so that’s a non issue for me. I only have 1 game on microsoft store and I don’t mind not being able to play that. I was really close to pulling the trigger on the SteamDeck but the 80$ difference to the Z1E Ally made me feel it wasn’t as good of a deal so in the end I think I wont be getting any of the 2 😂😭
Shame mine came in with a broken joystick, had to purchase a replacement stick since they don't do customer support here in Mexico for the Rog Ally, so I haven't been able to fully enjoy it, but been enjoying some games that don't need the left joystick, like have a nice death.
I found an open box one for 491 from Best Buy, so like you suggested I'm just going to try it. I already have a Steam Deck but I use Game Pass a lot. I'm in the market for a new gaming PC right now to plug into my TV, and so I'm hoping that the Ally will fit that use case. Being able to unplug it and continue my game portably sounds wonderful. That said, I never use my Steam Deck docked, so we'll see. I'm going in pretty skeptical, because I love my Steam Deck and this thing better be pretty incredible to replace it.
At that point I'd just get a more powerful gaming pc or a laptop since you'll be docking it anyway and remote play anything you can't play natively on the deck
You could always just get a big SSD and then install Windows on a partition. Dual booting is not that hard in 2023. Ally will do a little bit better than a Deck, but neither will do all that well in pure horsepower unless you're willing to buy an XG dock. For something that can actually run modern games properly at high settings and resolution, I feel like you need to invest in a 4060 laptop at the very minimum, and that's at a completely different budget. But if you're willing to buy an XG dock, you could probably get a 4080 laptop for the price of an XG dock + Ally.
I don't really disagree with you there. I'm all about convenience these days since I have young kids, and so if the pick-up and play factor is not there, I fully intend to take it back and go back to my original plan of building an ITX PC. That said, you're not going to be able to build or buy a PC for anywhere near what I paid for it, and if the performance is "good enough," I'll be happy with it. The laptop form factor is a no-go for me, I'd never use it. I know this from experience.@@harissonbond7499
I ended up deciding to take it back. There are just so many frustrations with Windows and to say that the whole "use it like a Nintendo Switch docking with my TV thing" was janky is a bit of an understatement. It took me almost 30 minutes to get one game running on my TV. Plugging it in would turn off the touchscreen, so I had to unplug it to use the on-screen keyboard. But every time I plugged it back in, the TV screen would wig out and I'd have to adjust the resolution to fix it. This created a viscous cycle where I kept having to unplug and plug the dang thing in. They also had a function to turn off the gamepad on the device if you are using a Bluetooth controller, but then that turned off my way to control the device without the touchscreen, which was turned off by plugging in the TV! Of course, all of this could have been avoided if I had just plugged in a keyboard and mouse, but as others have said at that point I might as well just use a regular desktop computer. Also, my wife tried to play Vampire Survivors on it and the battery died before she even finished one round from 24% battery. For Vampire Survivors! The Steam Deck will run that game for hours. It might have been in high power mode though. I still really like the idea of the thing, and I think that price for a computer this powerful is a steal, but I'll wait until Windows can get its act together on these devices. Maybe the next iteration will be better.
Love your videos. I’m also happy they have been listening to the community and fixing everything they can. It’s been quite a ride for me since June over on my channel with this thing. I love the Ally so much for all the generations of games I’ve played throughout the years
I have one and I had a bad experience with it, which makes me to no suggest this console to anyone. To make it short, its a glass cannon: powerful, but fragile. Mine died with 2 days of usage - and Asus Brazil refused to repair it (and Asus USA wanted me to send back to USA) and I had to pay for it. plus, many people are having issues witht he SD cards being fried because the SD slot was placed on a very bad position which gets hot a lot.
I bought this as an adult that likes tinkering around and learning how to make things run better with a moderate amount of pc/gaming knowledge. I can’t imagine a young child trying to use expecting a switch experience. Oddly, It is a lot of fun to figure out and problem solve this thing. When you get an older game you love running on max settings with custom controls in a handheld it is pretty amazing.
Really enjoying mine so far, I have a PC with a 970 so this is still and upgrade as far as AAA titles. The battery life is obviously a bummer but I recently got a great Anker 100w battery bank. Thanks as always for such a comprehensive review!
Ive had an aya neo device befoee, and i gotta say i barely used it. The Rog ally though is such a nicer experience than those devices and I'm glad for it. I'm hoping they continue the product line
I don't know man. The only reason I could see to get an Ally over a SD OLED at this point would be if you plan to play games that can't run on Linux, and you don't wanna mess with setting up a boot manager for Linux/Windows dual boot. The extra performance from the Ally is really of little to no concern to me. If you want to actually run the Ally at full bore to get that extra little bit of performance over the Steam Deck, then you're basically going to be limited to playing next to an outlet only. Sure you can dock it, but you might as well just play the game on a desktop PC or even a laptop at that point and get way better performance than the Ally. The SD OLED is easily the clear winner right now.
Most people pretty much play these devices at home connected to an outlet already. I never understood the love for the Steamdeck; it's a great trendsetter and cheap but every device since has been better in almost every way aside from ease of use.
Well, just being able to play MORE games is a huge plus. Recently I played Genshin Impact, HonkaiStarRail, Lies of P and Yakuza Like a Dragon, the last two on GP. They don't work on SteamOS. And while the screen on the Ally isn't OLED, it's a better screen, it's 1080p, it looks sharper, and it has VRR, so I play locked at 48 fps, which is much smoother that 30, and doesn't need as much power as 60. And the Ally is still lighter, smaller, and it can be easily get a 2280 nvme, I got a 2TB one.
One of the biggest reasons is because Windows on a handheld is a trash experience overall. SteamOS has that "it just works" aspect to it. Also, the OLED revision addressed pretty much every major complaint of the LCD model, outside of just a generational jump in performance. If you ever get the chance to try the OLED, then you will understand.
@@MegaOverclocked Same. I have zero interest in SteamOS and I have to bring a license to legally run Windows, making the SteamDeck more expensive than anything out there if you want to use Windows. I use GamePass a lot, so SteamOS is not a great solution for me unless I stream, but the Logitech G-Cloud is a better and cheaper solution for that. Also easy enough to do on my iPad or iPhone as well. Many games work well with Proton, others don't - so Windows is a necessity if you want to be able to play just about everything locally. So that means you need to dual boot - or just not run SteamOS. If that's what you're doing then the Ally and Legion Go are much better solutions. The standard Z1 Rog Ally is now only $430 at Best Buy. The base Z1 outperforms the Steamdeck APU.
For the past week, I’ve been taking myself out of getting this. I’d added to cart and then changed webpage in hopes that I could do without it. I bought one upon its release, loved it but couldn’t justify the price. Your six month review pushed me to get it at open box price at my local Best Buy. Thank you.
I actually seen one in person a few weeks ago, Although the only game installed was Forza Horizon 4. I didn't think too much of it until yesterday when I woke up and was scrolling through my phone while in bed. Less than a half hour after waking up I pulled the trigger on a Z1 Extreme, open box in excellent condition at one of our local stores. Basically like new when I opened it. Landed it for $499 and a grand total of $538 out the door. I also grabbed a 512 SD card to go with it. Should have just grabbed a 1tb, but $20 bucks for a 512 seemed like a pretty damn good deal for now. After getting all the updates and countless restarts, I finally got the chance to test it out, I loaded up Just Cause 3 XXL and I was immediately impressed with how well it performs at maximum settings. I quickly learned that I have to switch the controls on the shortcut menu to gamepad only so the game controls would cooperate. This function is a game changer no pun intended. Next I loaded up GTA V at maximum settings at 1080p it runs similar to the PlayStation 4 around 30 fps, but with maxed settings. Pretty damn good though I thought. I actually do achieve better frames if I lower it to 900p. It doesn't look too bad, although some things in the distance got a little blocky looking, but it ran much faster. When I get home, The last big test will be Far cry 6, but first I'm going to run through some of the settings on the console to Make sure that I am running an absolute full throttle. So far If I could improve on the Ally, I'd probablyn thicken the device a hair to increase the battery size, then introducing a 8-in screen and maybe a front-facing HD camera.
I want to get the ROG Ally, but the one thing that scares me the most is the part where you said how the SD Card slot has all of these sorts of problems.
Exactly what I was searching! I was able to buy the ROG Ally for equivalent less than half official price in my country, Brazil, on this Black Fiday. Great video as always.
Thanks for the great video! I was considering picking one up open box since the current price is great, but I am content with my LCD Steam Deck, so I want to wait until the next generation of handhelds start coming out.
Picking up a open box Ally is a great option! Just think of it as if it was your best friend’s Ally, and they don’t want it anymore. Nothing wrong with it being used!
I picked mine up day one, small quirks here and there like your own thoughts. However, it has made me fall in love with handheld gaming again just like the Switch did almost 7 years ago. Except this time, with power. Running essentially anything I want to play or try to play. I don't use Steam enough to warrant a Steam Deck and I can just use the fact the Ally is on Windows OS, download it as such. It's awesome, and it seems like ASUS is actually trying to go the distance with it rather than leaving it to rot after release.
I bought the ROG Ally two weeks after it came out and I've been very happy with it. I was one of the lucky ones to not have the SD issue and I do use but I don't rely on it. The ROG ALLY was a mess when it first came out and I knew what I was getting myself and held on and very glad that I did. These updates that have been coming out for the ROG ALLY has been getting better and better especially playing at 15 watts and the 900p update. I don't use Gyroscope but the fact that it's an option, kudos to Asus. Let just hope they keep going. Also, with the battery, I was able to swap out the battery with the battery from the Asus G15 laptop that has 90whr battery and it has been amazing! Needed to get a custom backplate for it and yeah it's a bit heavier but it doesn't bother me at all. I truly thank the ROG community to providing this type of mod and hopefully more down the road.
Bought the Z1 extreme open-box from Best Buy for around $500. NO REGRETS! It's an amazing little device. The most demanding game I have tried on it so far is Red Dead Redemption 2. To my surprise, I was able to hit 60FPS with MEDIUM settings(also at 720p which I don't find bothersome on a screen of this size)! Mind blowing, IMO. Another huge bonus is that Game Pass(and any other launchers you use) just WORK! ABSOLUTELY worth the subscription if you're gaming on one of these! I was so torn between getting this or the Steam Deck OLED, but I am happy I opted for this.
Only thing I don’t one about the Ally is the colour. Wish it was black. I tried to mitigate this with a case but all the cases suck. Also windows can be annoying at this form factor, but after initial set up the experience is nearly flawless as Armoury crate is awesome in my opinion.
They’ll get me back when they make an XG Mobile eGPU that you can slot a desktop GPU into. I sold my Ally because I didn’t like being forced to use their proprietary solutions. Also: on the topic of the RGB brightness, you can actually trick the lights into a lower brightness setting by manually setting the RGB values lower on the 0-255 scale when creating a custom color. I did this and it was perfect when I had my device.
I bought the Z1 on black friday and i have absolutely loved it so far. I couldnt swing that last 100 for the z1 extreme. Ive been playing RE2make, genshin and the KH collection on Epic. Suprisingly my HP gaming laptop couldnt run Kingdom Hearts without constant crashing but the Ally runs it perfectly.
I bought a Steam Deck to play Genshin while traveling, and man it was a nightmare to get running. Even when I did, it runs and looks awful on the Deck. Easy as pie on the Ally!
great review. but you should have shown how good it is as a desktop pc without an e-gpu, just by using the maximum power profile. You can do all kind of office works and coding and so on. you can even get creative and make your own games on this device. All windows programs should work. This makes it so much more useful than the steam deck.
I bought my about this week and so far I'm loving it. You video help me narrow down what pc handheld to buy. Ayaneo and onexplayer are cool and probably have better battery life then ally but the money budget wise, I bought the ally for $400 and still loving it.
Hey, please, you should consider switching the ROG Ally's and the external GPU's positions on your laptop stand. The Ally does not have enough room to suck up air on your current setup. This made me anxious just watching it, lol I also picked an open box ROG Ally on Black Friday for 450 CAD. I also got a Steam Deck OLED . My original plan was to get the Ayaneo Kun and keep my OG 512 GB Deck, but the launch of the OLED Deck and Black Friday ruined that plan and saved me like 1k lol.
I finally just sent mine in for RMA since it seems like a good time to have the microSD card reader fixed. I've heard some horror stories with the ASUS repair center contractors so wish me luck on getting back a fully functional, clean, and fixed device
I bought an open box version and I love it. Have had no issues with it and use it mostly for emulation (Retro games and even Switch). But I also played FF7 Remake on it along with FF7 Crisis Core Remake and it worked well at 1080P getting 30FPS +. I need to upgrade the SSD as I already used 400GB of the 500GB available and would like to install Elden Ring on it as well and I am also planning on upgrading the joysticks in the future. The only thing is I wish the XG Mobile was cheaper so I could justify getting one and just using the Ally as my daily driver while docked.
I use Yuzu and the only issue I get is sometimes when I put the device to sleep and wake it yuzu locks up completely and needs to be killed in task manager. I use Retroarch for all the other emulators.@@spicysugarbun
Honestly got the base model and it runs fine for me. Gta5 and mw2-3 are my main jumps and they run fine on high. Maybe it's better for extreme but tbh this still runs better than my i5 3060
I've had both a steam deck and a rog ally. I find myself playing the ally a lot more due to the greater game compatibility and better performance with ps3 emulation
Bought an ally in September and it has basically replaced my gaming pc. It's sooooooo good. I just wish the ergonomics were more similar to the steam deck, the ally is quite flat. Not uncontrollable, but it could en better.
Saying the lcd is better than oled reminds me a LOT of friends swearing they couldn't see a difference between 30 and 60 fps. I really think we just sometimes have blind spots around things we've grown accustomed to. I don't mean to imply someone is wrong for thinking this way but at the same time, taken to the extreme, my father couldn't see the difference between a ps2 game and a ps4 game...
Interesting that you prefer the steam deck speakers. I just got an OLED SD and was a little disappointed by the sound, but it was much improved by an aggressive EQing using a windows equalizer and streaming my PC to the deck. I have a feeling the EQ is just better tuned on the Ally which is why ppl prefer it. Hopefully Valve adds an EQ to steamOS bc there's a lot of room for improvement through software.
Facts. I tried both lcd and oled steam deck and the sound from the lcd model was so much better in my opinion. I really want to get the Ally though but I’m scared.
after watching this I caved. Been tempted enough to want one and Boxing Day deals are up. I bought a steam deck at launch and sold it the day after getting my Ally. Both are great devices, I couldn't get past 800p screen and linux.
21:20 It’s a design flaw. The answer is that the SD slot, rather then being put on the bottom or side like most systems, ASUS placed the SD card slot literally smack dab right on the exhaust😅… with no heat sinks- at that! I’m guessing their so-called “fix” was a little Thermal Paste🙄. An almost unbelievable oversight coming from a tech company like ASUS; it’s not like it’s their first rodeo, ya know? Btw you mentioned they “fine- tuned” the FPS Limiter in the last software update? Does that mean they finally got it working? Anyway, always love your reviews and Instagram retro posts, keep up the great work & game- on🖖
I've got my ROG Ally coming on Wednesday, I waited for a bit so ASUS could iron out the issues. So hopefully mine doesn't have any of the issues people have been mentioning online.
I just ordered a set of the Xbox buttons from Etsy. Not cheap at £25 but the standard loose buttons are getting on my nerves, especially in rhythm/reaction games. I never liked the design either. Incidentally Asus are charging £6 each for spare buttons so the same price. I love the Ally. I just upgraded to the Oled Steam Deck from the original and have a good gaming PC but the Ally is still my most enjoyable experience at the moment. Thanks RGC ❤
I would like to mention that you can use the ROG Ally to play an existing gaming PC remotely. Does require some up-front setup and i havent taken the step to get it to work outside my house but it works great once you get it up and running.
I've had it for 10 months now. I love it. I'm mostly playing older games I missed over the years - like all the Souls games. But while travelling in Pakistan I used it to play new releases like Starfield and Baldur's Gate 3.
What do you want in pakistan?
i never thought I'd see you here
Just FYI. If you set the joysticks to a static color you can make the color something that isn't as bright. In my case I made them white, but in Armoury Crate it's set to a color that is closer to dark grey. The result is a very dim white ring around the joysticks. This will also work with colors by selecting a darker version of the color.
how do you adjust the joystick colours?
Armory crate > settings> lighting@@01devilsmilitia
@@JosephSeed at max value it wouldn't be more than 1% of the power draw. 90% of the draw is the APU so anything you can do to mess with that is a give and take. I have had no issues with battery life.
Picked up the Ally from a Best Buy Black Friday sale...all I can say is "wow." This thing is amazing. Having a high refresh rate with VRR on the go...playing PC games i never dreamt of playing in a hand held form factor...the speakers. Good Lord, the speakers are some of the best I've ever heard!
Something to add, though. Was super paranoid about the SD card issue...so, I have a massively aggressive manual fan curve. While it may be loud - it keeps things running cooler and so far no issues.
Me as well, just love the system
How much did you pick it up for?
@@shadow45ac $600 for the Z1 Extreme from Best Buy
@@shadow45acnot sure how much they got it for but for me the base model (base Z1 cpu, 500gb storage) is $400 at best buy. I plan on picking one up this weekend
@@ayozion Do NOT buy the base model with the Z1 chip, the GPU is heavily underpowered.
Comprehensive and well articulated. I can attest as well. The ROG Ally is an incredible handheld.
Love my ROG Ally! I was thinking of getting a steam deck just before the Ally came out, but I’m not a big PC gamer. When the ally came out and i found out i could use Xbox game pass on it, i was sold.
Quick PSA to those who are thinking of getting a open-box, please check them in-store if you are able to, some of the open-box ones have critical defects such as the triggers or buttons not working properly or at all, i experienced this twice and just opted for a new one, not all of them are returned because “people don’t know how to work Windows”
Yea I should have done that my open box was bust. Almost didn't exchange for new but glad I did
Would it be okay to go with the excellent quality open box or no?
@@Precise_Ant76 my excellent quality open box had someone else's windows logged into it still no charger no stand and right joycon wasn't working. My local best buy did all they could to try and fix it. It was honestly their after to make it right and the light experience I had on the faulty device that made me exchange for new as the open box was a a gift. I'd say it's deff worth a shot just prepare to be disappointed, hope to be amazed. Some ppl are returning just cuz it's windows.
I have never been able to convince myself to Buy open box Electronics. There are some places where I just don't trust what other people have done with things before they decided to return it.
Also keep in mind some Allies have a bad sd card slot and have to be exchanged for a v7 or higher model.
Picked up the Z1 Extreme on the Best Buy $100 off Black Friday/Cyber Monday deal. Also a Steam Deck owner. I like the Steam deck, but I love the ROG Ally! I appreciate the smaller form factor, modern look, more power and familiarity of Windows 11. Looking forward to a lot of gaming enjoyment on it.
You should have picked up the Steam deck OLED and sold your steam Deck OG.
@@cdiff07And not be able to play everything like the lcd model 😊 The deck is great if your vested in the steam ecosystem,but I'd not get a ally cause you have more options where to play and get games and run them at a higher resolution ! So you get more options aka more playable games at a higher fidelity.
@@youngjustin82Windows is a horrible handheld experience, not to mention, I have my 7950X3D, RTX 4090 Strix PC for my main gaming rig. I do own around 800 games on Steam. Point is though, the steam deck will last longer as a TRUE handheld and just work seamlessly, more so than the Ally!
@@youngjustin82I’ve been getting back into multiplayer games and a lot of games I play now is on epic or gog. Wasn’t an issue when I was just playing steam games. They say the steam deck is more user friendly but I’d say not really with all the extra steps you have to go through
@@youngjustin82 I'm vested in the steam ecosystem on my main rig
Got the ally because I like good performance lol. Unfortunately the Deck just isn't quite there imo. I like being plugged in with cpu boost and playing games like monster hunter world on a handheld at good frames and decent settings...being able to use mods, the whole nine.
The ally is just simply better in this regard. Not to shit on the deck, it was the best gaming handheld for a while there but now we've got actual computers that can play triple a titles in the form of a handheld. Could never pick OG deck (lets be real they are both OG...) over these. Now obviously Steam will have an answer, an actual answer (better performance and resolution) to the Ally and the GO. But I think the people who bought the oled must be playing old/indie games because theres no way I could deal with the lower performance of the device when we have something like the ally for basically a similar price.
Saying all that with the big caveat that I am 100% plugged in player. I wouldn't want to play any handheld at 15w with the performance hit today. So being plugged in, for the price, id just rather have the performance.
One of the things I appreciated in this video is you talking about pricing. Lot of ppl only talk about retail price and not about fluctuations which can effect the value of something.
The SD card issue is solved from R8 units, bad solder apparently has been the issue. Mine has been repaired and has been very strong since. (Repair overall went really well)
I've owned the Ally since July when it came to the Philippines. It's so good ngl for my emulation and Genshin Impact handheld gaming, and thankfully the updates have really made it better.
I returned my ROG Ally Z1 Extreme. Didnt enjoy being tethered to an outlet. The battery is terrible. I bought the AYN Odin 2 Max after watching your video on it.
It's hilariously bad.
I have in and picked up a ROG Ally (open-box) from Best Buy. After tweaks and updates I got this thing just where I want. Playing triple games on this thing is great! The Z1 extreme is amazing and I am glad I have this in addition to the LCD Steam Deck. Great 6 month review
What quality open box did you get? And how has it held up since I’m considering getting an open box in excellent quality.
I got an open box good and it’s help up quite nicely. I recommend you get it
I’m enjoying my ally
@@Chino11ificationis rog better than the deck?
Indeed
I love that they added an anti-deadzone setting in armorycrate. The armorycrate software has been sigificantly more stable since i bought my ally back in june. Havent had any issues in a while with it freaking out. I also love being able to calibrate the triggers and sticks now. Command center used to get pretty buggy like armorycrate and they both work great now.
I was going through updated reviews for this device up until yesterday. I went on a flight with my Steam Deck OLED and was totally sold on just keeping it and moving on from research on the Ally. Now here comes this video! Im back into research mode, lol. I still think the battery life of the Steam Deck OLED is the most important thing for someone who has to travel as much as I do.
It depends on what you like and what fits your needs.
SD Pros: Linux, easy to manage games and device, track pads, OLED (90hz), and battery.
SD Cons: Compatibility with Anti cheat and windows games, difficulty rises if you want to install games outside of Steam. Non oled touch screen responsiveness.
Ally Pros: Game compatibility, 120hz screen with VRR, super responsive touch screen.
Ally cons: Windows isn't handheld friendly, battery life, requires some knowledge of windows not plug and play like a switch.
Personally I prefer the Ally to my OG SD. I was worried because I though not having a trackpad to nav windows would be an issue. I would still love a touch nub like my GPD win 4 had. However, the responsiveness of the touchscreen makes up for it. Armory Crate works surprising well and if you set some one the hot keys as window management like f5, alt + enter, F4, etc it makes navigating the ally a ton easier.
I would also argue if you know how to limit the TDP properly and settings that the Ally got similar battery as the steam deck with the option to add more power. However, the OLED model has improved battery drastically. You can still get a good boost plugged in that you can't on the SD.
Go to a best buy they will have a rog display. Personally the display they had made me go with the steam deck the build quality is super poor compared to the SD.
@@Madblaster6 I think I’m just going to keep the OLED SD. The performance boost isn’t as important to me as the battery life. I went through a full 2+ hour flight playing and had 44% left. I didn’t have to think about anything. No software issues, no battery worries, no heat temp concerns.
It’s a perfect handheld gaming PC for me. I’m not sure I’d really take advantage of the power boost.
@@DieHardEddieEdwards That's totally understandable. I've been itching to get the OLED model myself but I don't use my original as much since the Ally but I'm by a plug most of the time. There were also games I couldn't play on the SD that bothered my like COD and NFS Unlimited.
@@Madblaster6 Yeah, I get that. I always want the most powerful thing. But that flight sealed it for me. I have consoles to play those games comfortably. I guess it depends on whether or not you really take these on the go.
I can’t wait til someone balances the power and battery life.
So I went with the Ally Z1 because I was able to find one for only $300 and for my use case it’s fantastic. I mostly play retro/indie games on the go but even games like Cyberpunk still work well albeit with adjusted settings. Also, being able to get full controller support including gyro for Xbox Cloud gaming makes up for the lack of horsepower. Just because the Extreme is better does NOT mean the z1 is a bad system; at the end of the day it’s a portable PC and at $300 or lower it’s a steal.
i gave 2 allys to my nephews for their birthdays. watching them play together made me think of the days when we use to pin a sheet to the ceiling to play split screen. Kids will never understand what we had to go through to get to these levels lol
Damn 2?!! How much did they cost you
@@zubairhussain7866that's what I was thinking 😂
My Ally has become my most used device. I even use it to browse windows with the analog stick mouse cursor and I find that it feels incredibly comfortable to use this way. I only use my desktop to watch RUclips now.
I got my Ally by December and I haven't touched my PS5 since then. I may even sell it, not sure yet
Just got my tomtoc ROG Ally case, and I'm loving it! It's super slim, the design is pretty, and it's impressively durable. The cutouts for the sticks are fantastic too!
The device is nice it’s not bad at all. I got an open box one and it was flawless. But I switched back to the steam deck and the ease of use and constant updates and having games played better than they did a year ago made me just take the rog back. It’s not bad I just prefer the simplicity of the deck and the dedication they have to constantly making it better.
I'm with you there. No doubt the ROG is great but the straightforward nature of the Deck is just a stress free great experience.
But with the steamdeck you cant play Hogwarts legacy or lies of P in 60 fps
Seriously, why this channel is not in the million subscribers yet. This channel reignated my interest on gaming and introduce me to retro gaming and emulation. Really love the detailed reviews of handheld devices.
Honestly, the fact that I can go out to a shop and get the Ally really makes a huge difference to me. Being in Aus it’s not impossible to get a steam deck but the extra steps are just too inconvenient. The fact the Ally is an awesome unit also makes the decision a lot easier
Not to mention you get the warranty that won't come with the Steamdeck (in Aus). I haven't looked into it too much but I assume Valve wont accept returns if you live outside the markets they sell to.
Yeah, 2+ years after Deck launched and Valve still refuses to officially sell/support the Deck anywhere outside US/Canada/Europe/those four East Asian countries. Asus sells the Ally EVERYWHERE, from Australia to Brazil you can find it and get decent support.
13:49 I liked my 3080 XG Mobile so much, I used the money I got from selling desktop, for a 4090 XG Mobile. It’s quite significantly more powerful, slightly bigger, and much quieter. But both of these models have been transformative for me as well, it’s amazing how much space the setup saves, and how portable everything is.
I would definitely say don't wait. If one of these devices has all the features that you need. Just pull the trigger. I play more games now and have completed more games just by having my Steam Deck. The quick sleep resume lets me pick up my Steam Deck and play 5-10 minutes here and there. I didn't even know I needed that feature in my life. Originally I bought a Steam Deck just because I was traveling around North America on my motorcycle and I still wanted to play some games occasionally. There will always be newer devices with, better and more, features. But you can't get back the time. Playing a fun game for a few minutes is way better then reading through the same reddit posts and refreshing the same web pages hoping for a new article. 100%, if one of these devices has all the features you need right now and you have the cash, don't wait. If there are some features that you absolutely need and none of the devices work for you, then save your money so that you have the cash on hand when a device does have everything you need.
😂 The SD card slot doesn't even work and you act like the thing is the next best thing since sliced bread Lmao .
@@ninemilli1266works for me since launch!
@@ninemilli1266 Plenty of other devices on the market where the SD card works just fine if that's a must have feature for someone. As I said, if there is a device that has all the features you need now, don't wait around for a next generation device with unknown features and released at some unknown future date.
As a Legion Go user i’m happy that the Ally is doing well ! It’s always a pleasure to see gamers enjoy their devices :D
Also it shows how well the Z1 Extreme can be optimized thanks to software updates, it gives hope for the future of these handhelds.
I am too way too many steamdeck fanboys bashing both the Alley & Legion Go claiming the Steamdeck is more powerful and better which really isn't true in terms of raw power. They always point too SD card reader problems which the steam deck had its own version of problems which the fanboys pretended never happened while bashing the Rog Alley.
@@Elknkam Can’t agree more ! The handheld market is still niche and has not a lot of players in it; i don’t count Aya Neo and GPD since they are underdogs against the big names like Lenovo, Asus or Valve; who seems to get the most attention out of the gaming community. But by being niche, it’s still prone to errors and mishaps even by big names like i quoted above, until it isn’t niche anymore.
Like i love to say, our handhelds that we have today will lay the foundation of the ones we will have tomorrow, let’s be patient and love our machines ✨
It's not just handheld market - Asus is different even in gaming laptop market. I think the people working in this company are all geeks who are passionate about making better products.
People at Dell, Lenovo, HP, Razer, etc - they don't care about feedback from customers.
I first noticed this aspect about Asus over 10 years ago while making a Hackintosh. There's an Asus laptop that was very popular with the hackintosh community, Mac OSX ran perfectly on it except Bluetooth which was missing a driver. A software engineer from Asus actually wrote a Mac driver for this bluetooth hardware and posted it at the Hackintosh forum. You will never see such a thing from any other company. Companies like HP or Dell are run like a faceless corporation, Asus has a very different culture.
I'm looking to get one but the fact alot of people have returned them alarms me
A lot of people returned the steam deck and the legion go to.
Why don’t you mention all the people who kept there’s?
I bought mine back in June and I returned it in like 15-20 days, amazing system but was not optimized and a lot of bugs. Glad to see it's been rectified, I may get it again or wait for a refresh
Great review as usual, Russ! Honestly, it seems like you can't go wrong with either the ROG Ally or Steam Deck. I do like the fact that you mentioned the Ally being available at Best Buy so you can just swing by and grab one, see if you like it, and return with little trouble if it doesn't suit you. I picked up a Steam Deck last year and have not regretted it for a minute. I do really like the console-like experience it provides. It is very easy to set up and start gaming!
With each update Asus slightly edges over for me. Gotta hand it to Asus, they've been on top of it with the updates. My faith in the company has gone up significantly.
can confirm you CAN see the black frame insertion through the youtube video clearly, it seems like a pretty sweet addition
Appreciate your methodical review, 1. Screen, 2. Customization, 3. Audio, 4. Processors, 5. ROG Software updates, 6. Comfort/ ergonomics 7. Windows experience 8. Frame rate 9. Refresh rate , 10. Case & accessories
I've owned the steam deck legion go and odin 2 and i keep coming back to the ally (although the odin 2 is a amazing device in it's own right)
ROG Ally is literally everything I ever wanted in a handheld!.
After going back to my PSP recently I think removable batteries are the answer to these handhelds. Battery goes flat, pop in a new one. It's not like this is a waterproof device that needs to be sealed.
On Amazon RIGHT NOW!!!!! I repeat right now is at 400$ I really hope it stays like that for this month cause I wanna get it so bad lol
I love the fact that the gentleman in the video states he does not have space for a desktop, but has a huge CRT TV in the background. This speaks to a healthy set of retro-oriented priorities.
$200 off in Canada is the best update Asus could have added
Yeah, I picked up a certified open box model (can't tell it's not new) for $575 CDN. Really amazing deal at this price.
@@slowmanual Nice!
Hoping asus launches a oled/new model with better battery within the next year or 2 🤞 if not maybe a black model.
Trust me the ally has a very good screen just adjust the colors a bit on the Radeon settings and it very close like 95% there. You are only missing the viewing angels which is the main downside of ips panels
Ally current screen is already on par with steam deck oled, so no need to release oled model. Ally screen is already great
OLED is nice...but the colors on the ROG are impressive, but VRR is the game changer.
@@kickconnection83 apparently vrr is not noticeable and worthless as per the legion go fanboys. I got both and I can clearly see the difference. Apparently the fanboys got both too and cant tell the difference. I wanna know what they are smoking lol?
@soldierplays4616 how funny. Digital foundry already demonstrated the difference. Disabling VRR by setting the ROG to 60hz - you will feel the frame drops...but, switch back to VRR/120hz - any drops you probably won't even notice and will feel far more smoother. BIG difference.
just got one open-box during black friday. the review was spot on. my only additional complaint is the secondary function of the back M1 and M2 buttons. there are so many instances where i accidentally hit these button while pushing a button.
You can disable those functions if you want to.
My friend got one of these a few months after it came out and it had issues
it has improved a lot since then with updates
Aye. I brought it with me on my trip to Japan, and I think on this trip, I've probably sunk in 60hr.
Of course all these awesome features drop after I sell my Ally and went back to my Steam Deck. My issues though were a combination of the hardware (mainly the SD card failure) and all kinds of weird software quirks. I couldn't start a AAA game many times without restarting the unit or I'd have terrible performance. Despite being limited to Steam games (without going into the OS that is) the Deck is just a smoother handheld experience and that was my focus.
It’s funny this releases the same day my brother informed me his Ally just stopped accepting inputs and needed a clean install of Windows. He learned this an hour before a 12-hour flight.
Had a common bug where my steam deck needed to run first time setup like 3 times. I couldn't use it on the 4 hour drive to the airport, but luckily the airport had fast wifi. Just handheld things.
Is it easy to install windows again? Newbie here for handheld PC. 😅
Ohhh... fuuukkkk!
@@diezfrancisyes. Just follow any guide
@@diezfrancis Not difficult, but it takes a good deal of time and energy, and you have to reinstall everything. Not easy to do in an airport.
The asus Rog ally left a mark in the portable pc world. Before it was the onexplayer, ayaneo, gpd that were competing with each other now all those companies are competing with the asus rog ally. Had this portable pc since it came out and still love it that's rare because with the ayaneo, akzoe, gpd win 3, steam deck, onexplayer I sold them not to long after purchasing them.
Pretty sure everyone is trying to catch up with valve actually
I personally received my Ally about a week ago, after seeing it for 100€ off on Amazon, and have been enjoying it so far. I obviously knew about it`s issues going in, but I`ve still been somewhat cought off guard by the battery life, though I`ve really only been using it in bed so far, and the charger is plugged in and ready to go on a moment`s notice, as well as my phone`s 65w charger, if necessary. Regarding the screen, I have 3 observations : it feels a bit smaller than I was hoping (more real estate than my red box switch for sure, but I found myself wishing it were just a bit bigger, at least when playing racing games specificly, especially given the bezels. Probably just a me thing though), the colors seem to pop less than I was expecting ( might have more to do with the games I`ve tried than the screen itself, and my main point of comparison in terms of games is my pc monitor, which I believe is in it`s most vibrant mode), and in the one or two games I tried playing with uncapped framerates, I still noticed the stuttering and variation in framerates more than I was expecting given the internet`s depiction of VRR (admittedly I was trying to find a good graphics setup for Tdu2 and NFS heat at 10w, which meant fairly big stutters despite framerates mostly in the 30-40 fps range with the settings I was trying with NFS heat, and Tdu2 is known for running inconsistently and generally pretty poorly on just about anything).
With that said, the addition of CPU boost options is great, and will hopefully help with battery life.
Regarding the SD card slot, I do wonder if it really was only early units that were affected, and I`m honestly kind of afraid of breaking mine. I might buy a fairly cheap card and use if for some stuff I`ll only occasionally want to access, and save all my propor games instals for when I upgrade the Ssd, hopefully within a couple of months
By the way, if all you intend to ever run is steam, you won`t ever really need to interact with the desktop or windows for gaming, since armory crate opens on startup, and you can launch steam from there (it`s pre-installed if I remember correctly), which opens in big picture mode. From that point all you have to do is set a macro in armory crate for the Xbox button (since steam sees the ally as an Xbox controller), set steam to also launch in big picture mode on startup, and basicly never look at or interact with windows again (other than all the times you`ll still need to interact with windows for things like updates, managing devices, smiting a particularly uncooperative game or task, and other amin stuff). The lower right bitten will bring up and minimize armory crate, allowing you to switch between it and steam, and you can use both steam and the control center to turn off the ally. That being said I personally find navigating windows and the web to be perfectly serviceable for casual use, with a combination of the right stich and RB and RT as the mouse in desktop mode (with the dpad as arrow keys, A as enter, and having set the left stick as the scroll wheel), the touchscreen (windows will be in tablet mode which works well enough IMO), and the on screen keyboard in the reduced floating windows mode, so that you can reposition it where it bothers you the least.
Oh, and here in Europe the legal minimum warranty is 2 years, as stipulated by EU law, so I guess i`m not that worried if the SD card reader does fail, as annoying as it would be to get it fixed
Ally gets overlooked for I dont know why reasons. Since I got mine my gaming habits have change for the better. Is so flexible as a full pc functionality and great gaming on the go and even better when docked. I forgot my deck once i got the ally
The choice between ROG Ally and the steam deck is a really hard one.
Steam deck sucks
@@davidchavez5418 you’re in the minority with that opinion.
Are most/all of your games on Steam? Are you fine with 30/40fps games? Get a deck. Any other situation get an Ally. I owned both and found that tinkering in Linux desktop to get non-steam games to work was a nightmare, and prefer to play at 60fps, or at close to it as possible
@@kylerclarke2689 I have come to the conclusion that I need to see for myself to be able to decide 😂 there are many different opinions each of them valid and I don’t know which one applies to me.
I dont mind the 40-45 fps on big games but what I don’t like is the 800p resolution of the deck. I would love to have a console like experience and a long battery life and I would like to avoid windows as much as possible. I have games all around the place but they can be played on steamOS too so that’s a non issue for me. I only have 1 game on microsoft store and I don’t mind not being able to play that.
I was really close to pulling the trigger on the SteamDeck but the 80$ difference to the Z1E Ally made me feel it wasn’t as good of a deal so in the end I think I wont be getting any of the 2 😂😭
Shame mine came in with a broken joystick, had to purchase a replacement stick since they don't do customer support here in Mexico for the Rog Ally, so I haven't been able to fully enjoy it, but been enjoying some games that don't need the left joystick, like have a nice death.
I found an open box one for 491 from Best Buy, so like you suggested I'm just going to try it. I already have a Steam Deck but I use Game Pass a lot. I'm in the market for a new gaming PC right now to plug into my TV, and so I'm hoping that the Ally will fit that use case. Being able to unplug it and continue my game portably sounds wonderful. That said, I never use my Steam Deck docked, so we'll see. I'm going in pretty skeptical, because I love my Steam Deck and this thing better be pretty incredible to replace it.
That's a great deal. I always considered buying one if it goes on sale under $500.
At that point I'd just get a more powerful gaming pc or a laptop since you'll be docking it anyway and remote play anything you can't play natively on the deck
You could always just get a big SSD and then install Windows on a partition. Dual booting is not that hard in 2023. Ally will do a little bit better than a Deck, but neither will do all that well in pure horsepower unless you're willing to buy an XG dock. For something that can actually run modern games properly at high settings and resolution, I feel like you need to invest in a 4060 laptop at the very minimum, and that's at a completely different budget. But if you're willing to buy an XG dock, you could probably get a 4080 laptop for the price of an XG dock + Ally.
I don't really disagree with you there. I'm all about convenience these days since I have young kids, and so if the pick-up and play factor is not there, I fully intend to take it back and go back to my original plan of building an ITX PC. That said, you're not going to be able to build or buy a PC for anywhere near what I paid for it, and if the performance is "good enough," I'll be happy with it. The laptop form factor is a no-go for me, I'd never use it. I know this from experience.@@harissonbond7499
I ended up deciding to take it back. There are just so many frustrations with Windows and to say that the whole "use it like a Nintendo Switch docking with my TV thing" was janky is a bit of an understatement. It took me almost 30 minutes to get one game running on my TV. Plugging it in would turn off the touchscreen, so I had to unplug it to use the on-screen keyboard. But every time I plugged it back in, the TV screen would wig out and I'd have to adjust the resolution to fix it. This created a viscous cycle where I kept having to unplug and plug the dang thing in. They also had a function to turn off the gamepad on the device if you are using a Bluetooth controller, but then that turned off my way to control the device without the touchscreen, which was turned off by plugging in the TV! Of course, all of this could have been avoided if I had just plugged in a keyboard and mouse, but as others have said at that point I might as well just use a regular desktop computer.
Also, my wife tried to play Vampire Survivors on it and the battery died before she even finished one round from 24% battery. For Vampire Survivors! The Steam Deck will run that game for hours. It might have been in high power mode though.
I still really like the idea of the thing, and I think that price for a computer this powerful is a steal, but I'll wait until Windows can get its act together on these devices. Maybe the next iteration will be better.
Love your videos. I’m also happy they have been listening to the community and fixing everything they can. It’s been quite a ride for me since June over on my channel with this thing. I love the Ally so much for all the generations of games I’ve played throughout the years
I have one and I had a bad experience with it, which makes me to no suggest this console to anyone. To make it short, its a glass cannon: powerful, but fragile.
Mine died with 2 days of usage - and Asus Brazil refused to repair it (and Asus USA wanted me to send back to USA) and I had to pay for it.
plus, many people are having issues witht he SD cards being fried because the SD slot was placed on a very bad position which gets hot a lot.
HAS the sd card issue been fixed? I can't find ANYTHING online suggesting this.
I bought this as an adult that likes tinkering around and learning how to make things run better with a moderate amount of pc/gaming knowledge. I can’t imagine a young child trying to use expecting a switch experience. Oddly, It is a lot of fun to figure out and problem solve this thing. When you get an older game you love running on max settings with custom controls in a handheld it is pretty amazing.
Literally just typed 'Steam Deck vs Rog Ally update Retro Game Corps' in the youtube search function and this popped up. Perfect timing :)
Really enjoying mine so far, I have a PC with a 970 so this is still and upgrade as far as AAA titles. The battery life is obviously a bummer but I recently got a great Anker 100w battery bank. Thanks as always for such a comprehensive review!
I'm so fuckimg excited to get my brother one of these handhelds for his birthday this month
Windows can be installed on the Deck... It's not that the Deck can't play the games you mentioned, it's the incompatibility with SteamOS.
Ive had an aya neo device befoee, and i gotta say i barely used it. The Rog ally though is such a nicer experience than those devices and I'm glad for it. I'm hoping they continue the product line
I don't know man. The only reason I could see to get an Ally over a SD OLED at this point would be if you plan to play games that can't run on Linux, and you don't wanna mess with setting up a boot manager for Linux/Windows dual boot. The extra performance from the Ally is really of little to no concern to me. If you want to actually run the Ally at full bore to get that extra little bit of performance over the Steam Deck, then you're basically going to be limited to playing next to an outlet only. Sure you can dock it, but you might as well just play the game on a desktop PC or even a laptop at that point and get way better performance than the Ally. The SD OLED is easily the clear winner right now.
Most people pretty much play these devices at home connected to an outlet already. I never understood the love for the Steamdeck; it's a great trendsetter and cheap but every device since has been better in almost every way aside from ease of use.
Well, just being able to play MORE games is a huge plus. Recently I played Genshin Impact, HonkaiStarRail, Lies of P and Yakuza Like a Dragon, the last two on GP. They don't work on SteamOS. And while the screen on the Ally isn't OLED, it's a better screen, it's 1080p, it looks sharper, and it has VRR, so I play locked at 48 fps, which is much smoother that 30, and doesn't need as much power as 60.
And the Ally is still lighter, smaller, and it can be easily get a 2280 nvme, I got a 2TB one.
One of the biggest reasons is because Windows on a handheld is a trash experience overall. SteamOS has that "it just works" aspect to it. Also, the OLED revision addressed pretty much every major complaint of the LCD model, outside of just a generational jump in performance. If you ever get the chance to try the OLED, then you will understand.
@@MegaOverclocked Same. I have zero interest in SteamOS and I have to bring a license to legally run Windows, making the SteamDeck more expensive than anything out there if you want to use Windows. I use GamePass a lot, so SteamOS is not a great solution for me unless I stream, but the Logitech G-Cloud is a better and cheaper solution for that. Also easy enough to do on my iPad or iPhone as well.
Many games work well with Proton, others don't - so Windows is a necessity if you want to be able to play just about everything locally. So that means you need to dual boot - or just not run SteamOS.
If that's what you're doing then the Ally and Legion Go are much better solutions.
The standard Z1 Rog Ally is now only $430 at Best Buy. The base Z1 outperforms the Steamdeck APU.
it's not a little extra bit of performance. It's pretty drastic. But yeah no one should buy an Ally for its battery life.
Got one yesterday on offerup. $500 for the extreme model with a 2tb nvme upgrade. I love it so far
For the past week, I’ve been taking myself out of getting this. I’d added to cart and then changed webpage in hopes that I could do without it. I bought one upon its release, loved it but couldn’t justify the price. Your six month review pushed me to get it at open box price at my local Best Buy. Thank you.
Thanks Russ for the review. Always informative and useful. Keep doing what you do.
The Ally is the best (major brand) handheld available.
Its size and power are what makes it great.
I actually seen one in person a few weeks ago, Although the only game installed was Forza Horizon 4. I didn't think too much of it until yesterday when I woke up and was scrolling through my phone while in bed.
Less than a half hour after waking up I pulled the trigger on a Z1 Extreme, open box in excellent condition at one of our local stores. Basically like new when I opened it. Landed it for $499 and a grand total of $538 out the door.
I also grabbed a 512 SD card to go with it. Should have just grabbed a 1tb, but $20 bucks for a 512 seemed like a pretty damn good deal for now.
After getting all the updates and countless restarts, I finally got the chance to test it out, I loaded up Just Cause 3 XXL and I was immediately impressed with how well it performs at maximum settings. I quickly learned that I have to switch the controls on the shortcut menu to gamepad only so the game controls would cooperate. This function is a game changer no pun intended.
Next I loaded up GTA V at maximum settings at 1080p it runs similar to the PlayStation 4 around 30 fps, but with maxed settings.
Pretty damn good though I thought. I actually do achieve better frames if I lower it to 900p. It doesn't look too bad, although some things in the distance got a little blocky looking, but it ran much faster.
When I get home, The last big test will be Far cry 6, but first I'm going to run through some of the settings on the console to Make sure that I am running an absolute full throttle.
So far If I could improve on the Ally, I'd probablyn thicken the device a hair to increase the battery size, then introducing a 8-in screen and maybe a front-facing HD camera.
I want to get the ROG Ally, but the one thing that scares me the most is the part where you said how the SD Card slot has all of these sorts of problems.
Exactly what I was searching! I was able to buy the ROG Ally for equivalent less than half official price in my country, Brazil, on this Black Fiday. Great video as always.
Thanks for the great video! I was considering picking one up open box since the current price is great, but I am content with my LCD Steam Deck, so I want to wait until the next generation of handhelds start coming out.
Picking up a open box Ally is a great option! Just think of it as if it was your best friend’s Ally, and they don’t want it anymore. Nothing wrong with it being used!
I picked mine up day one, small quirks here and there like your own thoughts.
However, it has made me fall in love with handheld gaming again just like the Switch did almost 7 years ago. Except this time, with power. Running essentially anything I want to play or try to play. I don't use Steam enough to warrant a Steam Deck and I can just use the fact the Ally is on Windows OS, download it as such.
It's awesome, and it seems like ASUS is actually trying to go the distance with it rather than leaving it to rot after release.
I bought the ROG Ally two weeks after it came out and I've been very happy with it. I was one of the lucky ones to not have the SD issue and I do use but I don't rely on it. The ROG ALLY was a mess when it first came out and I knew what I was getting myself and held on and very glad that I did. These updates that have been coming out for the ROG ALLY has been getting better and better especially playing at 15 watts and the 900p update. I don't use Gyroscope but the fact that it's an option, kudos to Asus. Let just hope they keep going.
Also, with the battery, I was able to swap out the battery with the battery from the Asus G15 laptop that has 90whr battery and it has been amazing! Needed to get a custom backplate for it and yeah it's a bit heavier but it doesn't bother me at all. I truly thank the ROG community to providing this type of mod and hopefully more down the road.
I returned 2 for sd card failure. I was going to wait for the fix, but I ended up going with the GPD win 4 2023. I'm very happy with the choice.
Bought the Z1 extreme open-box from Best Buy for around $500. NO REGRETS! It's an amazing little device.
The most demanding game I have tried on it so far is Red Dead Redemption 2. To my surprise, I was able to hit 60FPS with MEDIUM settings(also at 720p which I don't find bothersome on a screen of this size)! Mind blowing, IMO.
Another huge bonus is that Game Pass(and any other launchers you use) just WORK! ABSOLUTELY worth the subscription if you're gaming on one of these!
I was so torn between getting this or the Steam Deck OLED, but I am happy I opted for this.
Only thing I don’t one about the Ally is the colour. Wish it was black. I tried to mitigate this with a case but all the cases suck.
Also windows can be annoying at this form factor, but after initial set up the experience is nearly flawless as Armoury crate is awesome in my opinion.
Try a skin
They’ll get me back when they make an XG Mobile eGPU that you can slot a desktop GPU into. I sold my Ally because I didn’t like being forced to use their proprietary solutions.
Also: on the topic of the RGB brightness, you can actually trick the lights into a lower brightness setting by manually setting the RGB values lower on the 0-255 scale when creating a custom color. I did this and it was perfect when I had my device.
Why buy it in the first place lmao
I bought the Z1 on black friday and i have absolutely loved it so far. I couldnt swing that last 100 for the z1 extreme.
Ive been playing RE2make, genshin and the KH collection on Epic.
Suprisingly my HP gaming laptop couldnt run Kingdom Hearts without constant crashing but the Ally runs it perfectly.
Saw that is available for even cheaper today
I bought a Steam Deck to play Genshin while traveling, and man it was a nightmare to get running. Even when I did, it runs and looks awful on the Deck. Easy as pie on the Ally!
great review. but you should have shown how good it is as a desktop pc without an e-gpu, just by using the maximum power profile. You can do all kind of office works and coding and so on. you can even get creative and make your own games on this device. All windows programs should work. This makes it so much more useful than the steam deck.
I bought my about this week and so far I'm loving it. You video help me narrow down what pc handheld to buy. Ayaneo and onexplayer are cool and probably have better battery life then ally but the money budget wise, I bought the ally for $400 and still loving it.
Hey, please, you should consider switching the ROG Ally's and the external GPU's positions on your laptop stand. The Ally does not have enough room to suck up air on your current setup. This made me anxious just watching it, lol
I also picked an open box ROG Ally on Black Friday for 450 CAD. I also got a Steam Deck OLED . My original plan was to get the Ayaneo Kun and keep my OG 512 GB Deck, but the launch of the OLED Deck and Black Friday ruined that plan and saved me like 1k lol.
Still love mine and appreciate that Asus is still updating it.
I finally just sent mine in for RMA since it seems like a good time to have the microSD card reader fixed. I've heard some horror stories with the ASUS repair center contractors so wish me luck on getting back a fully functional, clean, and fixed device
I bought an open box version and I love it. Have had no issues with it and use it mostly for emulation (Retro games and even Switch). But I also played FF7 Remake on it along with FF7 Crisis Core Remake and it worked well at 1080P getting 30FPS +. I need to upgrade the SSD as I already used 400GB of the 500GB available and would like to install Elden Ring on it as well and I am also planning on upgrading the joysticks in the future. The only thing is I wish the XG Mobile was cheaper so I could justify getting one and just using the Ally as my daily driver while docked.
What emulator do you use for switch games?
I use Yuzu and the only issue I get is sometimes when I put the device to sleep and wake it yuzu locks up completely and needs to be killed in task manager. I use Retroarch for all the other emulators.@@spicysugarbun
I wish OLED refresh would have brought a more powerful system for the Steamdeck.
Honestly got the base model and it runs fine for me. Gta5 and mw2-3 are my main jumps and they run fine on high. Maybe it's better for extreme but tbh this still runs better than my i5 3060
I've had both a steam deck and a rog ally. I find myself playing the ally a lot more due to the greater game compatibility and better performance with ps3 emulation
Same here
Whoa that version of Mario World at the end looked very weird I'm so used to the semi widescreen version on the Game boy advance.
Bought mine last Friday and I'm having a blast. It's amazing!
absolutely have not fixed the SD card reader, still reports of them breaking, and as well as my own.
Nice video. Just ordered the tomtoc Ally case!
Had my ally for about a month and it’s been amazing.
I feel dropping actual cash on products is a different review than getting review samples and would be critical
Bought an ally in September and it has basically replaced my gaming pc. It's sooooooo good. I just wish the ergonomics were more similar to the steam deck, the ally is quite flat. Not uncontrollable, but it could en better.
Saying the lcd is better than oled reminds me a LOT of friends swearing they couldn't see a difference between 30 and 60 fps. I really think we just sometimes have blind spots around things we've grown accustomed to.
I don't mean to imply someone is wrong for thinking this way but at the same time, taken to the extreme, my father couldn't see the difference between a ps2 game and a ps4 game...
Depends on the game. On Fortnite 30fps is very noticeable but something that's turn based like Persona 30fps isn't that bad.
@@mrman6035 For sure, 30fps can be an awesome time in the right contexts.
I’ve owned all 3 devices (ally, go and SD OLED) the best device for me is the ally. I prefer the 1080p VRR display over the go and 800p OLED
Interesting that you prefer the steam deck speakers. I just got an OLED SD and was a little disappointed by the sound, but it was much improved by an aggressive EQing using a windows equalizer and streaming my PC to the deck. I have a feeling the EQ is just better tuned on the Ally which is why ppl prefer it. Hopefully Valve adds an EQ to steamOS bc there's a lot of room for improvement through software.
Facts. I tried both lcd and oled steam deck and the sound from the lcd model was so much better in my opinion. I really want to get the Ally though but I’m scared.
after watching this I caved. Been tempted enough to want one and Boxing Day deals are up. I bought a steam deck at launch and sold it the day after getting my Ally. Both are great devices, I couldn't get past 800p screen and linux.
21:20 It’s a design flaw. The answer is that the SD slot, rather then being put on the bottom or side like most systems, ASUS placed the SD card slot literally smack dab right on the exhaust😅… with no heat sinks- at that! I’m guessing their so-called “fix” was a little Thermal Paste🙄. An almost unbelievable oversight coming from a tech company like ASUS; it’s not like it’s their first rodeo, ya know?
Btw you mentioned they “fine- tuned” the FPS Limiter in the last software update? Does that mean they finally got it working? Anyway, always love your reviews and Instagram retro posts, keep up the great work & game- on🖖
Hi My Rog Ally Micro SD Card Slot died 9 months after launch, I didn't use the SD card slot much, but now have the legion go and a Rog Ally 👍
I decided to pick up Steam Deck OLED Limited Edition. I'll get ROG Ally or Legion GO maybe after another year of updates, and hardware iterations.
I've got my ROG Ally coming on Wednesday, I waited for a bit so ASUS could iron out the issues. So hopefully mine doesn't have any of the issues people have been mentioning online.
I just ordered a set of the Xbox buttons from Etsy. Not cheap at £25 but the standard loose buttons are getting on my nerves, especially in rhythm/reaction games. I never liked the design either. Incidentally Asus are charging £6 each for spare buttons so the same price. I love the Ally. I just upgraded to the Oled Steam Deck from the original and have a good gaming PC but the Ally is still my most enjoyable experience at the moment. Thanks RGC ❤
I would like to mention that you can use the ROG Ally to play an existing gaming PC remotely. Does require some up-front setup and i havent taken the step to get it to work outside my house but it works great once you get it up and running.
Great review, I like seeing how the ROG Ally keeps improving. I can't wait to get one