Well, we cannot hide that it has seemed to us not only a rival for Valve’s proposal, but also, in the absence of knowing its price – a detail that there was no way for ASUS representatives to release a pledge – but a team that despite arriving later at the market can take the throne from him. Because? Well, because, to begin with, you can tell that it is a product that has been made by a brand that knows what it is doing and that has been launching gaming laptops to the first-level market for more than a decade.
The ROG Ally feel
ASUS portable console-PC weighs 608 grams, a figure that on paper may seem high – more than half a kilo -. What makes it much more surprising from the first moment you have the product in your hand. Not only because the company has managed, as they revealed to us, to lighten almost 100 grams compared to the first final prototypes, but because the weight distribution is outstanding. The only comparison that the subscriber can make is with the Nintendo Switch (398 grams) and I can assure you that despite the fact that the ROG Ally weighs 200 grams more, it feels even lighter.
As for the design, ASUS was not hiding saying that they have taken the xbox controller layout for the placement of the buttons and sticks, but they have taken care that the shapes are as comfortable as possible, adding extra angles on the edges to perfectly adapt to the contour of the hand. And we can say that: job well done by the company’s engineers and designers. It is a very gaming product, so there is also the possibility of personalization through multicolor LEDs here and there, even in the analogue pits, creating a product that is visually very interesting.
Details (we can talk about)
We already warned you that it is not possible to talk about the power, FPS, or performance of the product because, to begin with, the ones we were able to touch were still almost laboratory samples, they were not final products – And on the other hand, because they don’t let us do it -.
But what we can say is that the machine moved Windows 11 without problems and with special launcher that ASUS has prepared, gather all the games that we have installed in the system regardless of the platform (Steam, Epic, Xbox GamePass, etc.) from which they come. And for those more interested in having full control of their products, there is good news: the equipment is free, so if you want to get rid of Microsoft’s operating system you can even install steamos of his great rival.
Without being able to talk in detail about the games, as you can see in the images we were able to “taste” how the machine moves very recent titles such as Hogwarts Legacy and ports like the god of war from sony. The experience was very short in time but we can say that we did not encounter any problem in a machine that comes with a screen 16:9 120Hz 1080p and whose objective is to maintain 60 fps at all times, can you achieve it? To answer that we have to wait for the review in a few weekslike the 500 nits of brightness to see how they behave in different lighting environments.
Things that we still have to test thoroughly
Continuing with these first impressions with the ROG Ally, obviously the issue of autonomy, power, cooling and noise came to the fore. ASUS has provided the equipment with a double fan capable of working with both one module and both and, in neither case, exceed the 30dB. The conditions for the preview, with a room full of people, were not ideal – just like they weren’t ideal for enjoying the speakers with Dolby Atmos that incorporates – to corroborate this but we have the feeling that, in addition, the design of the air intakes and outlets that are designed so that they do not disturb when playing and, above all, a Construction design in which everything is turned to the comfort and heat dissipation.
For its part, it has to deal with a processor AMD RYZEN Z1 Extreme, created ex-profeso for the occasion and the machine. with architecture Zen 4, RDNA 3 graphics and 8 CoresAccompanied by 16GB of DDR5 RAM and 512GB for storage – expandable via microSD -. On paper, quite a colossus but, again, are aspects that due to time and commitments we cannot assess at this time.
In this sense, at full power what suffers is the autonomy and the official figures speak of 1 hour and about 40 minutes of autonomous play. It is true that the machine, although accessories are sold separately, is prepared for use both independently and connected to a dock for both a television and a monitor. What’s more, if we need extra power, in the event that we want to reach 4K, you can use a external graphic as the ROG XG Mobile with which it is compatible.
Final feelings and conclusions
The brief but intense contact with the ROG Ally has left us wanting more, and that’s a good sign. It is a team that in the absence of knowing its price which, hopefully, will be announced on May 11 in its presentation – and which, according to the information we have, will be below 1,000 euros… but not far below -, has a good chance of sneaking into the wish list of those who want to have a portable gaming pc and that, until now, they only had one option in the market. Is it better than the Steam Deck? Is it worth for its price? Can it deliver the performance it promises? We summon you to our analysis in a few weeks when we have been able to “gut”, in the best of the senses, the new contender in this particular segment that looks like it will cause a lot to talk about in the coming years.
