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The Asus ROG Ally is here to take on the Steam Deck. This handheld gaming console features better specs than Valve’s machine, including a 1080p 120Hz display and the new AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme chip. It can also play Windows-compatible games right out of the box.

We've tested both systems and found them to be great for playing PC games on the go. But how do they compare against one another? In this video, we’ll go over what each handheld gaming console has to offer to help you decide which one to get.

#asusrogally #steamdeck #gamingconsole

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Tech
Transcript
00:00 Right here we have the Asus ROG Ally,
00:02 a brand new Windows 11 based handheld
00:04 that wants to take on the ever popular Valve Steam Deck.
00:09 I've tested both of these,
00:11 and while both of them are great,
00:13 one is actually a clear winner.
00:15 Is it the Valve Steam Deck or the Asus ROG Ally?
00:20 We're gonna find out.
00:21 (upbeat music)
00:23 Both of these have the same basic form
00:28 as you would see in other handhelds.
00:31 Both of them have the same basic design,
00:33 buttons, D-pad and all that.
00:35 The big difference is that the Valve Steam Deck
00:38 has these touch pads underneath the analog sticks,
00:42 which is something the Asus handheld doesn't have.
00:46 It can be a big deal to some.
00:48 Like I feel it makes it easier to play keyboard
00:51 and mouse base with the touch pads.
00:54 All right, so the other difference is back buttons,
00:56 even though both do have back buttons,
00:59 the Asus ROG Ally only has two back buttons
01:02 while the Steam Deck has four,
01:05 which means you have more options to program.
01:08 I also feel that the back buttons on the Steam Deck,
01:12 they feel better just because they're contoured
01:15 with the actual console itself,
01:16 then they go where your fingers go.
01:18 Whereas with the ROG Ally, they just kind of stick out.
01:23 It's not bad, but it doesn't feel as intuitive.
01:26 One of the other differences with the shoulder buttons.
01:28 So the shoulder buttons here on the Asus ROG Ally,
01:31 as you can see, they have these little contours here,
01:33 which make it really easy to press.
01:34 If your fingers get sweaty,
01:36 you don't have to worry about that.
01:37 With that said, however,
01:39 I still feel the Steam Deck has better shoulder buttons,
01:43 not only because they're bigger,
01:45 but they just feel more responsive,
01:47 more clicky when you press on them.
01:49 The other cool design thing, as you can see here,
01:52 is that there's RGB lighting
01:54 underneath the two analog sticks.
01:56 Their vents are kind of the same.
01:58 Here's the Steam Deck, you know,
01:59 heat comes out of there.
02:01 Same thing with the Asus ROG Ally.
02:03 And both of these, their hottest part is right up here,
02:07 which is good because your fingers are nowhere near it.
02:09 They even have the same amount of ports.
02:11 They have one USB-C port at top,
02:13 power button, volume button.
02:15 The difference is that the Asus ROG Ally has all those,
02:20 plus a PCIe port where you could connect
02:23 to the Asus XG Mobile graphics card.
02:27 In my personal opinion,
02:28 I think the Steam Deck has a little bit of a better design.
02:31 It's more ergonomic, the buttons feel clickier,
02:36 and as far as their weight is concerned,
02:38 Asus ROG Ally is lighter by a little bit,
02:42 but the Steam Deck, even though it's heavier
02:45 and a little bit bulkier, it feels better to hold overall.
02:48 Okay, let's talk about display,
02:49 and this is the one area where the Asus ROG Ally
02:53 is a clear victor.
02:54 Like the Steam Deck, it has a seven-inch LCD screen,
02:57 but that's where the similarities pretty much end.
03:00 This has a 1080p screen, resolution, and 120 hertz,
03:04 whereas the Steam Deck has a 720p screen and 60 hertz.
03:09 That difference in resolution and refresh rates
03:13 makes a big difference.
03:15 Like, I honestly believed beforehand that,
03:17 like, oh, seven inches,
03:18 you're not gonna be able to tell the difference
03:19 between 720p and 1080p.
03:21 You absolutely can.
03:23 It's remarkable how much detail you could see
03:25 in games like Spider-Man and Cyberpunk.
03:28 Even if you're playing a game at 60 frames a second,
03:31 the 120 hertz refresh rate just makes it feel a lot smoother.
03:35 That isn't to say that the Steam Deck, you know,
03:38 just looks terrible in comparison.
03:40 It doesn't, but it's a big difference
03:43 that you're gonna be able to tell right away,
03:45 and that's one of the biggest selling points of the system,
03:47 the fact that you get something this small
03:49 with such a crisp, vibrant, and vivid display.
03:52 It's a huge game changer.
03:54 All right, next, we gotta talk about performance,
03:56 and this is where, quite frankly, I'm kinda shocked.
03:59 So let's get some of the particulars out of the way.
04:01 The ASUS ROG Ally, the one we reviewed,
04:04 comes with the brand new AMD Ryzen R1 Extreme chip,
04:09 which is based on Zen 4 architecture.
04:12 Compare that to the Steam Deck,
04:14 which has a custom AMD APU as well, which is Zen 2.
04:19 You would figure because of that,
04:21 that the ASUS ROG Ally would be more performant.
04:25 As a matter of fact, ASUS said, and AMD as well,
04:29 said that this is twice as powerful as the Steam Deck.
04:32 On paper, it is, but in practice, not really so much.
04:37 I've played on both of those back to back.
04:39 I've played the same games, in this case specifically,
04:42 Spider-Man, Doom Eternal, and Cyberpunk,
04:46 and the big winner was Doom at 720p.
04:51 It ran around 60 to 71 frames a second
04:54 on the ASUS ROG Ally, which is fantastic.
04:57 On the Steam Deck at 720p,
04:58 it runs around 25, 30 frames a second.
05:02 When I bumped up the ASUS ROG Ally to 1080p,
05:05 the frame rate for Doom was around 45, 35 frames a second,
05:10 which isn't terrible, obviously,
05:12 but I was expecting it to be a lot higher,
05:15 and even our lab testing, we did,
05:17 most of the games that we ran
05:19 through their dedicated benchmarks,
05:21 frame rates barely hit 30 frames a second
05:23 across the board at 1080p,
05:25 and then when we compared it to the Steam Deck,
05:28 they were almost comparable,
05:30 and the only thing that I think is happening here,
05:34 or rather, the main reason you're not seeing
05:36 big performance gains on the ASUS ROG Allies
05:39 because of the fact that this is just
05:41 straight up Windows 11.
05:42 There is nothing that has been optimized
05:45 for this system yet, right?
05:46 For example, with the Steam Deck,
05:48 all the games are optimized to run
05:50 on that specific hardware,
05:51 optimized to run on Steam OS, right?
05:54 That's not the case with the Ally,
05:56 and I said this in my review,
05:58 just because a game could run on Windows 11
06:00 doesn't mean it'll run well,
06:01 so that's one of the big issues
06:03 when it comes to the performance.
06:04 I'm not saying it has bad performance,
06:06 but I was expecting a lot more,
06:09 especially since this costs $50 more
06:12 than the highest-end Steam Deck,
06:14 very disappointing.
06:15 Okay, let's talk about software.
06:18 Like I said, this is a Windows 11-based handheld.
06:21 As a matter of fact, you could pretty much consider this
06:23 a miniature Windows PC,
06:26 'cause it runs exactly like Windows,
06:27 which means every Windows 11-compatible game
06:30 is compatible with this system,
06:33 but that's where some of the problems start.
06:36 Right now, I'm showing you the ASUS Armory app,
06:40 which compiles every game you have downloaded on here,
06:42 and it doesn't matter whether you got a game
06:44 from Steam, from EA, from Xbox, Ubisoft, Kinect,
06:48 it'll bring everything here,
06:50 which is good in theory,
06:51 but the problem is that the instant you go
06:54 into one of the games,
06:56 it'll bring up that game's launcher.
06:59 Right before I previously had Cyberpunk,
07:01 and it brought up this menu,
07:03 and it's not as intuitive as it is on Steam Deck.
07:06 On Steam Deck, you're in Steam OS itself.
07:11 So right here on Steam Deck, we have Steam OS,
07:13 which is tailor-made for this system.
07:16 Very easy to navigate.
07:18 It's no problems, the buttons all work.
07:20 You have your options here.
07:23 It's something I wish the ROG Ally had.
07:27 Again, Armory trait is good,
07:29 but it's not as intuitive as this, not at all.
07:32 I'm not sure if they'll ever make a dedicated app
07:35 with a good UI for the ASUS ROG Ally,
07:38 but you don't have to worry about that with the Steam Deck.
07:40 It's just pre-built-in,
07:41 and it's a big point of contention for me, 'cause...
07:45 All right, so when it comes to game library,
07:47 the Steam Deck, right out of the box,
07:49 you have access to over 2,000 Steam games.
07:52 Most of them are, as they call it, deck verified.
07:55 That means they've been tested.
07:57 They'll run on the system perfectly.
08:00 But there's even a lot of games,
08:01 even though they're not verified,
08:03 they'll still run on the system regardless.
08:05 This is one of the Steam Deck's greatest strengths,
08:07 but it's also somewhat of a weakness,
08:09 because if you wanna run, for example, Xbox games,
08:13 games from GOG or Ubisoft Connect or apps like that,
08:17 you can run them on the system,
08:19 but you'll need to install them via the desktop mode,
08:22 and that's not always very intuitive.
08:25 And that's where the Ally has an advantage,
08:28 because since it is a Windows 11 handheld,
08:31 you can just download all that stuff right out of the box.
08:33 As a matter of fact, when I first got it,
08:35 I installed Chrome and Slack, and it was fine.
08:38 I wouldn't be able to do anything like that
08:40 on the Steam Deck.
08:41 So you could say that the Asus ROG Ally
08:45 has a larger game library,
08:49 but the problem is none of those games
08:51 have been optimized for the system.
08:53 Not yet, not at the time of recording.
08:55 So your results may vary.
08:58 Moving on to battery life is another point of contention.
09:02 In our testing, and even in my own personal testing,
09:06 the Steam Deck runs around three hours on a good day,
09:10 depending on what games you're playing.
09:11 So I was hoping maybe I could get five, six hours.
09:15 As a matter of fact, when I went to a hands-on preview,
09:18 one of the PR reps told me that you get eight hours
09:21 of gameplay from this.
09:23 Nope, that didn't happen.
09:25 So based on our testing and even my own testing as well,
09:28 you're lucky if you get two hours of battery life
09:30 from the Asus ROG Ally.
09:32 Matter of fact, if you want to get specific about it,
09:34 the Steam Deck in our testing got an hour and 40 minutes
09:37 of battery life.
09:38 This got an hour and 43 minutes of battery life.
09:42 So not good.
09:43 I was stunned when I was playing it.
09:45 Like I just saw the battery just drain and drain and drain
09:48 right before my eyes.
09:49 Here's the thing, you want to play this as a handheld,
09:51 but it seems if you want to play for long stretches,
09:54 you got to keep it plugged in,
09:55 which is also a problem I had with the Steam Deck.
09:57 You almost always have to keep it plugged in,
09:59 which is kind of disappointing.
10:01 If you plan to leave the house with this thing,
10:03 make sure you bring the battery pack
10:04 because it is not going to last you very long.
10:07 All right, so now for the big question,
10:08 which one should you get?
10:09 Should you get the Asus ROG Ally or the Steam Deck, right?
10:13 But the reason it's tough is because I really wanted
10:17 the ROG Ally to be like neck and neck with the Steam Deck.
10:20 I wanted it to be a legit competitor.
10:22 And again, it has a lot going for it.
10:24 The design is awesome, nice to hold.
10:27 The screen is beautiful, right?
10:30 The buttons are nice and clicky, great game library.
10:33 There's a lot going for it,
10:34 but unfortunately the compatibility isn't there
10:38 as I talked about in the review.
10:40 Yes, you could run Windows games on it,
10:43 but not all Windows games will run great.
10:44 And currently there are no games that take advantage
10:47 of the Ryzen Z1 Extreme chip.
10:50 And even though the Steam Deck has lower spec,
10:54 the games are actually optimized for this thing.
10:56 So that goes a long way for your enjoyment
11:00 and it's a little bit upsetting, but at the same time,
11:04 I do feel that the ROG Ally
11:07 is the best Windows 11 handheld, like bar none.
11:10 This comes from Asus, they know what they're doing.
11:12 They have a long history when it comes to gaming.
11:14 So this will not be the only ROG Ally.
11:17 So we will be seeing others and I'm pretty sure
11:19 they're gonna iterate, make it better.
11:21 So I would recommend this.
11:22 And also the price point, right now,
11:24 the Asus ROG Ally with the Z1 Extreme chip costs 699,
11:28 whereas the high-end Steam Deck costs 649.
11:32 I know that's $50, may not sound like a big difference,
11:34 but some people could be.
11:36 All right, guys, so that's it for this video.
11:38 I hope you guys enjoyed it.
11:39 I hope I was able to help you decide which one to get.
11:41 And for more on everything gaming, computing,
11:46 all the good stuff, make sure you check out Tom's Guide.
11:48 We're on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter.
11:52 And we're also online, obviously, tomsguide.com.
11:55 So make sure you hit us up and we'll have more for you soon.
11:59 Once again, I was Tony Polanco,
12:00 and I will see you around, later.
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