ASUS ROG Ally Game Console Is Not Only Real It Could Blow Away The Steam Deck
The ASUS ROG Ally was not an April Fool's joke after all, but that has turned out to be a very good thing. Sources claim that ASUS’ new handheld gaming console will destroy the Steam Deck in gaming performance with up to twice the performance potential, thanks to beefed-up internals running on the latest AMD CPU and GPU architectures.
These reports suggest that the ROG Ally will feature an AMD 4nm Ryzen mobile SoC/APU, featuring a Zen 4 CPU core cluster combined with an RDNA3 integrated graphics engine. The best part is that it is a fully custom design by AMD, which suggests it could be faster, or at least more efficient, than AMD’s Ryzen 7000 mobile CPUs for gaming. AMD has lots of experience in this field knows how to make fast gaming SoCs. Good examples include the custom SoC inside the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series consoles, as well as the custom AMD Van Gough APU found in the Steam Deck.
Sadly, ASUS has neglected to share any details beyond this. But there is a good chance AMD’s custom API could be a faster version of the Ryzen 7 7840HS CPU with its eight Zen 4 cores and Radeon 780M graphics. The previous generation Radeon 680M has already proven itself to be a capable integrated gaming GPU, with 1080P 60FPS gaming capabilities in most titles. If this custom APU has a custom iGP more powerful than the 780M, it could approach mobile GTX 1060 performance.
Whether or not this is true, the 2x improvement will be substantial compared to the Steam Deck. The Steam Deck has garnered a massive audience thanks to its killer price, full access to the Steam library, and generally good PC gaming performance. However, the latter part is starting to taper off due to the console's aging hardware. The console is now struggling to hit playable frame rates at playable resolutions in AAA titles launched in 2023, like Plague Tail Requiem or The Callisto Protocol.
The ROG Ally should be better equipped to solve all of these issues with its vastly superior performance. The console is designed as a Steam Deck competitor but is capable of running the full gauntlet of PC games out of the box thanks to Windows 11 integration. The form factor is similar to the Steam Deck, with similar grips and button placements. However, it differs from the Deck with its ROG white color scheme, 16:9 aspect ratio display, and Xbox-like control-layout with the D-Pad and right joystick brought down to the middle of the console. This deletes room for potential mousepads like the Steam Deck has, but it could be more ergonomic for some games.
Similar to the internals, the ROG Ally also features a serious monitor upgrade to the Steam Deck with a display resolution of 1920 x 1080 and a refresh rate of 120Hz. That is a lot of pixels and frames for an integrated graphics solution to handle, but if the custom AMD APU isn't up to the task, you will also be able to plug in ASUS’ external GeForce RTX 4090 graphics enclosure right into the handheld for increased GPU horsepower.
This combination of hardware should give gamers a vastly superior gaming experience to the Steam Deck, and enough performance headroom to last for years. The only question is price and availability, which we don’t know yet, but ASUS promises us it will be competitive.
Images from Dave2D
