Customer Ratings & Reviews

It was really good…when it worked. I bought this for an extended trip overseas. After a week of using my Ally it stopped working. It randomly shut off after I had plugged it into power. It wouldn’t turn on or show the indication that it was charging. Upon searching up how to fix this, it turns out it’s a common issue. The Best Buy representative who “helped” me couldn’t understand that I was out of town for an extended period of time, sent me a link to schedule an in person appointment and closed the chat as I said that there are no Best Buy locations where I am staying. I’ve tried multiple working chargers and outlets. Doing different resets with the power button/lower volume button. This thing turned into an expensive piece of decoration.

When Asus announced the Ally I was one of the to-good-to-be-true people. Everything about the specs and what it can do made me get all hyped for it to be an excellent competitor to the "deck". Though I was cautious about it, once I had it in my hands, all doubt was immediately blown away. The Ally lived up to it's promises and YES, Asus LISTENS to their crowds. It is super awesome of them to take in all feedback whether good or bad and work to make things even more better for us end users. The Ally is just plain great to game on. In the box is the Ally itself being well protected, the usually literature, a very cheap feeling stand and a power brick to get you set up and ready to game. Remember that the Ally runs on Windows 11 so once you finish up the Asus 1st time set up, you then have to do the Windows 11 setup. For me, I had to update Windows 11 and a lot of system updates and drivers 1st, then update the Ally's BIOS to be 100% up to date. No issues after that. (I would personally skip and avoid installing the Win 11 KB5026446 update or risk losing Fingerprint functions). Performance is great whether plugged in or yes, even when using the battery. The display being full FHD @ 120hz makes gaming look so good on a device so small. Everything is buttery smooth as long as you set the settings correctly (also personally, turn off motion blur on any game). There is more than enough power to run Indies to AAA titles. Asus Armory crate is actually really nice and useful now after many updates. I really like how anything can be installed and shown on the Game Platforms tab. I use the Xbox, EA, Steam and Epic launchers initially to download my titles from them and then once installed they go to the Game Library tab for easy access. The Command Center is where it's at for performance tweaking. If plugged in, I want every maxed at 1080 @ 120hz. Operating mode is usually set to Performance but if you need some extra juice for more demanding games, then active Turbo to boost the FPS. Honestly there is so many customizations you can do, there is no way it'll fit in a review. Sound is shockingly good for a handheld. Asus really did a good job in not just throwing in random speakers and hoping for the best. They actually sound good in low to med-high while gaming. Didn't sound at all like you were playing in a tin can. Of course it's not going to make you through a party with Crab Rave, but it's more than enough unless you use headphones. The feel of the ROG Ally fits perfectly in my big 'ol hands. Also personally, I do like the feel of it being more an Xbox controller layout vs how the deck is. Never did I feel hot while playing plugged in or on battery mode. Grips feel quite nice and prevent slipping. Now the console is white with some some accents, so long playing sessions will eventually get it a little dirty like it did me after a week but it is SUPER easy to clean with a microfiber cloth and some IPA. When in Turbo Mode (also performance monitoring on) temps reached as high as 90C and as low as 35C in Silent Mode. Never did I feel like it was going to burn me due to the great build and placement of the exhaust. Even when cooling the system down, I never noticed it being audible at all. Even when trying to listen for it, the sounds in game either drowned it out, it was just plain quiet or I had headphones on and couldn't hear it anyways. Now for the elephant in the room. Battery life. Now my roommate has the deck and I have the Ally. He gets roughly 2 hrs of gameplay while on the couch before he has to plug in. With the Ally, I turned Silent Mode on, FPS cap to 30, 60hz refresh and 720p max in the Command Center. After an hour straight, my battery life dropped 40%. I didn't need to plug in to recharge until 2hr 13 min. So it seems as long as you tweak it just right, battery life seems to be on par with the competition. Also if you want to squeeze a little more power you can just turn off the RGB lighting in the same menu. Another thing people will notice for the Ally is storage. 512gb may be fine with some, but it might be too small for others. I went ahead and got me a Sabrent 2tb NVMe. Make sure 100% IF YOU WANT TO UPGRADE GET THE 2230 SIZE. Asus actually has a nice tutorial video on their website if you feel comfortable taking apart the Ally to swap NVMe's and reinstalling Windows. ASUS' 1st try into the market of handheld PC gaming is a super strong start. Yes it's more recent than the biggest competition so it uses more recent and powerful hardware, but this is a SOLID choice for on the go gaming.

I am very happy that I use it as a great game console as a computer.

Great product and specs but the edges of the rings are sharp and cut into the joystick so for prolonged use maybe get a spare controller with Bluetooth or insurance I have had mine just under a month and started to notice damage

Upgraded the SSD to 2 TB, now I can play all the aaa games I want.

Was looking to help my friend get back to gaming by going mobile.

Best handheld game so far so good best picture quality and smooth

You can run everything at 720 60fps, it's an good investment

Head some hiccups still have some more hiccups. Don’t know if the Sim card will work on it but I’m hoping to new dates will fix that but overall it is OK.

The ROG ally is an awesome gaming handheld that has a few quirks and problems since I have the steam deck I couldn't justify keeping the ROG ally instead I shal wait for the next generation of pc handhelds

This product is not ready at all to be on the market! My sd card reader fried just after the 2 week return window. Next, the windows os just doesnt work quite well with handhelds. There are an insane number of issues causing drivers to not work and then comes all types of troubleshooting which i do more than gaming on the device. This purchase is one of my biggest regrets honestly, but another reason to stick with desktops until another couple of years.

It’s pretty good except my unit keeps having an issue with 30w mode will power down to performance mode instead of staying at 30w mode while plugged in

It’s a cool product but the battery dies pretty quick and randomly lags along with the screen turning red and turning off randomly.

The best PC I’ve never had Best Buy away the best.

The first one had problems reading the SD card, then the second one fried my SD card then days later the charger stopped working, other than that, i loved the gaming experiece but i wouldn’t trust ASUS to expend 700 bucks again, i ended up having some accessories that im not going to be able to use anymore

I’ve been tempted to buy a Steam Deck over the past year, but I knew that it was just the first device in a new market of powerful gaming handhelds. Enter the ASUS ROG Ally, a Windows-based handheld that claims full compatibility with PC games. After my first week of use, its clear that the ROG Ally has the power and specs to deliver a fantastic on-the-go gaming experience, but there are some major drawbacks such as battery life and quirks with using Windows on a device like this. ===SETUP=== If you’ve ever power up a new Windows PC for the first time, you’ll know what to expect. The ROG Ally is basically a mini touchscreen Windows computer, so you’ll have to click through all the standard Windows setup screens such as logging into a Microsoft account. One major downside here is that you’ll need to wait a while for all of the Windows Updates to complete. ASUS recommends that you let this process complete before playing games since there is at least one BIOS update available via Windows Update that improves battery life and optimizes the fingerprint sensor. After you finally boot into Windows, you’ll see the familiar Windows desktop, and the ROG Armoury Crate software should automatically load. Armoury Crate acts as the central location for system settings and your game library on the ROG Ally. You’ll want to spend some time getting to know the various settings available here, since you may want to tweak the various performance modes to optimize frame rates and battery life. Unfortunately, Windows 11 just isn’t fully optimized for a device of this form factor or with a touchscreen of this size. Often, the on-screen keyboard will fail to appear when needed. It is sometimes very difficult to tap smaller menu items in Windows settings menus and Start menu. I’ve learned to live with it, and luckily you don’t really need to navigate Windows very often if you stick to using Armoury Crate for most of your tasks. ===DESIGN AND COMFORT=== My first impression was that the ROG Ally felt amazingly slim and lightweight given its large screen. The white color is nice enough, but I wish ASUS would have also offered a black version. There is RGB lighting around each control stick which can be customized or turned off via Armoury Crate. They look nice, but they also flash or pulse even when the device is in standby mode, which can be distracting. The device feels very premium, with textured grips and contoured edges that make holding the ROG Ally for hours on end very comfortable (especially compared to something like the Nintendo Switch). There are two buttons on either side of the 7-inch screen. One button on the right launches the Armoury Crate software, while another on the left pulls up a Command Center where you can control screen brightness, volume, and some other basic settings. The screen itself is beautiful. I was a bit disappointed that it wasn’t an OLED display, but that really doesn’t matter. This screen gets very bright (up to 500 nits) and packs a 120Hz refresh rate at 1080p. It’s perfect for this size of a device, and anything more would sacrifice performance and battery life. Also worth nothing is that ASUS included the USB-C charging port on the on the top of the device, so you won’t have to worry about a cable hanging down into your lap or chest while gaming. ===PERFORMANCE=== This model of the ROG Ally is equipped with a Z1 Extreme chip, 16GB of DDR5 RAM, and a 512GB SSD. I wish ASUS would have included at least 1TB of storage since I have already chewed through most of the 512GB with just a few games installed. Luckily, there is a microSD card slot at the top of the device for expanded storage. In terms of raw gaming performance, you’ll need to get used to tweaking most games to run at low to medium settings for maximum performance. I’ve played three games so far: Resident Evil 4, God of War, and Cyberpunk 2077. I dipped the resolutions down to 720p for maximum performance. On RE4, I’ve averaged about 65 FPS on “Low” presets, with the ROG Ally set to Turbo mode. On God of War, I get about 55-60 FPS on the “Original” preset, also on Turbo mode. Cyberpunk 2077 can push through about 50-55 FPS on “Medium” presets, also on Turbo mode. Bumping the resolutions up to 1080p causes a noticeable hit to performance at the same presets (about 15-20 FPS downgrade), but this can be alleviated by further reducing quality settings in games. Even at these low and medium settings, games look great. Lower textures and resolutions are barely noticeable on a screen of this size. There are some occasional stutters and frame drops, but I haven’t noticed anything that would be a deal-breaker. For gaming on the go, it really doesn’t get better than this. ===BATTERY LIFE=== The ROG Ally represents a case where battery technology simply hasn’t kept up with devices that are becoming more powerful and energy-hungry. When I unplug the ROG Ally from a wall outlet and run the same games above with the same settings on Turbo mode, I’m lucky if I get an hour of battery life. I’ve been able to push it to just about 2 hours by switching the device to Performance mode and limiting the screen’s refresh rate to 60Hz. But this further reduces performance/FPS which is very noticeable in some games. Bottom line - battery life is going to vary drastically based on the games you play and the performance settings you choose. My advice is to never be too far from a power outlet. Or, do like I did - buy a long, 6 to 10 foot USB-C cable and a 65W power adapter and play with the device plugged in as much as you can. Yes, you’ll be able to use the ROG Ally in short bursts on airplanes, trains, etc., but until there is a giant leap in battery technology, you’re going to constantly be hunting for a power outlet to get the maximum performance out of this device. ===OVERALL=== The ROG Ally is an excellent entry into the handheld gaming market from ASUS. I’ve personally never used a Steam Deck, so many users will want to research the pros and cons of both platforms. But the ROG Ally is a device I’ve been dreaming of for a long time - one that can play any Windows game I throw at it with just minor compromises. Yes, battery life leaves a lot to be desired, and there are some strange quirks using Windows 11 on a device like this — but for me, the ROG Ally has everything I need to fully replace a gaming laptop when I travel. I’ll just need to remember to pack the charger. Highly recommended!

I ordered it online and in the item description it says “Includes all original parts, packaging and accessories (or suitable replacement).” Because I got it excellent condition used. It didn’t come with a charger which it should have because the product says so. I had to go to a store and spend an extra $40 to get a charger that it should have come with originally. I talked to customer support online and in person and they both said I needed to buy a charger separately. The fact that eBay is putting Best Buy to shame on used products should not be happening. Unless you are getting it new buy it from a different company.

It’s a decent hand held PC device. Won’t recommend this device (1st Generation ROG Ally). It was rushed out into the market. The quality control was TERRIBLE. My ROG ALLY is currently being Repaired at Best Buy service center due to NON WORKING SD READER. If you do your research. This is a RAMPANT PROBLEM for this device. I’m fortunate enough that my SD card broke while under Manufacture Warranty. It might not be the case for YOU.

It only lasts about 30 minutes playing off the charger. Besides that it’s nice. Lenovo Go is better imo.

This review is for buying it fair the package was too tight probably messed up the sticks