Customer Ratings & Reviews

Steam Deck has brought portable gaming to the next level. ASUS with it's ROG Ally made it even more possible by bringing a device with more horsepower under the hood thanks to AMDs Z1 Extreme chip. Despite it's small SSD size and not great battery life when in Turbo mode, this is still a great device to use. Some people invest in modding it by swapping SSD and battery or adding more RAM or doing it all at once. I used this device more like a portable PC - connected to docking station with lots of USBs and HDMI for the external display. ROG Ally made my overlay 10hrs stops at Pilot/Love's more enjoyable.

Great device for gaming. It does what it was built for and it does it rather seamlessly and without heating up much. I play pretty intensive games so I can with certainty say it’s perfect for those types of high intensive games. I’ve played Hell Divers 2 on it with just one crash but that wasn’t a big deal all in all. One thing about the device is that it would have been better if it had its own OS much like the steam deck but windows was pretty alright choice. Just wish it would have been optimized. Battery life isn’t the best on the ROG ally but you can play plugged in and the charger is pretty long so you can play at good comfortable distances and angles. The battery will probably last for games like Night In the Woods or Oxenfree but if you plan on playing Resident Evil or Call of Duty you should play plugged in. If you want your device to receive full power be sure to check out tips and tricks videos on YouTube on how to optimize your settings. It worked charms for me and makes your device much better. It’s a mini PC so for PC players this isn’t anything too new, you’ll know what settings work best and what doesn’t power wise and graphics wise. Give this device a chance, at first I was skeptical but I’ve had a pretty good time with my ROG ally.

This is a wonderful device, IF you are willing/able to tinker with Windows in order to game. PC gaming, in general, can be very fiddly, and even moreso when your device needs updates from 4 different places. Please do some research before buying. If you can handle that, the device is absolutely amazing. Coming from the Steamdeck, the Ally is lighter, more powerful, and quieter. The battery is not great, but it ain't half bad. Again, do your research.

This review was written, created and posted using the ASUS ROG Ally! The Asus ROG Ally is a true game-changer that takes portable gaming to new heights. When compared to its competitor, the Steam Deck, the Ally shines in every aspect, offering a superior gaming experience that justifies its slightly higher price. One of the most noticeable advantages is the Ally's 1080p 120Hz display, which outshines the Steam Deck's 800p 60Hz display in every way. The visuals on the Ally are not only clearer, but they also exhibit vibrant colors and smoother motion. Whether you're exploring vast landscapes or engaging in intense battles, the Ally's display ensures a truly immersive gaming experience. Beyond the display, the Ally's Windows 11 operating system unlocks a world of gaming possibilities. Unlike the Steam Deck, which runs on SteamOS (Linux), the Ally lets you play a wide range of games that are not available on the Steam Deck. Popular titles like Call of Duty, Destiny, and Fortnite become accessible, allowing you to enjoy a vast library of games without restrictions. Under the hood, the Ally's more powerful Zen 4 AMD APU, with its 8 cores and 16 threads, offers higher clock speeds and superior gaming performance compared to the Steam Deck's Zen 2 AMD APU, which has 4 cores and 8 threads. This hardware advantage translates to smoother gameplay, faster load times, and overall improved gaming performance. In terms of storage, the Ally offers the flexibility to easily upgrade from the included 512GB 2230 M.2 drive to a spacious 2TB SSD. If you don’t feel comfortable taking the Ally apart you can put up to a 1TB MicroSD card. This upgradeability ensures that you have ample storage for your growing game library, media files, and applications, giving you the freedom to expand without compromise. Another compelling reason to choose the Asus ROG Ally is the convenience of the Best Buy Protection Plan which even covers accidental damage. Unlike the Steam Deck, which lacks accidental damage warranty. This protection is especially important for a handheld device that you'll be taking with you on your gaming adventures, providing peace of mind for your investment. When comparing the Ally's price of $699 to the Steam Deck's closest spec model at $649, the Ally emerges as the clear winner for just $50 more. With its superior display, Windows 11 compatibility, more powerful APU, easy storage upgrade options, and physical damage warranty, the Ally delivers exceptional value for the price. It’s easy to forget that the Ally is a full fledged Windows 11 PC, that can be docked to full size monitor, mouse & keyboard to deliver a fully productive PC experience with hardware better than many laptops, all in one, and desktop PC’s for $699. I would’ve loved to have had a system this versatile growing up, making this a jack of all trades for young people who may not have a lot of money to get into PC and much better investment than a traditional gaming console. In summary, the Asus ROG Ally Windows Handheld Gaming PC is a top-tier choice for gamers seeking an unparalleled portable gaming experience. With its stunning display, wider game compatibility, powerful hardware, easy upgradability, and added protection, the Ally outshines the Steam Deck and solidifies its position as the ultimate handheld gaming device. Invest in the Asus ROG Ally and elevate your gaming adventures to new heights.

Im enjoying the Ally, I've tried a number of different games and quite impressed with how well this handheld does with them. Even the new MW3/Warzone work well on the device. Its not like my desktop rig but who wants to take that on their trips. The Ally has performed to every task ive thrown its way which is what i was looking for. Battery life while gaming isnt going to last long, aside from that I would compare playing on this versus my xbox series S console and id say this little gadget has more power and clarity in the palm of your hands

I love my Ally. It's light, the screen is bright and sharp. High refresh rate. It's powerful and easy to hold. Battery life is not great though

The ROG Ally is an excellent portable gaming solution, and it can also be used for general web browsing, watching movies, music, or anything else you'd like to do in Windows while on the go. I recommend pairing it with a USB hub with HDMI out (for the option to put the picture on larger screens), and a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. Works nicely with ROG's portable gaming monitors. It's able to smoothly run all manner of retro and indie games, but also titles like Street Fighter 6. With a fast built-in, 120Hz screen, it provides a way to game and train while traveling, even if you are a competitive or pro player. This thing has transformed the way I game while traveling, and I highly recommend it.

It's a bit of a pain to get everything set up, especially with some wonky aspects of windows 11 that makes me miss the Windows 8 Metro design. Once set up, this thing is a proper beast. Averaging a solid 60+ FPS on many games outside of the newest ones. Even newer games are running pretty well. Good build, fantastic speakers, okay battery life. Again, it takes a while to set up and get used to the UI, but once you take steps to dedicate the machine fully to games, it is a fantastic portable monster.

If you’re someone who really likes handheld gaming and is looking into getting into the PC side of gaming, the Ally is perfect for you. Had mine for a month now and I love it. I’ve had no issues with playing any title on this so far. The Ally is very user friendly and you can get to know how to use it no problem. The only complaint I know is of the micro sd card slot overheating and burning out, but if you upgrade SSD it takes care of that issue. So storage could be an issue for some depending and how much you download. Unfortunate but not the worst thing ever. Still recommend this to anyone.

I gotta say the ROG Ally. God, I love this thing. Way better than the Switch for me, no question. Don’t get me wrong, the Switch has its place, but the Ally just hits different. The power you get in such a small device is insane. I can run full PC games on the go, something the Switch just can’t do. The screen is crisp, the refresh rate feels buttery smooth, and the whole experience just feels premium.

This one of THE BEST purchases I’ve made in a long time. My boyfriend got me into gaming a year ago and I love it. Still just a casual gamer but I went from XBOX to PC. Recently, I have been having issues with games crashing and have been trying to fix it. But in the mean time I got one of these to game and bed, on the go and during my lunch break. It’s AMAZING, I even connected my wireless keyboard and mouse for InZOI. The only thing is it doesn’t have a great battery life so keep your charger on hand or get a battery pack.

Pros: Power of a gaming pc in your hands. Feels well made. The face buttons are in the right place(A,B,X,Y buttons),and not below the analog stick(as like the steam deck)Screen is great all though not OLED its bright and crisp and tbh its almost on par with oled. Speakers are pretty loud, and sound great. Works as a complete functional pc. Its not loaded up with bloatware. Now onto the performance aspects, this performs between a low end to midrange gaming laptop. Older games you can crank the settings up to max. For MW2 I had to set the quality to standard to get consistant FPS. Its great when docked. I plugged my 7 input usb hub into it via the dock and it picked up on all devices. So its great if you wanna go to a buddy house and play games on a spare tv and not lug around a laptop. Ive yet to test out emulators but they should all work just fine. Cons: this thing gets hot and, I mean hot. It will max out temp wise (95c) till it starts thermal throttling but when you consider that both the cpu and gpu are both AMD(not hating on AMD my main rig has a AMD cpu but is water cooled so temps are reduced marginally) it kinda makes sense, the screen will heat up during gameplay. This cpu does boost to 5ghz which is impressive. Also the “stand” that comes with it is insanely chincy. Its made of cardboard I think ASUS could have done better in the department. All in all I high recommend this handheld its %100 worth the money I only took one star off because Im being a thermal snob.

Powerful handheld PC, performs almost as well as a standard gaming PC, sleek design and light weight. Comfortable in my hands for some long playing. I love that it was designed for gamers & the ability that you can customized and upgrade the SSD. Runs every games smoothly. It does run a bit hot, changing setting around to see the happy medium for performance & heat dissipation. This little unit has become my go to gaming device.

Great product and runs games great! I had this device for a few months and often play on it when I'm on the go! The only complaint is the battery life isn't long if you are playing games with high settings. Playing with the graphics turned high, the battery won't last an hour. However playing a not much demanding game, like undertale/deltarune, the battery lasted me for for about 6 hours. So bring a charger when on the go I definitely would recommend this if you have the money to spend and love gaming

From day one, I actually enjoy this gaming system. I have a good selection already installed. I did do a day 1 upgrade of more storage with a 1 TB gen4 nvme. Remember, due to the physical size, it has to be a 2230 M.2 drive. Almost every game I put on there performs great with some tweaking of the settings. In most cases, I reduce the resolution to 720p as it reduces the video memory requirements by more than half. The system could have benefited from a larger memory amount of 32GB, but it does most of the trick. I even got Star Citizen, a notoriously horrible system resource hungry game, to install and run. I wouldn't recommend playing Star Citizen because of the continual lag when changing zones, and honestly I haven't yet played in space. If you want to install this massive game, first go into the Armory Crate, go into Settings and then go into Operating Mode. From here, go into GPU Settings and turn the assignment to 2GB. After install, run the game and let it build all the resources it needs. After loading into the game, exit. Go back into the GPU settings and put your assignment back up to 4GB. The game will complain about system memory being less than 8GB, but it will still run. The console will not detect Star Citizen for the control settings, so you need to manually select from the Command Center. Please make sure you setup the controls in Star Citizen's settings. It's REALLY hard to see the key tips for what to press. Also, be sure to set your graphic settings in the game down and I suggest running at 720p as this reduces video memory requirements for the frame buffer. All other games I have installed on it run great. The only negative about this is the required Windows flavor being Windows 11 Home. With tinkering, I think the services can be shaved down to allow minimal overhead, but with reduced Windows functionality. With only 12GB of memory being available in standard setup, Microsoft could have made a Lite version of Windows in this collaboration with Asus. Being a premium device, I would also have expected a kickstand built into the system. Instead, it comes with a janky cardboard stand. It doesn't travel very well. All screenshots of the ROG Ally have a matte film screen protector installed to help with glare reduction. If you have a Steamdeck, you won't see much of a benefit. You will be able to play your Windows games without having to mess with Proton settings or patching the anti-cheats that don't work well under SteamOS. So, if that's something you despise about the Steamdeck, this might be the way to go. Maybe in another year or two, Asus might make a modem with more memory that will perform flawless.

Awesome portable gaming PC. Good enough for most games as long as not too graphics intensive. Can run high end games on low/mid settings depending on GPU demand. Storage is honestly its only fault, needs way more space. Also good for media/regular PC usage with a monitor

So cool, i could play forza, fortnite, high on life with no problems, i maybe had to set my graphics to medium to low but a smooth 90fps is a step up from 60. Its also nice knowing that when i travel, im not carrying a big xbox with a cable and controller and monitor. Just the handheld. Performance is excellent, build quality is so cool, i usually dock it and use it as a normal windows computer. Life changing. Everything i need in 1 device.

Overall -Would absolutely recommend, though it has its quirks. The Good -This device is POWERFUL. Compared to the Switch OLED, the Rog Ally Z1E provides an experience with few compromises when it comes to performance. The 7-inch screen, paired with 120Hz at 1080p, delivers a crisp image. Additionally, it can run a range of AAA games like Monster Hunter World/Rise, Resident Evil, etc., making it a great companion to a dedicated gaming PC. It’s worth mentioning that this performance comes at a steep cost. When playing demanding games, expect very short battery life. Depending on your use case, this could be a non-factor, or it could be a big issue (e.g., long plane ride with power outlets, no worries; car ride, you may need a power bank). Fortunately, less demanding games can run much longer, so indies and emulated games work well when you don’t have backup power. This trade-off exists with all handheld gaming, though, so regardless of the device, you’ll eventually have to consider it. The Bad -The joysticks aren’t great. You can definitely get used to them, but if you’re jumping between consoles, you might notice they feel like lower quality. It may be best to consider the SD card slot DOA, as it seems to fry easily. I never bothered buying a card just to check. Which leads to general storage: 512GB is technically plenty, but you'll need to plan accordingly before a long trip. Lastly, Windows 11 seemed fine mostly, outside of poorly timed updates. If you'd prefer, you can always boot Steam OS instead. The Unfortunate After a night of playing, I left my device on the charger. The next day, it refused to turn on at all. After hours of troubleshooting, it completely bricked itself and didn’t respond to anything (charging cables, power button, etc.). I doubt you can expect this to happen, but it was frustrating when it occurred just 6 days after my warranty expired. Final Thoughts -Overall, despite a few inconvenient quirks, I think it’s a great device that offers above-average performance, so long as you’re willing to understand its shortcomings and plan around them.

The ROG Ally is a unique device that presents itself as a portable PC in the form of a handheld console. It's important to note that this device isn't designed to cater to every demographic like the Steam Deck, which comes equipped with a gaming operating system. Instead, the ROG Ally requires some initial setup, such as updating the basic version of Windows it comes with. However, it does include Microsoft Office without any unnecessary bloatware cluttering the system. One aspect that could be improved is the Armoury Crate, although it shows promise in its early stages. Despite that, I found it manageable to work with and appreciated the ease of access it provides at any time. During my tests, I primarily focused on 1080p gaming. One game I experimented with was Modern Warfare 2, achieving a commendable 90-100fps on recommended quality settings while using 30 watts. Lowering it to 15 watts resulted in around 70 fps, and at 10 watts, it dropped to about 20fps. During an average game of Team Deathmatch, the battery drained approximately 15% while running at 25 watts without being plugged into power. For Apex Legends, I was able to achieve a stable 60fps on maximum settings using 30 and 15 watts. Additionally, I tested Battlefield 2024 on default settings and achieved an average of 50fps with 30 watts and 30fps with 15 watts. Based on these results, I anticipate using the ROG Ally primarily while plugged into a power source to take full advantage of its 120Hz display. When traveling, I would consider using a battery bank or playing non-triple-A games, as the device's battery life would be limited in those scenarios. If you're determined to play triple-A games on the go without constant access to power, I would recommend scaling down the resolution to 720p and adjusting the settings accordingly, potentially capping the frame rate as well. One of the standout features for me was the device's lightweight design and comfortable ergonomics, making it enjoyable to use for extended periods. Moreover, the option to connect a portable graphics card and create an overkill ROG Ally adds to its appeal. The display quality on the ROG Ally is notably superior to that of the Steam Deck, which is a major selling point. Furthermore, it's encouraging to know that this device offers plenty of options, and I have confidence that Asus will listen to feedback from gamers and continue to refine and improve the ROG Ally as it progresses further in development.

From the moment I unboxed the Rog Ally, I knew I was in for a treat. This device isn’t just a gadget; it’s a testament to what modern technology can achieve. As someone who values both aesthetics and performance, the Rog Ally hits every mark with precision. Firstly, the design is sleek and professional, easily fitting into both gaming and work environments. Its build quality is robust, reassuring me of its longevity. The ergonomic design ensures comfort during extended use, a crucial aspect for both gaming marathons and long work sessions. Performance-wise, the Rog Ally is a powerhouse. It handles high-demand applications with ease, showcasing its superior processing power. The graphics are stunning, bringing games and media to life with crisp, vibrant visuals. For gamers and professionals alike, this level of performance is a game-changer. Connectivity is another area where the Rog Ally excels. With multiple ports and seamless wireless options, it integrates effortlessly into my setup. Whether it’s for gaming, streaming, or professional use, the connectivity options cater to all my needs. The user interface is intuitive and user-friendly, making it accessible to both tech-savvy individuals and those new to high-end gadgets. This ease of use is a huge plus, allowing users to dive right into their tasks without a steep learning curve. In conclusion, the Rog Ally is a remarkable device that stands out in the tech market. Its combination of stunning design, outstanding performance, and user-friendly interface makes it a must-have for anyone looking for a top-tier gadget. Best Buy has truly outdone themselves by offering the Rog Ally, and I couldn’t be happier with my purchase.