ASUS ROG at PAX AUS 2023

Feature

October 20th, 2023 by William Thompson

Although we at Hooked Gamers like to focus on the awesome indie titles during PAX AUS, the event also has a whole heap of other features that keep gamers entertained from tabletop games to the big AAA titles with their long queues, or the wonderfully presented Cosplay artists.

One of the larger booths that stood out was hosted by ASUS. It featured a range of gaming laptops of various specifications and sizes from the value packed TUF Gaming range to the premium ROG Strix range with all their RGB lighting, through to the Flagship Zephyrus Duo. But the main focus was the set of three displays highlighting the ROG Ally, the latest portable gaming device from ASUS. The three displays were split into distinct areas which enabled the ASUS team to show off the versatility of the ROG Ally.

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The first area had the ROG Ally in its handheld phase, and allowed the gamers at the show to test out the unit as if they were sitting on the train commuting to work. The ROG Ally features a 1080p screen and hardware capable of 60 FPS in many of the latest titles, providing an on-the-go experience that will satisfy most gamers as they travel from school or work. We were advised that the Ally can offer a superior image and motion clarity to its competitors thanks to its FHD touchscreen and AMD FreeSync Premium technology. Without a side-by-side comparison it was hard to argue, as the display ran smoothly and looked gorgeous. And weighing in at just 608g, it makes for a great portable gaming device.

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Of course, players don’t always want to play on their own, and so the second display area was set up like a lounge room with the ROG Ally docked similarly to a Nintendo Switch. With the optional ROG Gaming Charger Dock, gamers can connect the ROG Ally to a TV to play and charge at the same time. The ability to add multiple controllers allows for couch co-op and some fun competition. The ROG Ally can handle multiplayer games like NBA 2K23, Moving Out, and Street Fighter V with ease for a party that never stops.

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But then there are those gamers who are looking for something a little more serious, and this is where the third setting came into play. The final area had the ROG Ally set up like a desktop computer, paired with an XG Mobile external GPU sporting up to an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop GPU. This set up allowed the ROG Ally to become a high-end gaming experience complete with gaming monitor, mouse, and keyboard attached. Gamers were able to play AAA games at 4K resolution.

Play All Your Games

All three ways of playing are all for nought if there are limited games to play. But with full support for Steam, the EA App, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass, the Epic Games Store, GOG Galaxy 2.0, and other platforms, gamers will have access to all their favourite titles. The ROG Ally was designed from the ground up with Windows at its heart, able to play all your games from any platform. ROG has collaborated with Microsoft, game publishers, and individual studios to ensure that gamers using the Ally have the best experience possible. The ROG Ally even comes bundled with a free three-month Xbox Game Pass Ultimate code, giving gamers instant access to Microsoft’s game library the moment they unbox the machine.

For those who like to know the finer details of the device, the ROG Ally is powered by an all-new Ryzen Z1 Series processor from AMD. Built on the "Zen 4" architecture combined with AMD RDNA 3 architecture-based graphics, the Ryzen Z1 Extreme processor rivals the prowess of game consoles, featuring 8 cores, 16 threads, and up to 8.6 teraflops of graphics processing power. An AMD Ryzen Z1 variant will be available later in 2023 with 6 cores and 12 processing threads, and both models support AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution and AMD Radeon Super Resolution upscaling technologies for excellent performance and stunning visuals in demanding AAA and indie titles.

Making this possible is the ROG Zero Gravity thermal system, which uses a dual-fan system with ultrathin heatsink fins and high-friction heat pipes to ensure the Ally stays cool in any orientation. The Ally also comes equipped with 16 GB of high-speed LPDDR5 6400 MHz memory, 512 GB of PCIe® Gen 4 storage, and a UHS-II microSD card slot to further expand its storage capacity. WiFi 6E support ensures that the Ally stays on a rock-solid connection, even in congested networks, whether gamers are natively playing a multiplayer match or streaming a game via Xbox Cloud Gaming or AMD Link.

We hope to put the ROG Ally through its paces in the coming months, so stay tuned.