A couple weeks ago this question would be a no brainer and I would go with the steam deck but as of recent the price diff makes it hard to choose. So in Canada the 512gb steam deck is $559 and $689 for the OLED. While the Ally is down from 900 to 600 for Black Friday. This price difference makes me want to go with the Ally but I also know the steam deck is better in many scenarios. The problem I have is my gaming pc stopped working a couple weeks ago (it’s about 9 years old so I knew its time was up). The ally can technically replace my pc in terms of everyday pc tasks if I hook it up to a monitor but I can’t get that from the deck. I’m wondering if the deck is worth it alongside a brand new pc build or if I should just stick with the ally.
Ally if you prefer performance over battery life, ability to run Windows out of the box (with better support than Valve supports Windows on Deck) and the ability to attach an eGPU.
Steam Deck OLED if you like SteamOS, want better battery, larger community and like Steam Input.
Personally even though the Ally is cheaper right now than the 512GB OLED, I still went with the OLED because I know Valve would support the Deck, it has a larger community, and I prefer Linux over Windows and I prefer better battery as the heavy lifting stuff can just be streamed from my PC.
Key note about the Ally’s eGPU - it’s a proprietary connection. You need ASUS special $1200 eGPU, normal ones won’t work.