Soooo yeah, I sold my Steam Deck (which I love) in preparation to get an OLED but I was very curious about the ROG Ally, mostly for the performance and VRR, so I bought one.

Here’s a quick rundown of my experience:

  • Took 2h or 3h just to get set up. Between Windows setup, windows updates, etc. it was very frustrating not being able to use the machine right away.
  • After I thought I was mostly ready to install games, the machine was incredibly slow. Like, opening Explorer or Steam would take 30s+. Activity Monitor didn’t really show any high cpu processes. Just intermittent blips of 20% or 30% on some tasks but would go back down. Machine was unusable though.
  • Googled for a bit and found there were lots of updates on MyASUS and Armory Crate. Two distinct pieces of software I had never used. Why two???
  • After I updated everything and did a firmware update everything was speedy again, so I installed a few games.
  • Started Sekiro as my first game since I had trouble hitting decent FPS on the Deck. The game would not respond to button inputs. And yes, I was in “game controller mode”. Quit out of the game and start it again: same thing.
  • Decided to reboot Windows and voila, now it received button inputs. (sigh)
  • The performance is indeed incredible. I was very impressed with VRR in particular.
  • I then tried Guardians of the Galaxy. Crashed on the first run with no error.
  • When I was finally in the game I was playing around with the power profiles / game modes / keyboard shortcuts using the Armory overlay or whatever it’s called. After changing a few settings the overlay froze. I was able to toggle it on/off but tapping the buttons did nothing.
  • Force quitting Armory crate didn’t seem to work. Had to reboot. Maybe I had to force quit some other dependent service?

Anyway, I could go on but it was just frustration after frustration. I never thought I’d see the day Linux would be simpler and friendlier than Windows but here we are.

I returned it even though I liked the form factor, performance, screen, VRR, the quiet fans, etc. The hardware is great. Windows is a non-starter for a handheld console.

Let’s go OLED STEAM DECK!!!

  • inkedmargins@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    As someone who owns both and now has an OLED as well I will agree asus quality has fallen but some of this is…nit picky/trying to convince yourself to return it and ignores how cumbersome Steam Deck was for the first year of its iteration. Guardians runs like ass on the SD unless you cap everything on low…my ally chugs through Hogwarts and Red Dead at higher settings than SD does…as it should given the specs.

    As for your software gripes…meh, Windows and Linux both have a set of pros and cons. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to go into Konsole to bend Linux to my will when I can just hit install on windows. Having to do bs like play with winetricks and proton to get games that run OOTB on Windows can be frustrating (looking at you Max Payne 1 and 2).

    I think you’re just used to SD/current state of the handheld and couldn’t overcome your biases or perhaps you couldn’t recognize the value add of your specific preferences until you had both in your hand. That said. SD is the superior handheld especially on the go.

    What I enjoy the most about Linux and SteamOS is that even if you have to finesse some things for finicky workarounds once you’re good the thing just works and SteamOS is fluid and intuitive (Valve is just awesome). The OLED is a beast and I love it. The Ally is great if I’m sitting down plugged in.

    However, I’m selling my Z1E because I didn’t know the microSD reader is faulty on these devices which is a deal breaker for me. Got a legion go coming. If I like it my plan is to main my SD and rock the go for its specific use cases and keep the two to game with my son when he’s around.

    Ditch the ally and gift the OG deck to my daughter. But the ally is just fine for those who want the freedom of Windows and I’d say the superior choice (if you value VRR because the OLED screen is so good it’s hard to discern image quality now imo making the case for 1080p harder to champion given price points) if they plan to play tethered for 90% of its use cases.