Earlier this month, ASUS revealed its answer to the popular Steam Deck: the ROG Ally. The company followed up by announcing a launch event for May 11 where the price, specs and availability will be revealed. However, ahead of this event, the price for the high-end model of the ROG Ally has apparently leaked. As reported by The Verge, the AMD Z1 Extreme chip, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD model will cost $700, which is only $51 pricier than the 512GB Steam Deck version. An apparent leaked Best Buy product page corroborates with the outlet's information:

Best Buy product page leaked the price of the Asus ROG Ally. It will be priced at $699 dollars for the 16GB/512GB variant. pic.twitter.com/CbfERTkGT4

— Khumail Thakur (@wickedkhumz) April 27, 2023

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As this pricing has not been confirmed by ASUS, we should take this news with a grain of salt. But if this price point for the high end ROG Ally is real, then the lower-spec version should be priced more competitively. Will it be comparable or cheaper than the $400, 64GB Steam Deck model? And does this reported cost for the high-end ROG Ally interest you?

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[Xzi]

It isn't "reasonably" priced at all though. It costs far more for what seems to be the same thing in a really, really cheap casing.

I don't love the look of the shape/texture either, but better to cheap out on the casing than the internals if you're gonna cheap out on anything. And it is a different chipset running a different OS, so it's demonstrably different in that regard. The Z1 version isn't enough of an improvement over the lower two tiers of Steam Deck IMO, but the Z1 Extreme settles into a good spot price-to-performance wise.

 

[Dyhr]

I don't love the look of the shape/texture either, but better to cheap out on the casing than the internals if you're gonna cheap out on anything. And it is a different chipset running a different OS, so it's demonstrably different in that regard. The Z1 version isn't enough of an improvement over the lower two tiers of Steam Deck IMO, but the Z1 Extreme settles into a good spot price-to-performance wise.

You say this and it's what leads to Anbernic (a company of arguably higher quality than ASUS of late---have you seen how awful their laptops are nowadays?) having plastic so poor using the buttons shaves the plastic (because it's too tight) and screens literally falling off.

Casing is NOT somewhere to cheap out on. At. All. It's also worrying because where the hell do you think heat goes? Even the Z1 one is going to be obscenely hot and without a metal casing like the Steam Deck it isn't keeping cool at all. Have you ever FELT hot plastic? Shit hurts.

 

[Xzi]

Casing is NOT somewhere to cheap out on. At. All. It's also worrying because where the hell do you think heat goes? Even the Z1 one is going to be obscenely hot and without a metal casing like the Steam Deck it isn't keeping cool at all. Have you ever FELT hot plastic? Shit hurts.

...Deck's casing is plastic too. It just has a thin metal plate inside with a few heat sinks attached, and I'm sure Ally will be designed similarly. These AMD chipsets are designed for portable devices to sip power, so they really don't get all that hot unless abnormal ambient temperature is a factor.

 

[Aggro-Hamtaro]

Do you guys think this device would be useful to someone who doesn't own a PC?