00:00B&S is like, that's it, I'm done, I won, OLED baby.
00:03We're back at it again with another handheld tech takedown.
00:06I've got the ASUS ROG Ally X.
00:09And I've got the Steam Deck OLED.
00:11All right, Tony, you're up first.
00:12Why do you think the Steam Deck OLED
00:14is still relevant in 2024?
00:16Well, the Steam Deck OLED is still relevant
00:18because of the OLED part.
00:20This screen is absolutely gorgeous.
00:22You wouldn't think it would make
00:23that much of a big difference,
00:25but it actually does.
00:26Colors just pop.
00:28The contrast between the darker and light elements
00:31just makes everything look fantastic.
00:34It just really immerses you.
00:36It's one of those things where you wouldn't think
00:38it would help that much, but it really does.
00:40And it kind of offsets the fact that,
00:43of an advantage that the Ally has,
00:45which is a 1080p screen.
00:47Yeah, that's great and all, but there's no OLED,
00:49so it just makes things so much richer.
00:52So right there alone,
00:54that could be just the biggest selling point
00:56where most people say, got an OLED,
00:58I'm buying this, end of story.
01:00And right now, aside from the Nintendo Switch
01:02is the only handheld right now that has an OLED.
01:05So right there, that gives it a huge edge.
01:08All right, 30 seconds on the clock.
01:09Here's why that doesn't really matter.
01:12Sometimes you do want to play games at 1080p.
01:13You know, I'm playing Red Dead Redemption 2.
01:15I want this to feel like a triple A console on the go.
01:20And sometimes I do want that extra screen fidelity.
01:22You can't get that there,
01:23even if you did have the performance,
01:25but you don't.
01:26I think the Ally X, especially now with its upgrades,
01:29is closer than ever to giving you
01:31true console experience on the go.
01:34I mean, undeniably, your screen is much better.
01:36I mean, it's an OLED.
01:38This does not hold a torch to it
01:39just like with the previous Ally.
01:41That's one of the few things that wasn't upgraded on this.
01:44What was upgraded,
01:45and it makes actually a lot of difference,
01:48is the performance.
01:49And even though this does have the same processor here,
01:51I think it gives a lot of quality of life improvements,
01:55both with its RAM, its heat dissipation,
01:57and even the ergonomics here,
01:58which we'll get to in a little bit.
02:00But in terms of performance,
02:01games that previously would, you know, chug along
02:05are running a lot smoother now
02:06because it has more of that headroom of performance.
02:09You know, we've gone from 16 gigabytes of RAM
02:11over to 24 gigabytes of RAM.
02:13Games that previously wouldn't even launch,
02:15like, what was it, Alan Wake 2,
02:17you'd have to go into the system settings
02:19and change it to from auto RAM
02:21to allocating all 16 gigabytes to the GPU.
02:25Now you don't have that problem.
02:27So games are gonna run smoother.
02:29You're gonna have now about, like,
02:30three to four frames per second more than you did before.
02:33And that's on top of the performance gains
02:35that it already had compared to the Steam Deck OLED.
02:39All right, so I'm not gonna deny
02:40that it has better performance,
02:42but as you said, and this is something I noticed myself,
02:45you get about five extra frames
02:47around the board, 720p and 1080p.
02:49Is that really worth the extra cost?
02:51Like, for some people, yes,
02:53if you're a competitive gamer, sure,
02:54but I think for most people,
02:55they're not even gonna notice that.
02:56Unless they have the little frame counter on the side,
02:58they're not gonna notice that big deal.
03:00Yes, I like more frames myself,
03:02but I don't think it's gonna matter to most people.
03:06Three to four frames per second maybe isn't as noticeable,
03:10but what is noticeable is smoothness.
03:12All right, so which one do you think is winning so far?
03:14Let us know in the comments below.
03:16And if you wanna learn more about Tony's thoughts
03:17on the new Ally X, check out his Buyer Skip live on YouTube.
03:21All right, Tony, you already know
03:23what my final point on this is going to be.
03:25This isn't just a gaming handheld.
03:27It's also a desktop replacement,
03:29and in fact, that's what I mostly use this for.
03:31I have this docked on my nice 49-inch ultra-wide monitor,
03:35and when I'm not playing games, I can do work on this.
03:37I can run Slack, I can run Word documents on it.
03:40When I'm not gaming, this is also a productivity machine
03:43that I can take anywhere with me,
03:45and I think the fact that you have SteamOS,
03:46which, yes, does have its pros, is limiting.
03:50The fact that this runs full Windows,
03:52which, yes, can suck at times,
03:54and I know you're gonna bring that up,
03:56that also unlocks a lot of potential with this
03:59because I can connect external SSDs,
04:02I can run programs on this,
04:03I can do a lot of things
04:04that this isn't really designed to do
04:06unless you do some workarounds for it.
04:09So as an all-in-one PC,
04:10which does cost a little bit more,
04:12it's a desktop laptop gaming console replacement.
04:15It's all three in one.
04:18Okay, those are all great points,
04:19but you're talking about a PC.
04:23That's great, but I buy these things
04:25because I wanna gaming handheld.
04:28I don't care about all that extra stuff.
04:30It's nice, but I just wanna pick up my machine and play,
04:33and as you said, Windows 11 isn't great for handheld,
04:36so I don't even wanna go through all that stuff.
04:39Like, why am I being asked if I want Office 365?
04:42I wanna know what games I can play.
04:44I don't care about any of that other stuff.
04:46It's cool, but I just wanna play my games.
04:49All right, and my last point,
04:51and this ties back to what you talked about,
04:54this runs on Steam OS,
04:57which is perfectly built for this form factor.
05:00When I start this up, it takes me right into my games,
05:04my launcher, and all that.
05:05You can do that with Arbitrary.
05:06Yeah, you can do that, but after you've installed Windows,
05:09which you have to go through that whole process.
05:11You sign up, you log into your Outlook,
05:13all that nonsense, I'm not trying to do that.
05:15I just wanna play my games.
05:16The biggest strength this has,
05:17and not only because of how easy it is to use,
05:19because games are actually better optimized for Steam OS
05:22and for this specific chip,
05:25and there's even a website that tells you
05:26which games are compatible, which aren't,
05:29and even sometimes games that aren't compatible
05:31still are compatible, so I think for most people,
05:34Steam OS is just the way to go.
05:36It's just so seamless.
05:37I never have to use the touchscreen at all,
05:39whereas you have to use the touchscreen all the time
05:41on the other systems.
05:44I'm not even just talking about the ASUS ROG Ally.
05:45Every single Windows 11 has that issue.
05:48This doesn't.
05:49It's just play your games seamlessly.
05:51Steam OS is the greatest advantage this machine has
05:54over all other handhelds.
05:56Rebut.
05:57Honestly, I think Armory Crate has come a long way,
05:59and once you're in it,
06:00and you can also set it to auto-launch
06:02once you log into Windows,
06:04so you don't have to worry about that.
06:05Yeah, you have to do the initial setup of compares, dude.
06:07I have all my games here.
06:08I have all my quick settings.
06:09I can monitor all my PC stats
06:11if I wanna get nerdy about that,
06:13but I think I basically have the same user experience
06:17once the game is installed here,
06:19and I have a lot more options.
06:21I don't have to go through Steam to get my games.
06:23I can go through GOG.
06:26I can go through Epic.
06:27I can do Xbox Cloud Gaming.
06:29Do you have all those apps on yours?
06:30I can get those, but you're right.
06:32It is a little bit more work.
06:34This feels a lot like when we took this on
06:37about a few months ago,
06:38and I think when we were doing that original video,
06:41we were all hypothesizing about this
06:43because rumors were coming out.
06:44We were like, what's gonna be new about this?
06:46And I think we were kind of in the right ballpark.
06:48We said, it's probably not gonna be
06:49a big performance upgrade,
06:51and I personally didn't even need a big performance upgrade.
06:53I just wanted them to fix
06:54a lot of the quality of life things.
06:56An additional USB-C at the top,
06:58also Thunderbolt, faster charging, a bigger battery.
07:01I think those are things I didn't even get to in the video,
07:03but they do make this feel like
07:04a more complete Windows gaming handheld,
07:07and the key word there is Windows.
07:09Yeah, I was about to say that, yeah.
07:11I want people to understand that
07:13I'm not just shilling for Steam Deck.
07:16I want something better, right?
07:17That has better specs than this,
07:20but at the end of the day,
07:21SteamOS really makes a big difference.
07:22Everything's just so seamless,
07:24so if I could have SteamOS in that form factor,
07:28that'd be fantastic, or, hey, Microsoft,
07:31if you're listening, Windows 11 for handhelds.
07:34Why don't we have that?
07:34What are we waiting for?
07:35Yeah, come on, that would really give Steam Deck
07:39and Valve a run for its money,
07:41but again, I think the fantastic upgrade,
07:43I think it addresses all the problems people originally had,
07:45but at the end of the day,
07:46I would still recommend a Steam Deck OLED,
07:48not only because of how seamless everything is,
07:50but it's also not as expensive.
07:52It comes down to value and convenience,
07:55and knowing that your games are just gonna launch well,
07:59versus, okay, I want the additional performance,
08:01I want the ability to use this, again,
08:03as a desktop replacement.
08:04I'm spending more money on it,
08:05but I'm getting a little bit more here
08:07if that's something that you want.
08:09That's great and all, but what do you guys think?
08:11Which handheld do you think came out on top,
08:13the Steam Deck OLED or the new ASUS ROG Ally X?
08:17You know what we think,
08:17but we wanna know what you think in the comments down below.
08:20If you wanna learn more,
08:21be sure to check out Tony's full video
08:22for the ASUS ROG Ally X.
08:24You can follow me to see more of the behind the scenes
08:26of what cool tech I'm working on.
08:28And you can read my articles over at TomSkai.com.
08:30Until the next one, we'll catch you guys later.
08:36New York, baby, New York, baby.
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