ASUS ROG Ally "Standard Z1 APU" Model Launches at $599

[T0@st]

We have had to wait a bit longer for the launch of a lesser ASUS ROG Ally variant—the Windows 11 handheld gaming PC was officially revealed sporting an AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme APU. A non-Extreme variant was teased to launch at a later date, which appears to be within the last couple of days—emerging first in North America. The more affordable—$599—offering has popped up for sale on Best Buy, and the ASUS store has a listing although it is currently "out of stock." This non-Extreme model's (RC71L-Z1512) arrival at retail coincides with Valve running a 20% price reduction on its Steam Deck handheld gaming range.

The $100 saving over the ROG Ally Extreme ($699) nets the customer largely identical features and specifications, apart from the main choice of APU. The Z1 non-Extreme chipset was analyzed earlier this month, with its "Phoenix 2" origin revealing usage of Zen 4c cores. The standard Z1 seems to be very similar in makeup to the mobile series Ryzen 5 7540U APU. The AMD Ryzen Z1 is a six-core Zen 4/Zen 4c APU with four RDNA 3 compute units, which is nowhere near as fierce as the "Phoenix 1" Ryzen Z1 Extreme—sporting eight cores (all Zen 4) and twelve RDNA 3 compute units.



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[bonehead123]

Y/a/W/n....more gammr toyz for da gammr bois

 

[Fouquin]

Y/a/W/n....more gammr toyz for da gammr bois

What a weird comment. Just as a reminder for where you are:

Welcome to TechPowerUp!, the latest in hardware and gaming.

 

[bonehead123]

What a weird comment. Just as a reminder for where you are:

Welcome to TechPowerUp!, the latest in hardware and gaming.

I know full well where I am...

I just like pokin fun at da gammr crowd, who are the main folks that tend to wet their panties or get a stiffy when underwhelming, over-hyped stuff like this gets announced/released........

Like the mobsters always say: "It's not personal, it's just BUSINESS" ......

 

[HOkay]

Seriously though, who would buy this? That APU is so weak in comparison to its bigger brother, it's easily worth the $100 upgrade! This would need to be at least $200 cheaper to be even slightly worth considering imho.

 

[Arkz]

I know full well where I am...

I just like pokin fun at da gammr crowd, who are the main folks that tend to wet their panties or get a stiffy when underwhelming, over-hyped stuff like this gets announced/released........

Like the mobsters always say: "It's not personal, it's just BUSINESS" ......

Ironic, you sound exactly like them.

 

[bonehead123]

Ironic, you sound exactly like them.

Who exactly is "them" - Please elaborate

Are they you pretending to be someone else ?
Are they the ones who wanna be you or me ?
Are they the ones that are, you know, not us ?

 

[CosmicWanderer]

I have the Z1 Extreme version, and I use it far more than I thought I would, despite having a dedicated gaming desktop. Performance is incredible for integrated graphics. I play Forza Horizon 5 at 1080p (upscaled) on a combination of medium and high settings at get over 60 fps. Same with FIFA 23 and F1 2023. It can even achieve 120 fps on games like Ori, Planet of Lana, Inside, and other lighter indies.

It's just so convenient and allows you to be far more comfortable gaming on the couch, in bed, or while travelling. Unexpectedly became one of my best tech purchases in recent years.

Seriously though, who would buy this? That APU is so weak in comparison to its bigger brother, it's easily worth the $100 upgrade! This would need to be at least $200 cheaper to be even slightly worth considering imho.

It's surprisingly capable though, even in AAA games.

But my guess is that it will appeal more to people who want a handheld to primarily play indies and emulated games. That $100 savings could get you a lot of truly fantastic indie games that would run great on this version of the Ally.

 

[HOkay]

It's surprisingly capable though, even in AAA games.

But my guess is that it will appeal more to people who want a handheld to primarily play indies and emulated games. That $100 savings could get you a lot of truly fantastic indie games that would run great on this version of the Ally.

Given the specs it is surprisingly capable, however, it's about the same maybe slightly worse than the Steam Deck, which is vastly cheaper. The only thing against the Deck at that point is the screen. If you prefer/need Windows you can install Windows on the Deck. I just don't know why you'd get the Z1 Ally over the Deck?

Edit: forgot to say, I bought a Deck a few months back & totally agree that having a portable handheld that can play proper games whilst lounging on the sofa or wherever is great!

 

[Cheeseball]

Given the specs it is surprisingly capable, however, it's about the same maybe slightly worse than the Steam Deck, which is vastly cheaper. The only thing against the Deck at that point is the screen. If you prefer/need Windows you can install Windows on the Deck. I just don't know why you'd get the Z1 Ally over the Deck?

Edit: forgot to say, I bought a Deck a few months back & totally agree that having a portable handheld that can play proper games whilst lounging on the sofa or wherever is great!

This may be slightly better than the 8 CUs RDNA 2 cores in Steam Deck's Van Gogh/Aerith, but yeah I get the contention that the Z1's 4 CUs of RDNA3 may still be weaker.

If its just for pure gaming, I believe it would still be better than the Steam Deck just for the display alone. You can always use RSR to upscale to 1080p with minimal image loss and native FreeSync support is very useful for those frame drops.

EDIT: Yeah, I don't think this Z1 can beat Van Gogh at 10W or 15W. Probably in more CPU-heavy games. At 25W/30W it should be able to. If they had made a 4-core Zen 4 CPU and paired it with 12 CUs of RDNA 3, it should be able to beat the Steam Deck even at lower wattage considering AMD's monolithic CPUs scale down nicely.

 

[CosmicWanderer]

Given the specs it is surprisingly capable, however, it's about the same maybe slightly worse than the Steam Deck, which is vastly cheaper. The only thing against the Deck at that point is the screen. If you prefer/need Windows you can install Windows on the Deck. I just don't know why you'd get the Z1 Ally over the Deck?

Edit: forgot to say, I bought a Deck a few months back & totally agree that having a portable handheld that can play proper games whilst lounging on the sofa or wherever is great!

The screen is a huge differentiator. It's what sways people to the Ally. The Z1 is more than enough to run emulated games and indies at 1080p 120Hz (native or upscaled).

So yeah, I'd argue that the Z1 Ally has a place in the market.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

Odd pricing, less GPU then Steam deck for way more £$¢€¥?

 

[HOkay]

The screen is a huge differentiator. It's what sways people to the Ally. The Z1 is more than enough to run emulated games and indies at 1080p 120Hz (native or upscaled).

Do you know what most people quote as the biggest part of that differentiator out of interest? Resolution, refresh rate, colours etc.? I'm a huge monitor snob for desktop PC use & gaming (LG 42C2 OLED as my primary gaming screen), but I've found the Deck's screen to be "fine" for that size of device. It's not good by any stretch, but it's good enough to not have me disappointed. I'm surprised how 40fps is kinda fine on a tiny screen, when anything less than 90+fps is unacceptable to me on desktop!

 

[Denver]

The All-New Z1 ASUS ROG Ally! First Look Hands-on Review - YouTube

Its not so bad at all... It seems that the limited TDP doesn't help the more robust version.

Interesting how only 4CU can achieve this performance.

 

[Cheeseball]

Odd pricing, less GPU then Steam deck for way more £$¢€¥?

The pricing is bad for sure (this should be $499 to be really competitive with the 512GB SD), but I think this Z1 version can beat the Steam Deck at 15+W settings in GPU performance. For sure at 25W/30W it can as it seems to boost to 2,800 MHz GPU.

 

[Deleted member 232534]

how much customer pays for having windows 11 preinstalled here?

 

[Zubasa]

how much customer pays for having windows 11 preinstalled here?

During the Win8 days Microsoft announced a program for OEMs, that allows lablets with screens under 9-inches to get free Windows.
I wonder if the same kind of deal is in effect today.

 

[ixi]

Cheapest I can get in country starts at 900euro, hell no.

 

[Hardware1906]

at the same time, Valve already dropped the price of Steam Deck
man, i really want to see Steam Deck 2 with RDNA3 APU

 

[ecomorph]

Why did Asus go for W11 instead of SteamOS? Isn't it open source? Or there's royalties involved if you want to sell a handheld device with it installed?

 

[Deleted member 185088]

I think the high end Ally should've used a 6 cores as well.

 

[HOkay]

Why did Asus go for W11 instead of SteamOS? Isn't it open source? Or there's royalties involved if you want to sell a handheld device with it installed?

I've wondered the same thing, with the better hardware it feels like they'd kill it if it was SteamOS out of the box. I guess they wanted the "it plays all games" selling point.

 

[TechHalp]

Very odd price point

 

[Minus Infinity]

Cool device, but I've never understood how anyone over the age of say 10 could stand gaming on a handheld device. And no, I don't game at all on my phone, I've even given up sudoku. Wouldn't game on anything smaller than my 11" tablet.

 

[TechHalp]

Cool device, but I've never understood how anyone over the age of say 10 could stand gaming on a handheld device. And no, I don't game at all on my phone, I've even given up sudoku. Wouldn't game on anything smaller than my 11" tablet.

I dunno how anyone could call mobile games actual games...

The form factor is good for travelling, laptops aren't portable, they need to be plugged in and you can't hold them while you use them. If you disagree, the most popular console of this generation and the last with kids and adults is the switch.