why the ROG Ally is SUPERIOR to the Steam Deck OLED

So the Steam Deck OLED has recently come

out, and as someone who personally owns an

ROG Ally and who believes that this is the

best handheld on the market right now, I

was wondering to myself, is the Steam Deck

OLED actually any better than my ROG Ally?

And I found myself finding that the answer

to that question is basically no. There's

virtually no reasons why I believe the

Steam Deck OLED can be better than the ROG

Ally, and in today's video I'm going to be

telling you why. So first of all, the

Steam Deck OLED is running the same CPU

and GPU as the original Steam Deck, so

it's not going to be any beefier or any

more powerful, which means that it's going

to be less powerful than the ROG Ally.

The ROG Ally already did benchmark tests

where it blew the original Steam Deck out

of the water in terms of FPS, frame rates,

graphical fidelity, and just power in

general. So the only advantage the Steam

Deck OLED has over the first Steam Deck is

basically the OLED screen. And I don't

really know about you, but I've never had

any problems with my ROG Ally screen.

It's completely fine, it's very bright and

colorful, and looks amazing in basically

every single game. And I never found

myself feeling that, oh, I want an OLED

screen so badly that I'm going to sell my

ROG Ally and buy a Steam Deck OLED

instead. And in some ways, ROG Ally screen

is actually better than the Steam Deck

OLED. So the Steam Deck OLED only has a

paltry 90Hz refresh rate for its screen,

whereas the ROG Ally actually has a 120Hz

refresh rate, which is much higher than

90. So you can have much better refresh

rates. And although the screen is darker

than the Steam Deck OLED, I think it comes

in at 500 nits of brightness compared to

Steam Deck OLED's 1,000 nits of

brightness. So I give the Steam Deck

points for having a more visible screen if

you're in harsh sunlight, but I don't

really go outside to play video games in

the sunlight, so I don't really have a

problem of my screen being too dark to be

able to play games. If I'm outside, I'm

outside for a reason that's not for

gaming. If I want to do gaming, I would

just stay inside. And when it comes to the

design of the consoles, obviously the

Steam Deck OLED has the exact same design

as the original Steam Deck. So if you

didn't like the Steam Deck design then

you're not going to like the Steam Deck

OLED design either. I personally prefer

the design on the ROG Ally. I think it

looks way better in every single way. I

really love this white look with the

little black buttons here and there and

the black highlights. It really has this

really cool look, kind of like a

Stormtrooper from Star Wars. White and

black is a very nice aesthetic that I like

on my tech. I've also got this black and

white I've also got this black and white

keyboard. So as you can tell, I'm a big

fan of the black and white design theme.

So for design, I really like the ROG

Ally, and not just because of the colors

or the shape, it just feels nicer in the

hand. Another point is on the Steam Deck,

the thumbsticks are horizontal, so you've

got one there and then one horizontally

there, whereas on the ROG Ally you've got

the diagonal, kind of like Xbox gamer Xbox

games controller where you got the

diagonal thumbsticks, which I believe to

be much more comfortable way of playing

games because you get to rest your right

thumb lower down instead of having— it's

really weird on the Steam Deck because

you've got your hands like this because

the thumbsticks are on the same level. So

the right hand has to be as high as the

left hand, which makes it kind of awkward.

The balancing is awkward when you hold the

console on the Steam Deck because you've

got both your hands right at the top of

the console like that. Instead of one up

there and one down here, which creates a

much more stable environment.

I feel that the triggers are much nicer to

press on the ROG Ally, and the bumper

button's very nice and clicky. So you can

hear that. And buttons— I don't really

like how rattly the sound of the buttons

are when you press the buttons, but you

don't really pay too much attention to

that. Thumbsticks are very nice, and

you've got 2 back paddles here. I know the

Steam Deck has 4 back paddles, but I never

really find myself needing 4 back paddles,

and the Steam Deck OLED also has the

trackpads, which I actually never used.

Trackpads, I found them to be very slow to

use, and if I needed to use the mouse

cursor for anything, I would just use the

thumbstick and tap to click on stuff. It

was much easier to just tap on stuff using

my fingers since, since it is a

touchscreen. So in terms of design and

comfort when holding the devices, the ROG

Ally again blows the Steam Deck OLED and

the Steam Deck out of the water. Just,

it's a much better looking device It's

much lighter, much more compact as well

than the Steam Deck OLED, and it just

looks cooler. I think it looks much

cooler, especially with the RGB lighting

around the thumbsticks. And when it comes

to games compatibility, again, the ROG

Ally just destroys the Steam Deck because

for some reason Valve refuses to put

Windows 11 as the default operating system

on the Steam Deck OLED. For some reason it

chooses Linux, probably because it's more

efficient and faster, but it doesn't have

all of the things that Windows has. For

example, Windows Gaming Pass or things

like Battle.net or Epic Games Store.

Other gaming stores are kind of difficult

to access on the Steam Deck unless you do

stuff like side booting Windows or

downloading specific applications and

programs to be able to do that. You can do

all that stuff already straight out of the

box on the ROG Ally. So you get access to

Xbox Gaming Pass, and like I said earlier,

all the different gaming stores. You're

not just restricted to the Steam Store,

which you basically are restricted to on

the Steam Deck. So if you want more games

for less cost, then I would go for the ROG

Ally. I think Xbox Game Pass is actually a

much better deal than Steam because you

only pay £12 a month and you get access to

loads of different games, thousands of

different games for free. Well, it's not

free because you're paying the

subscription every month, but it's only

£12 and you get access to all these games

whilst you're paying that. Whereas on

Steam there's no subscription cost, but

then you've got to pay full price for all

these games. So for example, imagine you

really wanted to play Cyberpunk,

Starfield, Halo, Spider-Man,

that's like £40 each. You're going to be

paying £150 to £200 for all of those

games, whereas with the Xbox Game Pass

you'd only be paying £12 a month for all

those games. And in one year you'd only be

paying a total maximum of £120 for the

whole year for unlimited gaming, whereas I

don't think £120 on Steam would get you

many games, maybe like 2 AAAs and some old

game, would cost about £150. So it turns

out you would end up spending more money

on Steam to be able to play and buy games,

whereas Xbox Game Pass is just so much

better and it's much easier to access on

the ROG Ally, whereas on the Steam Deck

it's kind of cumbersome. So for those

reasons, I still believe the ROG Ally is

the superior Windows-based gaming handheld

device, and the only thing the Steam Deck

OLED has going for it is basically the

cheaper and lower price point. So If you

don't have a lot of money spare to be able

to buy this stuff, then maybe you'd think

the Steam Deck OLED is more appealing,

more appealing, but I don't really have

that problem. So I went ahead, got myself

the ROG Ally, and I have no regrets.