It feels like just yesterday when ASUS introduced and launched their ROG Ally. Launching in June of last year, the device started off a trend in the market that saw Lenovo and MSI introduce their own handhelds to compete with Valve’s Steam Deck, which boosted the handheld PC market tremendously. Now, it seems ASUS is already planning the successor to the Ally, which could come this year.
In an exclusive reported by Techlusive and brought to our attention by Deck Wizard, ASUS launched their first consumer PC in India yesterday, the Zenbook 14 OLED, and the team had a chance to sit down with Arnold Su, the Vice President of ASUS India to ask some questions. One of those questions was about the ROG Ally, and during the conversation, he hinted that a next-generation ROG Ally could be coming this year:
[…]we most likely will launch a second generation [handheld gaming console] this year. We will still keep the Windows features, but we will focus more on gaming.
Arnold Su – Techlusive Interview
This would be pretty monumental if it’s true. It would prove that the Ally was worthwhile enough to continue hardware development, and we could see some pretty nice improvements too. Moving the MicroSD card slot should be at the top of the list, but we could see the next-gen AMD Z2 APU make a debut too. I would love to see an improvement in the handles as well, as the Ally doesn’t feel great to hold.
I wouldn’t be too surprised either, as ASUS is a hardware company first and foremost. I hope they don’t go overboard and release too many handhelds that will pollute the market or make consumers feel fatigued when a new device is released right around the corner, but it’s great to see nonetheless.
I have reached out to ASUS to confirm the report and will update the article once I hear back.
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