Over the past several years, new gaming handhelds have been coming out of the woodwork to challenge the iconic Steam Deck for portable handheld supremacy.
One of the newer contestants to step into this competitive market is the Xbox Ally, a Microsoft-branded variant of ASUS's ROG Ally console built to play Xbox titles with high performance rates while being comfy to use.
What makes the Xbox Ally a fun gaming handheld?
The Xbox Ally is a modest gaming handheld built with all manner of high-quality hardware specs that make it worth your consideration.
It's built with an AMD Z2 Series processor, so it can run games at smooth, consistent framerates of 30fps or slightly higher, whether you're playing them offline or through Cloud services like Xbox Cloud Gaming and NVIDIA GeForce NOW.
To help make the framerates stable, the Xbox Ally is outfitted with a 7-inch FHD IPS touchscreen display that can render images with 120Hz refresh rates (complete with Variable Refresh Rate Support) and a screen resolution of 1920x1080p.
The display also features 500 nits of max brightness, a 16:9 aspect ratio, and a color gamut with 97% of sRGB, so it renders images with clear, distinct, and vibrant colors.
Other standout features include comfortable ergonomic grips modelled after Xbox controllers, a silent and efficient cooling system to prevent the Xbox Ally from overheating during long gaming sessions, and dual USB-C ports to allow for charging and accessories to be plugged in.
The only objectionable drawbacks of the Xbox Ally are that it doesn't support HYPR-RX to enhance gameplay performance as the Xbox Ally X does, it has a small SSD storage unit of 512GB, and its steep MSRP of $599.
Fortunately for you, we have curated a list of the best microSD cards for Xbox Ally and Xbox Ally X to help fix this gaming handheld's storage issue, and this 18% discount we have found has reduced the Xbox Ally's pricy toll to $489.99 at Amazon.
So if you have been holding out for a chance to get one of the best gaming handhelds to play your favorite Xbox titles on the go at a more affordable price, now's the time to do so as discounts for this device don't come often.
Alternative discount deal
If Amazon's 18% discount on the Xbox Ally expires or stock runs dry, we have found an alternative discount of this gaming handheld for $499.99 at Best Buy you can use as a back-up option.
FAQ
What is the battery for the Xbox Ally?
The battery life of the Xbox Ally will depend on what games you run it with. Playing graphically demanding games like Cyberpunk 2077 will drain the battery in less than 2 hours, whereas 2D and AA 3D games will drain the battery in less than 8 hours.
If you're using it for basic tasks like browsing the internet or writing notes in Windows Mode, the Xbox Ally will last for 13 and a half hours.
What is the best performance mode for Xbox Ally?
It depends on the situation. Turbo Mode (25W-30W+) is to be used for getting the FPS out of your games while it's plugged into a charger. Whereas Performance Mode (15W-18W) provides a healthy balance between performance and battery life conversion for playing games while on the move.
What's the difference between the Xbox Ally and Xbox All X?
The Xbox Ally X has stronger performance rates, longer battery lifes and superior ergonomics to the Xbox Ally, but at the cost of twice as expensive at $999.99 at most retailers.
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