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Asus ROG about to be launched next month. Possibly ideal for running SL?

Rohan Dockal
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Rohan Dockal

Rohan Dockal

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Wondering what you all think of this device for running SL? One of the biggest barriers to SL right now is that while years ago you could run your viewer with a decent frame rate on an ordinary computer, now you need a powerful gaming computer to run SL smoothly, especially if you are in public areas where the lag is high. But gaming computers cost a lot. However, this one is about to be launched for only $699. For those that don't know about it, this thing looks a lot like a Nintendo Switch, but it's actually a full computer and runs windows. It supposedly can run games with a very good frame rate. It doesn't have a keyboard, but you can attach one. You can also hook it up to a monitor if the screen is too small, but it has 1080 resolution just like most computer monitors today. 

Apparently the battery life is terrible though, I don't think there's a way around that. More performance = more power consumption. But this might be a great way for people to enjoy SL who have been frustrated by low frame rates and lag.  

 

https://www.ign.com/articles/asus-rog-ally-review
https://www.wired.com/review/asus-rog-ally/

Specs:

CPU: AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme Zen 4
CPU Speed: 2.8GHz
GPU: AMD RDNA 3
Display: 7-inch IPS touchscreen
Resolution: 1920x1080 display at 120Hz
Storage: 512GB NVMe SSD
Memory: 16GB LPDDR5 RAM
Audio: Dual speakers with Dolby Atmos
Security: Fingerprint Scanner
I/O: USB Type-C (top), headphone jack, MicroSD expansion, Asus PCIe port
Battery: 40WHrs
Connectivity: Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2

Edited by Rohan Dockal
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Coffee Pancake

Coffee Pancake

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Awesome for SL .. if you never text chat ever.

Which for a text chat centric platform seems sub-optimal. 

 

Is it going to be better than a steamdeck? No. Not by a million miles for one simple reason "platform support". Battery life is also super terrible (90min gaming) and both the Steamdeck and the AOG run hot. The entire architecture is unsuited to mobile use. Which makes both toys that rarely leaves the house .. you know, that place where your real computer lives.

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Rohan Dockal

Rohan Dockal

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6 hours ago, Coffee Pancake said:

Awesome for SL .. if you never text chat ever.

Which for a text chat centric platform seems sub-optimal. 

As I mentioned, you can plug a keyboard into it. It would probably support BT keyboards as well. 

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gwynchisholm

gwynchisholm

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3 hours ago, Rohan Dockal said:

Not for that price. Not gaming laptops anyway. 

Well it’s not really equivalent to a gaming laptop. It’s a mid power tier apu system, which we don’t really see in laptops anymore outside of a few rare examples and definitely not with this AMD Z1 apu. It will be interesting to see what it’s capable of, they’ve gone a strange route with throwing battery life out the window with the 1080p 120hz display and running 15 to 30w power modes on the apu. It kinda takes the portability aspect out of the equation.

Half the reason the steam deck is tolerable is because it’s a low power system with a low power 720p display where you won’t notice poor graphical detail anyway. 
 

As for its use in SecondLife, I could definitely see it being pretty good for that minus having to use an onscreen keyboard. The controls could be bound pretty quick like any controller with SL. But that big limitation will be the lack of a physical keyboard. If you’re someone who uses voice heavily I would assume it would be perfectly serviceable as a portable SL machine.

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Coffee Pancake

Coffee Pancake

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4 hours ago, Rohan Dockal said:

Not for that price. Not gaming laptops anyway. 

This is a mid range business 'creator' class laptop with a small screen, small battery and no keyboard. It's not in the same class as anything with a discreet GPU.

Give it like for like rendering .. and it's a handheld PS4 at best. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5oHS7CA6Qo)

I would suggest waiting for the gamers nexus review although after they just torched Asus they probably wont be getting a free review copy.

 

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Ardy Lay

Ardy Lay

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1 hour ago, Coffee Pancake said:

I would suggest waiting for the gamers nexus review although after they just torched Asus they probably wont be getting a free review copy.

 

I think his audience has already paid him to purchase one and give it an honest review.  He can still refuse.  I say "no" to Ally because of how the one Linus Sebastion reviewed performed.

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Lyssa Greymoon

Lyssa Greymoon

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11 hours ago, Rohan Dockal said:

Not for that price. Not gaming laptops anyway. 

$699 is about where gaming laptops start. I’m sure anyone can shop around and find better ones and better deals, but I just went to see what Best Buy has.
 

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/msi-bravo-15-15-6-144hz-gaming-laptop-fhd-ryzen-7-5800h-radeon-rx6500m-16gb-memory-with-512gb-ssd-black/6532167.p?skuId=6532167

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/msi-prestige-14-14-laptop-intel-core-i5-16-gb-memory-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1650-512-gb-ssd-blue-stone/6502642.p?skuId=6502642
 

I’m confident either will be more capable at SL than the Asus, and more versatile. I think a discrete GPU is a defining feature of gaming laptops. If someone is open to using an APU, that opens up cheaper options.

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Toothless Draegonne

Toothless Draegonne

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I couldn't tell you what the Ally definitely will run like, but based on my experience with an 1165G7-powered handheld, it runs SL at medium quality quite nicely.

Given the Ally is running a chipset a lot newer than the 1165G7 with RAM that's a lot faster than LPDDR4-4266, I'd say chances are high it will run SL rather well. Don't forget some kind of little bluetooth keyboard/mouse though, at least until someone makes a viewer more oriented towards the whole twinstick-and-a-dpad thing.

Now you'd probably get a better desktop for the same price, but if you absolutely want SL in a handbag (or maybe very large pocket), it might be a decent little thing.

Edited by Toothless Draegonne
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Toothless Draegonne

Toothless Draegonne

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1 hour ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

$699 is about where gaming laptops start. I’m sure anyone can shop around and find better ones and better deals, but I just went to see what Best Buy has.
 

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/msi-bravo-15-15-6-144hz-gaming-laptop-fhd-ryzen-7-5800h-radeon-rx6500m-16gb-memory-with-512gb-ssd-black/6532167.p?skuId=6532167

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/msi-prestige-14-14-laptop-intel-core-i5-16-gb-memory-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1650-512-gb-ssd-blue-stone/6502642.p?skuId=6502642
 

I’m confident either will be more capable at SL than the Asus, and more versatile. I think a discrete GPU is a defining feature of gaming laptops. If someone is open to using an APU, that opens up cheaper options.

Your problem with laptops that have actual GPUs in them - and I say this as someone who has a couple of them - is they tend to run hot. Like, really hot. In the case of more awful thin-and-light types, so damn hot I'm amazed they aren't violating some kind of consumer safety laws.

Handhelds like the Ally tend to sip 25 to 30W max, at least for the SoC. They won't be roasting your nuts while you play virtual barbie dolls or pewpew your buddies across regions with keyframe guns.

Edited by Toothless Draegonne
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  • 2 months later...
rottweiler Lednev

rottweiler Lednev

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On 5/21/2023 at 9:34 AM, Rohan Dockal said:

Wondering what you all think of this device for running SL? One of the biggest barriers to SL right now is that while years ago you could run your viewer with a decent frame rate on an ordinary computer, now you need a powerful gaming computer to run SL smoothly, especially if you are in public areas where the lag is high. But gaming computers cost a lot. However, this one is about to be launched for only $699. For those that don't know about it, this thing looks a lot like a Nintendo Switch, but it's actually a full computer and runs windows. It supposedly can run games with a very good frame rate. It doesn't have a keyboard, but you can attach one. You can also hook it up to a monitor if the screen is too small, but it has 1080 resolution just like most computer monitors today. 

Apparently the battery life is terrible though, I don't think there's a way around that. More performance = more power consumption. But this might be a great way for people to enjoy SL who have been frustrated by low frame rates and lag.  

 

https://www.ign.com/articles/asus-rog-ally-review
https://www.wired.com/review/asus-rog-ally/

Specs:

CPU: AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme Zen 4
CPU Speed: 2.8GHz
GPU: AMD RDNA 3
Display: 7-inch IPS touchscreen
Resolution: 1920x1080 display at 120Hz
Storage: 512GB NVMe SSD
Memory: 16GB LPDDR5 RAM
Audio: Dual speakers with Dolby Atmos
Security: Fingerprint Scanner
I/O: USB Type-C (top), headphone jack, MicroSD expansion, Asus PCIe port
Battery: 40WHrs
Connectivity: Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2

It wont run it good unless u get the version of ROG Ally with NVidia as open gl does not work good on AMD. The key to sl running fast is fast ram 3600 or more a cpu that is at least 3.4 ghz and above and a video card that supports open gl non emulated. I have owned over 100x systems and tried everything under the sun to run second life the fastest I have ever made it run is 420 fps. The new intel 13900k can run 6ghs if u use a gigabyte motherboard that has auto over clock one button feature and fast ram and a rtx 3060 ti allowing non emulated open gl. As For Rog Ally expect about 30 fps that's my experience with all and products maybe 90 for a high end pc. Best laptop for second life cheep budget is the ASUS tuf gaming f15 with the 3050 in it. One awesome feature perhaps a rog ally might do will be video card in a docking station if that's the case u can run a 3060 docked at home and the rog ally standalone handheld when travel.Trust me all I do is obsess over second life fps and try everything to make it perfect.

Edited by rottweiler Lednev
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J Canucci

J Canucci

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I can appreciate the idea of portability, but Second Life is not a linear AAA game, it is a text based social network platform..yeah, you could plug in a keyboard, but in doing that, it rather negates the portability. I cant really relate on this, because i'm rather accustomed to having a desktop and dual monitors. One thing to note though, is that the Ally has been recently noted as cooking the M.2 storage...

29 minutes ago, gwynchisholm said:

Yeah but it would not be portable, this device competes with stuff smaller than basic gaming laptops.

Edited by J Canucci
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AmeliaJ08

AmeliaJ08

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Seems like an attempt at taking on the Steam Deck more than anything else?

Don't fancy trying to run an SL viewer on such a small screen, the user interface of every viewer is not designed for that at all. It could work but I think it'd need a custom viewer and then of course you need to remember everyone developing HUD interfaces in SL does so assuming they'll be viewed on a large screen, many don't seem to account for touch screen use etc...

Just sounds like pain to me, would be curious to see how the integrated GPU holds up though. AMD GPU and SL is a pretty unknown quantity, I know they improved OpenGL performance in their drivers some time ago now though but unfortunately the brand is not usually recommended for SL due to those old performance issues that probably don't apply so much now.

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J Canucci

J Canucci

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I was searching for the best word to use for this device last night as far as SL goes, and at the time of posting totally escaped me..but, it occured to me this morning...and that word is novelty. An expensive one at that. Now, the following list doesn't hit the $699 price point that the Ally is MSRP'ing for...but this machine will run SL fantasticly...

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X                             $179.00, no need for a cooler as this chip ships with an air cooler

MSI B550 A-PRO                                    $132.00

Corsair LPX 16GIG                                $ 39.00

MSI RTX VENTUS 3x                            $ 284.00

NZXT H5 FLOW Case                           $ 94.00

Corsair RM750 power supply             $ 99.00

Samsung 970EVO Pro Gen. 3 M.2     $ 49.99

all tolled it comes to about $882.00, you could spend a little more by upping the RAM from 16 to 32GB..this machine will run SL fantastically...its not the latest and greatest hardware, but for Second Life, you don't need the latest bleeding edge tech...but, if you wanted to price out a build, i'd suggest pcpartpicker.com. You dont need to sell a kidney and sell your soul for a 'high end gaming pc' to get good performance for SL

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gwynchisholm

gwynchisholm

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18 hours ago, J Canucci said:

I was searching for the best word to use for this device last night as far as SL goes, and at the time of posting totally escaped me..but, it occured to me this morning...and that word is novelty. An expensive one at that. Now, the following list doesn't hit the $699 price point that the Ally is MSRP'ing for...but this machine will run SL fantasticly...

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X                             $179.00, no need for a cooler as this chip ships with an air cooler

MSI B550 A-PRO                                    $132.00

Corsair LPX 16GIG                                $ 39.00

MSI RTX VENTUS 3x                            $ 284.00

NZXT H5 FLOW Case                           $ 94.00

Corsair RM750 power supply             $ 99.00

Samsung 970EVO Pro Gen. 3 M.2     $ 49.99

all tolled it comes to about $882.00, you could spend a little more by upping the RAM from 16 to 32GB..this machine will run SL fantastically...its not the latest and greatest hardware, but for Second Life, you don't need the latest bleeding edge tech...but, if you wanted to price out a build, i'd suggest pcpartpicker.com. You dont need to sell a kidney and sell your soul for a 'high end gaming pc' to get good performance for SL

I’m gonna shorten this one with a tldr first, just no. You can build a better pc for less money and have less compromises in terms of platform capability.

Buying into Ryzen 3000 series in 2023 is throwing money into the garbage unless you’re buying used for extremely cheap, and in the case of SL more cores will not help anything, that’s the only advantage the R7 3700x would have over the r5 3600. Or an equivalent in newer generations. New AM4 in general isn’t recommended unless you’re doing high end 5000 series like a 5800x3D on X570.

The wraith cooler the 3700x comes with is not suitable for the sustained boosts the processor can pull without sole substantial supporting airflow and the NZXT Flow is not going to help that despite the name. On a 3600 or whatever it would be fine but still AM4 and especially old am4 is not the route to go.

“Msi ventus 3x” isn’t a model but guessing by price, that’s an RTX 3060 12gb. Which is just another example of a product that’s fine in principle but it’s a poor example of it, the Ventus is the lowest end model msi offers, the only advantage it has is having three fans over the ventus 2x’s two fans. An RX 6600 XT will be cheaper and will perform on average better. And the RX 6700 costs the same and performs way better.

The RM750 is excessive for a conventional build with a midrange gpu and the Samsung 970 evo is relatively old tech in the nvme ssd space that’s coasting on brand name alone. I’ve got a 970 evo in a 6 year old Kaby lake build. There are better nvme SSDs.

One of the biggest gripes I have with this mindset though is if you’re buying previous gens hardware, which is fine for the sake of value, why on earth would you buy any of it new? I can get a 3700x with the wraith Heatsink on eBay right now for $114 shipped, I can get a better B550 board (an rog strix one) for around $95 shipped. It doesn’t make sense to throw that much money down the drain on older hardware when you can just get the same thing for less money.

That also brings up why buy the old hardware to begin with on that budget when an equivalent price new gen pc outperforms it. An i5 12400F on B660 will run circles around a 3700x on B550 for less money, even buying new, and by a decent bit.

But this is still ignoring the point of the device, it is not meant to be a desktop pc, it is not a gaming laptop. The rog ally is not competing with either of those markets. It is a portable machine where you make compromises in performance and graphical fidelity in exchange for portability. You don’t get a big screen with a keyboard and mouse, you don’t get high settings and framerates, you have to live with a limited operating time. In exchange you can play videogames literally anywhere, which a desktop or most gaming laptops even cannot do.

 

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  • 3 months later...
Michael Shadow

Michael Shadow

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On 5/21/2023 at 12:34 PM, Rohan Dockal said:

Wondering what you all think of this device for running SL? One of the biggest barriers to SL right now is that while years ago you could run your viewer with a decent frame rate on an ordinary computer, now you need a powerful gaming computer to run SL smoothly, especially if you are in public areas where the lag is high. But gaming computers cost a lot. However, this one is about to be launched for only $699. For those that don't know about it, this thing looks a lot like a Nintendo Switch, but it's actually a full computer and runs windows. It supposedly can run games with a very good frame rate. It doesn't have a keyboard, but you can attach one. You can also hook it up to a monitor if the screen is too small, but it has 1080 resolution just like most computer monitors today. 

Apparently the battery life is terrible though, I don't think there's a way around that. More performance = more power consumption. But this might be a great way for people to enjoy SL who have been frustrated by low frame rates and lag.  

 

https://www.ign.com/articles/asus-rog-ally-review
https://www.wired.com/review/asus-rog-ally/

Specs:

CPU: AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme Zen 4
CPU Speed: 2.8GHz
GPU: AMD RDNA 3
Display: 7-inch IPS touchscreen
Resolution: 1920x1080 display at 120Hz
Storage: 512GB NVMe SSD
Memory: 16GB LPDDR5 RAM
Audio: Dual speakers with Dolby Atmos
Security: Fingerprint Scanner
I/O: USB Type-C (top), headphone jack, MicroSD expansion, Asus PCIe port
Battery: 40WHrs
Connectivity: Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2

I used firestorm viewer on it and it work as well as a gaming laptop almost better if u have the extreme version of the Rog 

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