Ayaneo isn’t new to the handheld market, but its latest product is looking to make major waves and hopefully overtake two key competitors in the process.
The Verge (opens in new tab) reports that the company recently announced its upcoming Ayaneo 2S portable system will be housing the same AMD Ryzen 7000 U-series chip, which is already in use for the Asus ROG Ally’s Z1 Extreme CPU. This not only puts it directly up against said ROG Ally but in competition with Valve’s Steam Deck as well.
Considering that the Asus ROG Ally is already stacked in terms of specs and performance, this is a huge deal. Especially if the Ayaneo 2S gets its pricing right, something that could hinder the ROG Alley if the latest price leak turns out to be false.
And it seems that the company has taken criticisms to heart in terms of its Ayaneo 2 according to Engadget (opens in new tab), as the new 7000 series processor features “substantial performance gains in the low TDP 8-15W gold range” compared to the current model’s 6800, as well as slightly reduced temperatures. That last one is important, as one of our criticisms of the ROG Ally was its noticeable overheating.
And even though there are plenty of other Ayaneos out in the wild, including the second version that was released in 2021 and the Ayaneo Air Plus, the company won’t be abandoning those models. According to The Verge, it will “offer a free speaker upgrade for every Ayaneo Air and a free cooling module for every Ayaneo 2 and Ayaneo Geek,” which will lower its temperature by up to 12 degrees Celsius.
This could be a huge game changer for the handheld market
The Steam Deck and Asus ROG Ally aren’t the only two handhelds that need to watch out either. The Nintendo Switch 2 will be facing some steep competition in a market that the current Nintendo Switch has been single-handedly dominating.
It seemed like Nintendo had everything in control, with Sony no longer interested in the portable gaming system market after its PlayStation Vita was thoroughly trounced by the Nintendo 3DS. But with the Steam Deck making some significant waves this generation, and the Asus ROG Ally looking to turn those waves into a tsunami along with the Ayaneo 2S, we could be looking at a serious shakeup.
If these systems end up landing in a big way, it could force Nintendo to go all out on the Switch 2’s hardware, as well as motivate Valve to make some much-needed improvements to its Steam Deck 2 (and get the company more serious about it in general).
More competition is always better, and I look forward to the best-case scenario that turns these three powerhouses into something that really pushes Nintendo and Valve and their hardware to their limits. Then, we the consumers will all win.
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