ASUS ROG Ally gaming handheld: Ryzen Z1 Extreme is up to 37% faster than Z1 non-Extreme

The ASUS ROG Ally is an absolute champion of a gaming handheld, but now ASUS is getting down to the nitty gritty when it comes to 720p and 1080p gaming benchmarks. The company has run a test between the AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme version of the ROG Ally, and the Z1 non-Extreme in both 720p and 1080p with some rather interesting results.

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ASUS ROG Ally: Ryzen Z1 vs Ryzen Z1 Extreme @ 1080p gaming (Source: ASUS)

First off, the AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme APU is part of the Phoenix family of products, with the Z1 Extreme featuring 8 x Zen4-based CPU cores while the Z1 non-Extreme features 2 x Zen4 and 6 x Zen4c cores. It might not look like much, but there's a big difference when it comes to gaming performance, as you can see in the benchmarks above (1080p results) and below (720p results).

ASUS is using the Z1 Extreme in its higher-end ROG Ally gaming handheld, which features an RDNA 3-based GPU with 12 Compute Units, versus the 4 x Compute units in the Z1 non-Extreme... hence the big performance gap between them. Still, even with the big cull in Compute Units, the Z1 non-Extreme version of the ROG Ally still has some rather decent performance.

ASUS teases that the ROG Ally powered by the Z1 Extreme APU is capable of 47FPS average in Diablo IV at 1080p on the Medium preset, a rather impressive 98FPS average in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II at 1080p on the Low preset, and even 49FPS average in Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p on the Low preset. This is compared to 36FPS, 63FPS, and 32FPS for Diablo IV, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, and Cyberpunk 2077 on the Z1 non-Extreme, respectively.

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ASUS ROG Ally: Ryzen Z1 vs Ryzen Z1 Extreme @ 720p gaming (Source: ASUS)

The ASUS ROG Ally was also benchmarked at 720p with similarly impressive results, with RSR (AMD Radeon Super Resolution) enabled. At 720p, we have Diablo IV pumping away at 73FPS average on the Z1 Extreme APU at 720p on the High preset, 97FPS on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II at 720p on the Medium preset, and an impressive 66FPS for Cyberpunk 2077 at 720p on the Medium preset.

Remember: this is with RSR enabled.

The Z1 non-Extreme APU spits out less FPS obviously, with 51FPS, 70FPS, and 44FPS for Diablo IV, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, and Cyberpunk 2077 at 720p, compared to the Z1 Extreme-powered ROG Ally, respectively.

ASUS explains: "The AMD Ryzen Z1 can handle even the largest game libraries, from AAA to indie and retro titles alike. In our testing, we found that even resource-intensive games like Cyberpunk 2077 and Diablo IV were capable of 30 FPS or higher at 1080p in Turbo mode, with many other games exceeding 45 or 60 FPS for a smooth handheld experience".