Asus ROG Phone II smartphone - pros and cons

The most powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Plus processor, impressive battery capacity, high level of cooling system, frame rate and sensor response are part of the top technical specifications that are equipped with the high-performance gaming flagship Asus ROG Phone II. This incredible device will surprise even the most demanding users.

On July 22, Taiwan hosted a closed presentation of the Asus ROG Phone II for the Asian market. The flagship will appear on the European market only after the official presentation in September, at the IFA exhibition in Berlin.

mytop.desigusxpro.com/en/ brings to your attention a detailed review of the most powerful gaming smartphone, with a description of all its pros and cons.

Main technical characteristics collected in the table

Asus ROG Phone II Review

Equipment

The gaming smartphone comes in a matte black box, which has a very unusual shape. As far as we know, in addition to the device, the box will include an external cooling system AeroActive Cooler II and an Aero Case. Also included will be a charging block, a fabric-wound charger cable, instructions, a warranty and a clip for opening the SIM card slot.

Design

Asus ROG Phone II, like the first generation ROG Phone, has an unusual, brutal, even daring design. The front side attracts attention by the presence of a huge display, which is dressed in very immodest indents. The impressive indents are due to the large built-in speakers, which are located on the "chin" and "bangs". Next to the top speaker is the front-facing camera almost imperceptibly, for which there is no separate cutout. The display is covered with 6th generation Corning Gorilla Glass.

ROG Phone II can be unlocked using the in-screen fingerprint scanner. The scanner reacts with lightning speed to touch.

The glass back meets with beautiful patterns and notches, it is also protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 6. First of all, the block for the cooling system with a hole for ventilation and a luminous logo, the colors of which can always be changed in the settings, are striking. There is also a rear camera with a dual module on the back, next to it there is a dual LED flash and an LED that illuminates the logo on the smartphone cases.

On the metal edges of the device there is:

• Above - a hole for 1 microphone;
• Bottom - holes for 2 and 3 microphones, 3.5 mm headphone jacks and
  USB-C;
• Left - a slot for a SIM card and a second USB-C connector along with a slot for charging the docking station;
• On the right is a volume rocker, a power and unlock button, and 4 microphones. There are also second-generation perforated AirTriggers, with double vibration and a fast response of 20 ms. Triggers can be programmed to perform specific actions in games. Now AirTrigger II is able to understand side swipes and the situation when the user does not want to use the buttons for their intended purpose, but simply put their fingers down.

The smartphone also boasts four Wi-Fi antennas that provide high bandwidth and minimal latency.

Processor and graphics card

The gamepad is powered by Qualcomm SDM855 Snapdragon 855 Plus. The process was unveiled on July 15th and the Asus ROG Phone II became the world's first smartphone with this impressive hardware inside. The single-chip platform has a 7 nanometer process technology and runs on eight Kryo 485 cores, clocked at 1.8 GHz, 2.42 GHz and a maximum of 2.96 GHz. Whereas the maximum clock speed of the Snapdragon 855 cores is 2.84 GHz, which is 4% lower than the improved version of the processor shows. For computing artificial intelligence and graphics, just like in the previous version, the Adreno 640 is responsible, but with a 15% increased clock frequency, which reaches 675 MHz.

The improved version of the processor has the following new features:

• support for virtual, augmented and mixed reality outside of VR and AR, using built-in tools;
• high speed of operations performed per second, reaching over 7 trillion, which is possible thanks to the fourth generation of multi-core processor module;
• support for the Vulkan 1.1 graphics standard.

Memory and cost

The top performance of the device also depends on the type of internal memory. It uses the UFS 3.0 specification. Asus is the third phone in the world to use this flash memory, which reads up to 1.5 GB / s. The RAM is in LPDDR4X format.

Previously, it was assumed that the smartphone will have only one configuration, in fact, the ROG Phone II will be available in 6 versions:

1. The base, low-cost variant comes with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of flash storage. This option will cost the buyer about $ 509.
2. Enjoy Peace in Beijing special edition with the same storage capacity as the base variant will retail for $ 537. At the moment, the differences between the special and basic editions are unknown.
3. The third modification has 12 GB of RAM and 512 internal memory. You can buy it for an average price of $ 870.
4. Enjoy Peace in Beijing, also with 12 GB + 512 GB, will cost $ 900.
5. Extreme Edition will be released $ 1,162. The amount of memory is still unknown.
6. The most impressively priced version is Esports Armor, which starts at $ 1,900. The high cost is justified by the presence of accessories for games and 30 W charging, which come with the smartphone and are supplied in a special case.

Display

The Asus ROG Phone II display can be safely called the best screen that smartphones now have. To make the phone as convenient as possible for active games, Asus gave users blanks of different sizes and after a survey 95% found the ideal ratio of 19.5: 5, height 171 mm and width 77.6 mm.

The huge 6.59-inch AMOLED display occupies 106.6 cm2 of usable area, or 80.3%. The screen is represented by a resolution of 1,080 by 2,340 pixels, with an aspect ratio of 19.5 to 9.

But the device received such a high title not because of the above characteristics. The highlight is in the following points:

• The refresh rate of the screen reaches 120 Hz, the response time is 1 millisecond. This is the world's first smartphone with such a high frequency. You can also use 60Hz and 90Hz modes;
• Incredible sensitivity of the sensor layer, which is 240 Hz. Lightning-fast response - 49 milliseconds;
• 108% coverage of DCI-P3 color space. The display conveys sufficient image sharpness and is distinguished by perfect reproduction of brightness and color;
• Color deviation deltaE less than 1. These parameters are ideal for professional monitors;
• Corning Gorilla Glass 6 protection.

Autonomy

Initially, Asus manufacturers wanted to install a battery with a capacity of 8,000 or 7,000 mAh, but the need for larger dimensions and weight forced them to decide on 6,000 mAh. The high battery capacity provides a whopping 7 hours and 10 minutes of non-stop gaming at the highest settings. And with standard use, the smartphone will last about 3 days without a charge.

ROG Phone II supports 30W Quick Charge 4.0 and ROG HyperCharg. There is also compatibility with a 3-amp cable. It takes 58 minutes to charge 4,000 mAh, and 1 hour 40 minutes to charge 100%.

A large battery is not only a high level of autonomy, but also a long service life. The manufacturers claim that the battery will only lose about 8% of its capacity in 2 years when using a 30W charger.

Cooling system

Adequate cooling is extremely important for the ideal interaction of the declared top parameters of the smartphone. ROG Phone II has a three-stage cooling system:

1. Three-dimensional evaporation chamber, which is located inside the device;
2. Heat dissipation through ventilation holes;
3. External cooling system with optional AeroActive Cooler II accessory. The nozzle is able to cool the back panel of the smartphone by 5 degrees, while being 4 times quieter than the first generation AeroActive Cooler. The noise level is only 24 dB.

Cameras

The ROG Phone II has the exact same camera as the Zenfone 6.

The front camera with f / 2.2 aperture has a resolution of 24 megapixels. The camera supports HDR format, portrait shooting is available in 6 megapixel mode.

The rear camera consists of 2 modules:

1. The first, the wide-angle Sony IMX586, has an f / 1.8 aperture and a resolution of 48 megapixels. The sensor size is 1⁄2, the pixel size is 0.8 microns.
2. The second, ultra wide-angle (angle 125 degrees) with aperture f / 2.4 is characterized by 13 megapixels.

Camera features

Key features and settings:

• support for HD, HDR +, Full HD, Slow-mo (high-speed), 4K (Ultra HD);
• optical stabilization and dual LED flash;
• automatic panorama and night mode (multi-frame scheme);
• laser and phase detection autofocus.

Photo quality

A smartphone designed for gamers does not have to have good cameras, because the main thing is high performance and autonomy. But the manufacturers of Asus ROG Phone II were able to surprise here too - the device shows a decent level of photo capabilities. In general, images and videos are sharp, with a high level of detail, and good color reproduction. Focusing takes just 0.03 seconds.

HDR + works well in sufficient lighting, otherwise the image will be a little washed out. As for how the smartphone takes pictures at night, the night mode helps to achieve good quality. But photos taken using 48 megapixels have a lot of noise.

Manual mode offers an extensive selection of different settings to help you capture high quality images. So, for example, after manually adjusting the focus point and scene depth, the user will receive an excellent, high-quality shot in portrait mode.

Interface

The device runs Android 9.0 Pie with ROG UI. Optionally, you can install a pure Android theme.

The characteristics of the smartphone already speak of incredibly high gaming capabilities, but the manufacturers did not stop there: ROG UI has additional optimization of the gameplay, providing a huge number of settings and functions. Here are some of them:

• game launcher Armory Crate;
• Game Genie mode that blocks notifications and calls;
• custom management;
• tracking phone performance.

Sound

Asus ROG Phone II is not only about incredible autonomy and performance, but also the best sound among all smartphones. Two huge stereo speakers and DTS: X Ultra deliver crystal clear and loud sound.

Accessories

Due to its size, the Asus ROG Phone II is not compatible with many of the first generation ROG Phone accessories. Now we know about 5 accessories:

1. Duplicate Lighting Case - ROG Lighting Armor Case;
2. TwinView Dock II - an accessory with an additional second screen, its own cooling system and a 5000 mAh battery;
3. ROG Kunai Gamepad joysticks, which can be used by connecting to a smartphone, TwinView Dock II or as a full-fledged gamepad;
4. Mobile Desktop Dock - a docking station for using a smartphone as a full-fledged computer;
5. WiGig Display Dock Plus lets you seamlessly display information from your display directly to your TV screen. And by connecting with the ROG Kunai Gamepad, you can get a complete console.

Test results

Since the Asus ROG Phone II has not yet been officially presented, the smartphone cannot be tested on well-known benchmarks. But Asus conducted its own testing, where the following results are known:

• The throttling test shows 0% throttling;
• In the performance test with active games, fps reaches 98%;
• The response latency test results in 49ms.

Advantages and disadvantages of new items

• Unusual, brutal design with beautiful notches, patterns and a back panel that shines in the sun;
• In-screen fingerprint sensor;
• Corning Gorilla Glass 6 back and front protection;
• Luminous logo and LED for highlighting the logo on the cases;
• Large speaker grilles and four microphones;
• Touch perforated triggers, with fast response, vibration and new features;
• Incredible performance
• Fast flash memory and four Wi-Fi antennas;
• A variety of configurations for a smartphone with a large amount of memory;
• Huge display with amazing parameters;
• Large battery capacity with support for fast charging;
• Three-stage cooling system;
• Decent quality photos and videos;
• High-quality sound and the presence of NFC.

• Lack of infrared port and wireless charging;
• Fingerprints remain on the back.

Conclusion

The Asus ROG Phone II is a device that impresses:

• high performance and advanced cooling system;
• high-quality sound and excellent performance of photo capabilities;
• large battery capacity and lightning fast response;
• incredibly fast refresh rates, as well as many other incredible features that you learned about in our in-depth review.