Early Aya Neo Pro Review Results Are Quite Positive--Potential Steam Deck Killer?

Aya Neo Pro review results seem to be quite positive early, which could mean that Valve's Steam Deck has some tough competition in the coming months.

In an early review by GameSpot, they called the former Indiegogo project "superb" and a "great" competitor to the Steam Deck. They praised the handheld for the power it packs on a relatively small scale, which they say could make it a great alternative to a mid-tier gaming laptop.

The Pro version of the original Aya Neo handheld (which was released last year) features a design that's very reminiscent of the Nintendo Switch's layout. While it doesn't have recognizable detachable side controllers, the controls have proven to feel great when playing specific games like classic side-scrollers.

Gamers will also notice that the face buttons feature a similar layout to an Xbox controller. This, according to GameSpot, makes a lot of sense since the Aya Neo Pro could be considered a portable Game Pass machine.

Under the hood, the handheld packs an AMD Ryzen 7 4800U, 16GB of special DDR4X RAM, and a speedy 1TB NVMe SSD which all power the 7-inch, 1200x800 screen. The original model, in comparison, only has a Ryzen 5 4500U.

The hardware is reportedly good enough to last for around 3 to 6 hours of play. However, it wasn't clarified how the battery life could vary when using the handheld plugged in or not.

With these specs, the Aya Neo Pro is basically configured similarly to the Steam Deck. The only differences would be the graphics chip (Steam Deck features RDNA2 units, while the Aya Neo Pro only says "Radeon Graphics") and the OS.

Valve is using the Linux-based SteamOS for their system. The former is fully considered a Windows PC, which separates it from Valve's handheld-at least for now.

Aya Neo Pro Review: What's The Performance Like?

The Aya Neo Pro seems to be a capable handheld PC in terms of gaming, proving that it is able to handle several of the current generation's biggest games.

In this review by the YouTube channel Chigz Tech Reviews (297K subs as of this moment), the handheld console (which seems to be noticeable smaller than the Steam Deck) is shown running games such as "GTA V," "Shadow of the Tomb Raider," and CS:GO" at decent graphical settings and frame rates:

As you can see, the tiny PC also proved effective in terms of game streaming from PlayStation Now. "God of War 2018," "The Last of Us Part II," and "Battlefield 4" were shown streaming just fine, though the review didn't exactly say whether the games were suffering from increased latency issues.

For now, the only problem is that the Aya Neo Pro doesn't seem to be working well with PS5 Remote Play. In the video, it shows that the handheld's controllers aren't being picked up. This could be fixed with a future software update, but for now, that remains up in the air.

But with all this, is the Aya Neo Pro a Steam Deck killer? Specs and pricing-wise, it likely won't beat out Valve's offering. Only time will tell.

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Written by RJ Pierce