Asus ROG Cellphone 6 Professional Evaluate

On the entrance, the ROG Cellphone 6 packs a monstrous 6.78-inch AMOLED show that’s flanked on high and backside by thicker bezels than I’m used to seeing from $1,000+ telephones. These bezels make room for a selfie digital camera that doesn’t reduce into the show any and a pair of matching audio system. A fingerprint scanner is located beneath the show, as we’ve seen from many latest Android flagships, and it’s fairly snappy at unlocking the telephone.

The show is massive, shiny, and sharp at 2,448 x 1,080 decision. Asus can be pushing it quick with a 165Hz refresh charge, a lot sooner than you’ll discover on most telephones and nonetheless sooner than we’ve seen flagships going these days. The show additionally helps a 720Hz contact sampling charge for improved responsiveness. The telephone can routinely regulate the refresh charge because the state of affairs calls for, serving to it save on battery when these 165Hz speeds aren’t wanted.

There’s not a lot must be conservative with the battery although, because it’s a pair of three,000mAh batteries (6,000mAh complete) and might cost up in 42 minutes with 65W charging utilizing the included HyperCharge energy adapter. To slot in further {hardware} for managing cooling on the ROG Cellphone 6, Asus needed to forego wi-fi charging although. The corporate did embrace two USB-C ports for charging, with one on backside and one on the left aspect. Each ports additionally help direct charging, which lets the telephone run off wired energy, avoiding pressure and pointless warmth for the battery.

One other sacrifice made for gaming is sturdiness. Although the entrance show is roofed in robust Gorilla Glass Victus, the rear of the telephone looks like plastic and the entire meeting solely will get an IPX4 score for water resistance. That’s solely good for a little bit of splashed water. In the meantime flagship telephones coming from Apple and Samsung can spend prolonged intervals totally submerged in water with their IP68-rated safety. After all, these flagships each lack the three.5mm combo jack that Asus has saved round for this telephone.

In correct gaming vogue, the ROG Cellphone 6 additionally contains shoulder buttons. They’re touch-sensitive patches on the proper fringe of the telephone, every with “ROG” engraved on them.

With all that Asus is packing in, it’s stunning the telephone solely weighs 239 grams – only one gram lighter than the iPhone 13 Professional Max. All the identical, the telephone feels unwieldy, and is hard to handle in a single hand. Asus features a slim case that not less than makes holding on a bit of simpler.

Whereas they aren’t a part of the package deal, it’s additionally price noting that the ROG Cellphone 6 line helps a handful of equipment from Asus, together with a Nintendo Change-like controller case (that felt a bit flimsy) and a peltier cooling attachment with further buttons and a kickstand on it.

Asus ROG Cellphone 6 Professional – Software program

The ROG Cellphone 6 and 6 Professional come working Android 12 with ROG UI & Zen UI. Apart from the pre-installed Armoury Crate app, the Sport Genie overlay, and the X-mode for gaming efficiency, there’s little in the way in which of additional fluff added to the working system. It feels very like working a Pixel 6, besides with an edgier icon pack. Asus will provide two OS updates and two years of safety updates, which isn’t nice given it’s beginning on Android 12, which is due for an replace quickly.

Asus’s personal software program isn’t terribly intuitive at occasions. The break up between Armoury Crate and Sport Genie doesn’t all the time make sense, and discovering the instruments for sure issues, like remapping controls for Asus’s numerous equipment proved far harder and tedious than it ought to have been, notably missing instruction for some staple items, like mapping the analog sticks. Even LG had a smoother, extra intuitive course of for the dual-screen attachment it supplied on a handful of telephones. Contemplating Asus is on its sixth foray right into a devoted gaming telephone lineup, I might have hoped issues could be extra streamlined by now.

Asus ROG Cellphone 6 Professional – Gaming and Efficiency

Simply as in all places else, the ROG Cellphone 6 Professional leaves little to be desired in terms of efficiency. It’s packing the Snapdragon 8+ Gen1 chipset – successfully a souped up model of the 8 Gen1 – and backs it up with 18GB of LPDDR5 reminiscence. It’s additionally paired with 512GB of quick UFS 3.1 storage.

In each second of each interplay, the ROG Cellphone 6 Professional feels prefer it’s cruising. Leaping forwards and backwards between apps isn’t any downside, because the absurd quantity of RAM can maintain greater than I’d ever think about essential. After bumping across the telephone, answering a textual content, and enjoying a complete match in Apex Legends, I used to be nonetheless in a position to bounce again into a special recreation and choose up proper the place I’d left off.

In gaming, the telephone additionally goes exhausting. In a number of matches of Apex Legends, it didn’t present any indicators of fighting UltraHD graphics and a excessive body charge setting. Even bumping the body charge up past that it continued to work with ease. For all Asus’s efforts, it nonetheless has to deal with warmth, and although the telephone settles at simply over 100 levels after a prolonged recreation, that’s warmth that’ll result in sweaty palms and fingers.

The controls on the telephone really feel responsive whereas gaming, maybe partially because of the pace of the telephone but in addition on account of the excessive contact sampling charge. Nonetheless, the shoulder ‘buttons’ don’t really feel nearly as good to make use of because the bodily buttons introduced and ingeniously constructed into final yr’s Black Shark 4.

Speeds in and outdoors of gaming additionally get a bonus from quick networking. Wi-Fi 6E is supported, although I used to be solely in a position to see Wi-Fi 6 speeds on my dwelling router. 5G connectivity is on deck, and although an preliminary check noticed the telephone clocking over 700Mbps on my T-Cellular connection in Chicago, reception and entry to excessive pace bands proved much less dependable. Typically I used to be caught within the gradual lane on 4G and even 3G networks in locations the place I’d usually get not less than gradual 5G on my Galaxy S20. This, paired with the ROG Cellphone 6 Professional’s preliminary launch taking place outdoors the US, suggests it may not be packing one of the best radios for US prospects.

Whilst you would possibly get caught out attempting to find sign, you’re not as prone to be left begging for battery. The 6,000mAh of cost within the ROG Cellphone 6 Professional is prepared for all-day use even with some gaming squeezed in there. In my testing, I by no means noticed it get beneath a 3rd of its capability by the top of that day, and I’d run a bit of gaming, a bit of leisure, and even a bit of cell hotspot in that point. A 105-minute film streaming over Wi-Fi with the show at about 75% brightness and quantity by means of the audio system maxed out solely sucked down 14% of the battery. And the audio system held up surprisingly effectively outdoors in opposition to the sound of July 4th fireworks going off continually. After fully draining the battery, it shot again as much as 40% from sitting on the charger for simply over 10 minutes, and 20 minutes introduced it as much as 61%. And certain sufficient, after 42 minutes, it reached 100% cost, although it obtained fairly toasty charging that quick.

Asus ROG Cellphone 6 Professional – Digital camera

If Asus could possibly be caught slacking wherever, it’s with the cameras. The ROG Cellphone 6 and 6 Professional each embrace a trio of cameras on the again, and so they’re actually nothing to get excited for.

Listed here are the cameras the ROG Cellphone 6 Professional packs:

• 50MP Vast
• 13MP Ultrawide
• 5MP Macro
• 12MP Selfie

These cameras nearly all produce photographs that look high quality when considered on the telephone itself, however fall brief when viewing them on a bigger display.

Asus ROG Cellphone 6 Professional – Primary Digital camera Samples

The primary sensor has first rate colour and appears lots crisp when it’s small. But it surely’s obtained a bent towards noisiness, is a bit gradual and due to this fact smears a bit in something however shiny daylight, and appears oversharpened. Each flaw of the principle sensor simply will get worse with the ultra-wide digital camera.

The macro digital camera is nearly not price mentioning, because it produces photographs that hardly provide something totally different than simply utilizing the principle sensor’s 2x digital zoom.

Asus ROG Cellphone 6 Professional – Selfie Digital camera Pattern

It’s truly the selfie digital camera that’s the standout of the bunch. It avoids over-sharpening, meets the lighting situations effectively, offers pure colour, and in all fairness sharp.