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First look at gaming smartphone ASUS ROG Phone

Republic of Gamers is the world famous brand of ASUS, which for over 12 years has been setting trends in the world of computer hardware for games. The mission of the Republic of Gamers today is simple and clear - this is the creation of an eco-system for gamers. During the existence of the ROG brand, the product portfolio from motherboards and laptops has been replenished with video cards, monitors, desktops, gaming devices and routers. Today, at a press conference in Taiwan before the Computex 2018 computer exhibition, ASUS launched a new chapter in the history of gaming products, unveiling its first smartphone for gamers under the Republic of Gamers brand - ASUS ROG Phone .



Specs



Appearance


The first thing you want to tell is the appearance. Today it is customary to argue that any smartphone entering the market is a copy of Apple. In the case of the ROG Phone, this is not the case.





First, the display - it is without a "bang" or "monobrow". This is a familiar rectangular panel. The frames on the sides are almost invisible, and the frames on the bottom and on top are symmetrical to each other. They are more than in most modern smartphones in 2018, but this was done rather in favor of user convenience. ROG engineers believe that gamers spend a lot of time with the smartphone in their hands exactly in a horizontal position.



Secondly, two stereo speakers on the front panel. They received a corporate ROG color - Plasma Copper, known to us by the models from the line of laptops, motherboards, etc.



Thirdly, the reverse side of the smartphone. Here everything is completely new - glass is combined with plastic. The solution is nonstandard exactly, but is explained quite simply. Glass is the latest generation of Gorilla Glass, the number is not specifically mentioned, since the new generation will be presented by the manufacturer only in July. But you and I perfectly understand the numerical version and the fact that it is the most durable glass today.



The logo and the inscription Republic of Gamers are located horizontally. This solution looks familiar to gaming consoles, but not for smartphones in their modern performance. The fingerprint unlock sensor of the smartphone is shifted relative to the center upwards and rotated 90 degrees, which once again underlines the idea of ​​using the horizontal orientation of the smartphone in most usage scenarios. In fact, such an arrangement of the sensor and in the vertical position of the smartphone remains quite comfortable, the question of a couple of days getting used to. Following the sensor, the glass of the camera received an irregular shape, there is no engineering feature here, and this is just a game of design ideas.



What does the plastic insert on the back, you ask? There are two copper-colored mesh elements on it, which in appearance resemble speakers. In fact, these are not dynamics, but a decorative grid that allows access to the air flow from the outside.

Cooling system


Yes, yes, you heard right. In this section we will talk about the cooling system of the smartphone.



The basis of the cooling system engineers Republic of Gamers laid the principle of the steam or heat chamber (Vapor Chamber) - a copper vessel with a vacuum cavity inside which the refrigerant is a liquid. The principle of operation of the steam chamber is exactly the same as that of the heat pipe. Air is pumped out of the cavity, creating a vacuum and cooling fluid is poured. When heated, the liquid turns into vapor and begins to move inside the chamber to a colder area, where it returns to a liquid state. After that, it returns to the heat source and the process repeats.



For faster heat removal, the Fan Dongle is included with the smartphone - this is an overlay on the back panel of the smartphone, inside of which there is a fan. For the convenience of the user, they also plugged the charging connector and 3.5 mm for headphones into it, so that if necessary, charging or playing with headphones the cables are not interfered with at hand. Fan Dongle comes with a smartphone.















Performance


Surely, after reading the block about the cooling system, a thought will arise that what’s so hot there is that you need to cool it in such a sophisticated way. We tell in order. First of all, it is a Qualcomm Snapdragon SDM845 processor. According to the Qualcomm specification, the frequency of the SDM845 processor reaches 2.8 GHz in maximum performance mode. But the meaning of the word “overclocking” to engineers of the Republic of Gamers is not known by hearsay, because it is not for nothing that almost all world overclocking records are installed on ASUS ROG boards. Could not get past the acceleration and this time, the processor in the ROG Phone is clocked at 2.96 GHz, which is almost 200 MHz higher than the nominal. For x86-processor 200 MHz, overclocking is not a reason for surprise, but on smartphones with ARM-architecture processors, this difference will be more than noticeable. It is worth noting that in such a processor performance, the merit of not only ROG engineers with their cooling system, but also the merit of Qualcomm engineers who pre-test the overclocking capabilities of the processors at the factory, and only the best copies are sent to ROG Phone.



In the notification panel, you can activate the X-Mode. This is the maximum performance mode in which all components are on alert, the RAM is cleared, and new processes X-Mode does not allow it to clog. The activation process itself looks very impressive, thanks to a proprietary shell that animates the wallpaper on your desktop.
Thanks to all the improvements, the engineers of ASUS Republic of Gamers managed to achieve maximum performance, confirming their words with test results during the official presentation.

Display


ASUS ROG Phone awarded 6-inch AMOLED screen with a resolution of 2160x1080 pixels. The trend in the form of the presence of "bangs" passed by ROG Phone. Engineers of the Republic of Gamers have decided that they themselves will be trendsetters in the market of gaming smartphones. And the first pancake did not get a lump. The screen response time is only 1 ms, as on the fastest TN matrices, and the screen refresh rate is 90 Hz. This combination of the two most important parameters of the screen for gamers is the best of what is available on the market today. The color gamut is 108.6% DCIP3, and the contrast is 10,000: 1. The display supports Mobile HDR and Gaming HDR.

More than a smartphone - TwinView Dock


Mobile gamers and mobile game streamers will truly appreciate the TwinView Dock. This is a docking station that has a second display and a built-in 6000 mAh battery. The second screen is completely identical to that used in the smartphone itself. You can use the second display in games, such as PUBG Mobile or FreeFire, to display a card or equipment on the second screen. Of course, this will give an advantage to players who now do not need to overlap the main screen. There is also a usage scenario for streamers - on the second screen you can display Twitch applications, see a picture from your stream and chat with subscribers.





















Joystick - console experience


Another option for using the ROG Phone is a console. You can purchase a joystick that connects to your smartphone via USB Type-C. Thus, the smartphone turns into a mobile console. To go to the next level there is a Wi-Fi 802.11ad receiver. Any TV or monitor connects to the receiver, and then wirelessly 802.11ad connects to the smartphone. Using the standard 802.11ad allowed to reduce the delay time to 20 ms. For comparison, when using 802.11ac, the delay time would be 500 ms.





















Play like on a computer


To totally dominate opponents in PUBG Mobile, you need a keyboard, mouse and monitor. Engineers of the Republic of Gamers have taken care of this scenario of using a smartphone - a special docking station allows you to get all this on the ROG Phone. Among the connectors on the docking station are four USB Type-A, one USB Type-C for charging, one Ethernet RJ45 connector, one HDMI, one DisplayPort, 3.5 mm audio jack and a built-in microphone.

















Conclusion


Smartphone from Republic of Gamers have been waiting for a long time. After a live chat with the ASUS ROG Phone, it's safe to say that Republic of Gamers engineers pulled off the launch for a reason. All possible game scenarios are taken into account, the benefit of accessories abound. And, of course, performance - the smartphone turned out to be the fastest in the world! ROG Phone prices have not yet been finalized, but you need to understand that in the basic configuration a smartphone can cost from $ 900, and in the maximum configuration, with a full set of adapters, approach the price of $ 1,700.

Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/413357/

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