The Asus ROG Phone 3 is perhaps the phone
that comes closest to a gaming PC yet – there are tons of accessories for
different gaming styles and everything is under your control. No, really,
everything: you can control the chipset’s clock speed and throttling threshold,
set up the screen and audio for an optimum experience, tune the network to
avoid hangups, even charging is entirely customizable. The ROG Phone 3 is among
the first Androids to be powered by the new Snapdragon 865+ chipset. There’s a
“ROG Phone 3 Strix Edition”, which uses the non-plus version of the S865 chip,
but here’s why you might want to consider for the more premium versions.
First, it’s the first mobile chip to have
its CPU hit 3.09 GHz. That, plus an overclock to the GPU brings a 10% performance
improvement over the vanilla S865. Also, the plus supports Wi-Fi 6E, which
works in the 6 GHz band and offers both more bandwidth and lower latency – with
the right router, sub-3 ms is possible.
The main version packs more RAM and
storage to boot. You get 12GB RAM as standard and you can go up to 16GB if you
want and your budget allows it. Storage starts at 128GB and goes all the way to
512 GB. For comparison, the Strix starts at 8GB of RAM and offers a choice of
128GB and 256GB storage. In all cases you’re looking at fast LPDDR5 RAM and UFS
3.1 storage. Note: there are some regional variations in the memory
configurations available.
This time Asus included the AeroActive
Cooler 3 into the retail package. There’s a vent on the back of the phone, allowing
the fan to blow on the enlarged copper heat sink (6x larger than the ROG Phone
II). The vapor chamber has been redesigned as well. By the way, the vent means
that the ROG Phone 3 is definitely not water resistant. All this is done to
ensure that the chipset can hit 144 fps. The new 6.6” AMOLED screen offers
144Hz refresh rate, though from the settings you can also choose 120 Hz, 90 Hz
and “auto”, which will pick the most efficient setting for the task at hand.
Asus reworked Android’s internals to achieve
25 ms touch latency (270 Hz touch sampling rate). This is the lowest of any
current smartphone, says the company. The screen paints a pretty picture too,
with HDR10+ it has 1 billion colors drawn with a deltaE < 1 and covering
113% of the DCI-P3 gamut. The phone’s ultrasonic shoulder buttons have been
made more customizable. You can split each into two buttons if you need
additional controls or use them as for slide gestures to adjust the game
camera’s angle.
The Asus ROG Phone 3
has been designed with landscape use in mind. Probably not to the extent that
the Lenovo Legion Phone is, but you still get bezels around the screen – they
keep your palms away from the screen and leave enough room for two powerful
front-firing speakers. Asus tapped Dirac to help tune the speakers to reduce
cross-talk, correct the frequency response curve and impulse response. Also,
you have a per-game equalizer so you can tune the audio on each separately.
The AudioWizard has presets for every ROG
headset – ones with a 3.5 mm jack, ones with USB and wireless headsets as well.
A note about 3.5 mm, there’s no jack on the phone this time, but most
accessories (including the AeroActive Cooler) do add a jack. The phone comes
with a 6,000 mAh battery and supports 30W fast charging over USB Power Delivery
(same as the second gen). Asus says that a 46 minute charge will push 4,510 mAh
into the battery, achieving a 70% charge. Most fast charging solutions start to
slow down at 70% (to protect the battery), so a smaller battery with a faster
charger would achieve less.
The Asus software gives you full control
over charging, if you’re the type to worry about battery health. You can cap
the max charge at 80% or 90%, you can limit charging speed to 10W or put it on
a schedule, so overnight charging reaches 100% just as you’re about to wake up.
Asus finally added a third camera on the back of the ROG, but it’s just a 5 MP
macro cam. The main sensor has been upgraded to the 64MP IMX686, which supports
“lossless” 2x magnification at 16MP resolution. The second camera is a 13MP
ultrawide-angle shooter (125°). The main camera can record 8K at 30 fps or 4K
at 120 fps. There’s a HyperSteady Video mode and a Wind Filter, leveraging the
phone's four mics placed all around. The selfie camera has a 24MP sensor.
The Asus ROG Phone 3 comes with Android 10
out of the box with two launchers – the gaming-inspired ROG UI or ZenUI. Both
are pretty close to stock, through they feature a number of internal
optimizations to ensure you get the best out of the hardware. The Asus ROG
Phone 3 will cost € 1,000 for the configuration with 12 GB of RAM and 512 GB
storage. Going up to 16 gigs of RAM will be € 100 extra. If you’re looking to
save some money instead, the Strix Edition with S865 non-plus, 8GB of RAM and
256GB storage will be € 800.
