That's not who Microsoft is trying to compete against.
Microsoft is trying to compete and stem the tied of SteamOS encroaching on it's Windows OS business which is one of Microsoft's largest cash cows.

Asus is the one who is competing against those other hardware platforms.

Who you are trying to compete with is one thing, but as a handheld platform you're competing with other similar platforms whether you like it or not.

Delivery hardware is completely irrelevant to MS at this point, it can be anything, it's all about OS. That's why you see them investing in Windows on ARM, among other things - they cannot let Android happen again, so to speak.

So because Microsoft cares more about the OS, we can't discuss hardware, in a thread about a new piece of hardware?

You are not looking at the bigger picture.

It's about Microsoft securing *all* hardware in the future to run ONLY it's Operating Systems... The entire Asus ROG Ally vs Steam Deck vs Legion Go vs MSI Claw vs GPD Win vs Ayaneo vs SteamDeck war is literally pointless for Microsoft if they all run Windows and they all direct users to Microsoft's store.

The Rog Ally X Xbox is just a platform for Microsoft to build it's fork of Windows 11 and optimize it for gaming to try and grab that pie... The fact they get to link it to the Windows Store, Gamepass and other Microsoft services to bring in revenue is extra icing on the cake.

That's the goal here.
The Rog Ally vs SteamDeck alone is not the real war for Microsoft or Xbox.

No one has said hardware cannot be discussed.

This thread is about a piece of hardware though, so claiming that the hardware itself doesn't actually matter is silly.

I think we're more just trying to clarify who this is actually aimed at and the reasons for it. Bringing up that it doesn't stand a chance against Switch and won't sell 10s of millions is missing the point in the same way that people miss the point of Steam Deck as well because it hasn't sold 10s of millions and the sale comparisons between Switch and Steam Deck.

Yes, a Switch technically competes with a PC handheld, but more in the same way that a mobile phone competes with a Switch, or a tablet competes with a Switch. In the same way that Netflix competes with Game Pass. For consumers time and money. But are they direct competition? That is debatable, a Switch 2 and a PC handheld are similar in form factor but offer two different experiences.

I'm likely going to get both because they both offer two different things but I don't really see them as directly competing. When I look into buying a Nintendo Switch 2, the factor of me buying a PC handheld won't influence my decision one little bit, likewise when I decide to buy a PC handheld, the fact that I have a Switch 2 will play no part in my decision, instead I will be comparing PC handhelds to PC handhelds.

ASUS direct competition is other PC Handheld creators such as Valve, MSI, Lenovo, Ayaneo, etc. Microsoft on the other hand, aren't even making the hardware for this, so they have no competition in the PC handheld market right now, Microsoft's competition is in the OS space and that is Valve, they're using ASUS to springboard their counter to SteamOS and then expanding it to all PC handheld devices. Valve is doing the same.

You are missing the point.

We aren't saying comparing the hardware is not useful, I would argue we should always compare hardware so that us consumers can get the best possible deal.

We are saying Microsoft isn't competing in the handheld space at a hardware level when people call this a "Microsoft or Xbox handheld".

Mate, I generally find you very reasonable and temperate, but you're just being a bit stubborn here and not seeing the bigger picture - it's literally not about the actual hardware, which in this case is almost completely irrelevant, it's not about how much does it sell against Switch 2 - MS has much bigger fish to fry, and that's SteamOS.

I'll repeat again - they cannot risk something like Android happening again:

"The greatest mistake ever is whatever mismanagement I engaged in that caused Microsoft not to be what Android is." - Bill Gates

@Pemalite

Something kept bothering me - I know NPUs are not used for DLSS/FSR type of uspcaling, so I dug a bit - I think something like Microsoft's Auto SR might be the answer, they use this on Windows on ARM, which is upscaler that works on full frame, so it can upscale any video input:

It is not as good as proper upscalers that have temporal data and motion vectors, but it does it's job quite decently on inputs that have stable image. This can be combined with DLSS/FSR/XeSS.