HANDHELD NEWS – There’s new hardware and old, tiresome hoarders who want to profit from stock shortages they create.

If you’re interested in the upcoming Asus ROG Xbox Ally X handheld PC, be careful where you buy it. Scalpers are already trying to rip people off on eBay by offering the product for more than twice the manufacturer’s suggested retail price. Meanwhile, the ROG Xbox Ally X is still available for pre-order at the normal price. Tom’s Hardware found several eBay listings where the Ally X is priced at $2,500. The Ally X has an MSRP of $1,000, while the base Ally is priced at $600. Both devices launch on October 16.

If you want to buy an Xbox Ally, it’s best to stay away from eBay. You can still pre-order the Xbox Ally and Xbox Ally X at Best Buy or on the Asus and Microsoft websites. You can find pre-order options in your region on the official Xbox pre-order page. This handheld PC is fairly expensive, so don’t let scalpers line their pockets when you can buy it for less.

If we consider the ROG Ally X to be part of the Xbox product family, then it is the most expensive Xbox to date. For $1,000, you get an AMD Ryzen AI Z2 Extreme chip, 24 GB of RAM, 1 TB of storage, and a 7-inch (17.78 cm) full HD IPS display. Benchmark tests of the Z2 Extreme chip show significant performance improvements over the Z1 Extreme and last year’s non-Xbox ROG-branded Ally X, but mainly at lower settings.

The upcoming Xbox version of the ROG Ally X may not be a significant enough upgrade to justify paying $1,000 if you already have last year’s model, so it’s a better choice if you’re upgrading from an older or cheaper handheld PC or buying such a device for the first time. In this price range, the Xbox Ally X competes with cheaper gaming laptops, many of which have separate GPUs and offer more powerful performance.

However, it’s worth considering other handheld PCs as well. For example, the LCD version of the Steam Deck is available for $330.

Source: PCGamer, Tom’s Hardware