Even the Best Steam Deck Competitors Lack One Major Feature

howtogeek.com:

The ROG Ally from ASUS announced in April 2023 looks like a great handheld gaming PC, but disappointingly, the Ally is yet another Steam Deck competitor lacking a major Steam Deck feature that is super important to me. I’m talking about the trackpads.

Now, if you don’t own a Deck, you might think its trackpads are a gimmick no Steam Deck owner is using or cares about. And I completely understand that sentiment because I shared it until I got my Deck. But after using the console, PC, or whatever you want to call it on a daily basis for almost half a year, I can say that the trackpads are an essential Deck feature that elevates the user experience to a new level.

The first hint of their handiness was when I switched to Desktop Mode for the first time. Naturally, I tried using the right analog stick to navigate the desktop, and yeah, it wasn’t great. But then I thought, “You know, there are two massive trackpads on each side; try using them, dummy,” and I never went back. The combination of the mouse cursor on the right trackpad and the “scroll wheel” on the left is almost as good as using a mouse.

The trackpads are also great to have around if you decide to try Windows on your Deck. I performed the Windows experiment one afternoon, and the right trackpad has helped me massively while navigating around the Windows 11 UI, using Edge, trying to install Xenia for the purpose of Xbox 360 emulation, and installing the Xbox app to play PC Game Pass games natively on my Deck.

And that’s something you can’t do on any other handheld gaming PC, even though they all come with Windows, begging for a trackpad or two to replace the analog sticks. The GPD Win 4 does feature a teeny tiny trackpad, but it’s miles behind the two found on Steam