Review for Inprovement ROG Phone 8 Pro

[ZeroFenix]

This is the first ASUS product I have purchased and I have taken the time to review every aspect of the device. I will make a description of the points that definitely I am not agree and need improvement, with the intention that ASUS will be considered and implemented in future updates. At some points I will have to make the comparison with the direct competing brand of the ASUS gamer line, nubia RedMagic, because I have been able to compare both devices. Without further ado, let's begin.

Air Triggers

I want to start with what has been the most widespread complaint about the device, the air triggers. The tactile response of a RedMagic is smooth and immediate, while in the Rog Phone 8 Pro it has two negative points: 1) You have to press to activate it, which generates a delay. 2) Having to constantly apply a certain level of pressure ends up exhausting your fingers after a couple of hours playing, something that has never happened to me in RedMagic. Having to press to activate the triggers means that placing certain covers makes their use even more difficult, so you have to remove them for a better experience, but it leaves the device exposed and vulnerable to damage from falls, something that is not difficult, since it is quite slippery.

In terms of design, the RedMagic has a relief where the triggers are placed, which makes you quickly get used to the position where they are placed; On the ROG Phone 8 it is difficult at first to get used to their position, since nothing denotes the limit of the triggers. This is particularly important because of the function of subdividing each trigger into 2, by the way this function is awesome.

Air Triggers after update 34.1420.1420.316

The sensitivity of the triggers improved slightly, now I can play with the cover that protects my cell phone, which was almost impossible before. I understand that due to the design of the Asus triggers there are a hardware limitation that will prevent them from being as optimal as any RedMagic.

I was already used to the sensitivity of the triggers without the cover, so at first I did not notice any differences, but where I did notice the differences was when I placed the protective cover. I must clarify that the protector leaves the space of the triggers free, despite this it is difficult to activate them with the cover on, something that has never happened to me in RedMagic with any of the unofficial covers.

I tried playing for at least 1 hour with the cover on and it ended up bothering my fingers, but not as much as before, which left me practically fatigued.

AeroActive Cooler X

This is not an optional accessory, it is mandatory to get the most out of the cell phone. Even if you have dynamic performance, if a game requires 165 FPS, the cell phone will heat up and you will need the cooler so that it does not bother your hand. Nevertheless, take in consideration this accessory adds considerable weight to the cell phone, so playing for long hours in this way can tire your hands.

When charging the cell phone it tends to get quite hot, so to care for the battery and avoid degradation of the materials it is good to keep the temperatures low, hence the importance of the cooler. However, it also has a negative point and that is that the fan does not work with the screen off, even if it is connected to the charger and even if you have the Always On Display function activated, so for it to work while charging you must increase the time of screen on.

I do not understand why ASUS changed the concept of that new cooler compared to the AeroActive Cooler 7, which was incredible with those 4 buttons and the built-in subwoofer. If you do not purchase the most expensive model of the Rog Phone 8 Pro, it does not come with a case compatible with the cooler and you will have to remove the cover every time you want to place it. Furthermore, this case does not protect the cell phone from falls. In addition, the light effects of the cooler has some bugs, sometimes it does not activate until you reboot the cellphone.

AniMe Vision

One of the most striking features, but with many errors and most wasted on the phone. It is good that it shows special animations, the weather and the time, but I do not see the use of showing the amount of battery left to others; it would be nice if this battery level effect were add when the screen is off or even while charging, not just in the option while the screen is on.

Regarding customization, it is incredible that we can draw our own designs. It would be nice if we could add effects in the custom option, as if it is possible to add them when you draw your own design. Likewise, it would be great if there was a place to see the designs shared by others, so people like me who are not creative in drawing could choose a design made by someone else, like Theme store.

A negative point about this is the notifications section, it only lights up for a second when you receive a notification, and applications like Whatsapp do not activate it. It would be convenient to be able to select which applications do activate AniMe Vision and which do not. Likewise, the battery charging effect is only activated when connecting the charger, and then it disappears; It would be nice if it showed the animation and battery level all the time while charging.

I would like all the AniMe Vision sections to have the option to program the time it will remain on, as if the screen off section has it, but also to allow the selection of times shorter than 30 seconds, for example 10 seconds. About screen off, here it does make sense to have the option to show the battery level, since it is a very good help if we place the cell phone face down.

The Lock Screen

Something that I do not like at all about this device is that you can make important changes to the cell phone from the lock screen. From here I can access Quick Settings panel and switch to airplane mode without problems, I can also change the sound of the device to vibration or silent mode, and I can even turn off the device. The above makes it a very vulnerable device to be easily steal. These are points that much older cell phones have covered and give you the option to block these functions without problems.

The device has two functions for notifications from the lock screen: 1) From App & Notifications. 2) From Privacy. These functions interfere with each other; the most useful is the one in the Privacy menu. Despite having the "Detect face to show all notifications" option selected, I can access notifications bar and see all messages, without having shown my face.

The charging animation when charging the cell phone is only shown when connecting the device, it is practically necessary to unlock it to check the charge level of our cell phone. Sometimes the status bar is not display from the lock screen, it is more frequent than I would like. Also, sometimes the wallpaper in the lock screen does not show, the background looks in black color.

Audio

The audio quality is very good, but compared to how loud its direct competition sounds, I can say that this Rog Phone 8 Pro was behind the competition, especially behind its previous model, the Rog Phone 7.

Audio after update 34.1420.1420.316

As I can test those days, the front and bottom speakers sound practically at the same level. I performed an audio test and measured the decibels of both speakers, obtaining practically the same results. Before the update, the front speaker could be heard with a lower audio level. I must highlight that even so, the lower speaker offers audio of at least 10 decibels more compared to the front speaker, which due to the position of the cell phone while watching multimedia or playing games can be negligible.

I wanted to test the audio level with my old RedMagic 5G, obtaining mixed results, but much tighter than before:

- In the games I tested, the Rog Phone 8 Pro had louder and clearer sound.

- In YouTube videos the RedMagic 5G had appreciably higher volume.

- Playing the same song on YouTube Music, the Rog Phone 8 Pro gave slightly better results than the RedMagic 5G.

For these tests I used the Decibel X application from an iPhone 13, to have equal conditions in the tests.

Application Compatibility

It is unacceptable that an expensive device has compatibility problems, especially if it is a gamer device and we are talking about an application that is a game. I have noticed that several games do not run at the maximum FPS that on older devices runs them without problems; I give as an example a game that is not at all demanding, Little Big Robots, on any other device it runs at 60FPS, while on the Rog Phone 8 Pro it does not exceed 30FPS.

Game Space (Armoury Crate)

I want to start with an error that I have noticed, if you activate the No Alerts function the notifications continue to appear, this is practically useless.

As a game space it is a few useless tool, its particular tools that position it as unique only work in three games. It does not have game support functions that are very useful, especially in shooting games, such as visual enhance, color filters to make it easier to see targets in the distance, and scope magnification. The crosshair option does not have a button to activate or deactivate it while you are in game; you have to open the menu to do it, which obviously leaves you vulnerable in game. The Red Magic 9 Pro for a lower price offers these features.

The gaming space also does not have the most used social media applications to be able to open them quickly while playing, a function that was essential for me on my old RedMagic 5G, especially to entertain myself during those downtimes of waiting. To have something similar on the Rog Phone 8 Pro, I have to use the Edge Tool option and load the social networks and applications that I want to have access to while playing, I would have liked to have this within the game space menu.

The Real-time info function should have the ability to be placed vertically, in certain games it bothers anywhere you place it horizontally. Likewise, it would be useful if the information could be hide by touching a button, without having to turn off the function.

Regarding the design of the gaming space, I am very surprised that you cannot customize it, taking in consideration the large amount of customizations that the cell phone has in general. It would be nice to be able to change the startup logo, the background music, the sound of the effects and even the wallpaper.

The Armoury Crate should have global statistics where you can see the time spent on each game per week, how much of the total time spent using the device has been dedicate to playing, among other statistics that may be useful to the user.

The Screen

The option of following the trend of placing the front part of the device all screen does not seem wise to me, especially if that will detract from the sound experience. Furthermore, few applications correctly take advantage of this extension of the screen, since for example to watch videos in full screen you will have to zoom in, which cuts out part of the video where you may be missing details.

The Cameras

Although it has good results for a gaming device, it is clear that the software needs some tweaks to deliver the best results that the integrated hardware can provide. Although it is not an aspect that gamers focus on, this cell phone is categorize as a premium product and should deliver excellent results.

Cell phones that cost a fraction of this one deliver better photographic quality, even with inferior hardware, but very well optimized at the software level. The optical stabilization that Nubia achieved with the Red Magic 9 Pro is very commendable, for example.

Battery Protection

The Battery Care section seems quite aberrant to me and I explain why. They leave the responsibility of battery care in the hands of the user, when it is something that would be cover by ASUS. With years of experience on various devices, they should have enough information to know what affects the battery and what does not. If it is prove that charging the device 100% affects the useful life of the battery, it would be blocked by software that charges it to 90% or 95%, but the software continues to display 100%.

It is known that heat degrades components and likewise the useful life of the battery, so fast charging can cause the battery to heat up. In this regard, I find it prudent that the AeroActive Cooler never turns off while the cell phone is charging, which would help with temperature control, as if the internal fan of any RedMagic model does.

Menu layout

The menu distribution often does not help us find the function we are looking for; I know that the search engine plays an important role for that. It would be good if the functions were brought together in a single space, although they may be duplicated, such as not wanting to see notifications on the lock screen if they are in the notifications section and the privacy section.

Something that is also very important is that there are menus that contain sub-menus, but these are not highlighted in any way and if you are not curious enough there may still be functions that as a user you do not know exist.

The AniMe Vision option should be within the general menu and not only within the gaming space, since it is one of the most characteristic functions of this device. Perhaps when you go to the Launcher personalization section, tapping the AniMe Vision option takes you directly to its settings and not to the Armoury Crate in the section where said menu is located.

Updates

2 years of software updates for such an expensive device is a mockery to the consumer. ASUS is sending a message with this that consumers do not care about the brand. A product of this level should have no less than 4 years of updates and support.

Extras

• The only live wallpaper that comes by default with the phone has bugged, does not work properly when you use it.
• When turning on the dual band function for better signal stability, I have noticed that the internet speed drops drastically below half of the contracted internet capacity. I have had better results disabling this feature, since the phone switches between bands automatically and quite quickly, so I do not really see the need to use this feature.
• If I have system navigation by gestures and I hide the gesture indicator, it generates many errors when using applications, especially if you are writing, since hiding the visual part also eliminates the base space and any interaction causes you to exit the application you are using. I had to leave said bar visible because it happened to me very often and it was quite annoying.
• Sometimes tapping on the corners of the cell phone screen does not work; you have to tap several times until it reacts.
• The calling feature triples your phone contacts and has no way to merge them or hide contacts without a phone number.

Conclusion

When purchasing a device of this range, so expensive and "premium", the minimum that is expected is that the basic functions are well optimized, that the errors are minimal and that it meets the concept for which it was designed, which in this case It's gaming. Considering the basic functions and the gaming section, it leaves much to be desired, it does not quite meet expectations in any of the areas, remaining in the middle in everything.

The gaming experience is completely throwing away by how bad the air triggers are, the lack of essential features in the gaming space and that many games do not run at the FPS they should to be enjoyable.

I understand that many of the problems cannot be solved with software updates, due to the hardware limitations that were included in the device. If I were the ASUS CEO, I would make a recall of this product and make the necessary hardware changes, so that the device meets expectations and users are satisfied with the product.

Paying an additional $100 for the fan, where the RedMagic have it integrated is a rather negative point about this device. Especially, it does not include a case that is compatible with this accessory. You will have to remove the case whenever you want to use the AeroActive Cooler.

It is the first time I bought an ASUS product. The Rog Phone 8 was difficult to get it and finally I feel like I wasted my money on this purchase. For the same amount I would have bought a Red Magic 9 Pro and a Steam Deck, having greater comfort and diversity when playing. I did not return this product because it is impossible for me.

Comparing a latest generation device with another released in 2020 and seeing that it is worse in many aspects is quite disappointing (Rog Phone 8 vs RedMagic 5G).

[tupatatapa]

I am back again as an asus phone user and starting to regret deeply!
The wifi problem as described in this thread, is extremely irritating: https://zentalk.asus.com/t5/rog-phone-8/asus-rog-phone-8-wifi-problem/td-p/418545

[Eqram_Slayerz]

Well said , hope the dev read this and fix the software related issue 

[MartinKo55]

I wouldn't expect too much from them honestly. First my experience with rog 7 is horrible with A14 updates completely ruins the gaming experience while Asus Customer Support completely denied the issue even though majority of reports here in Zentalk point it out...Now AirTrigger and many bug with Rog 8. Its either the dev team is very incompetent or Asus is trolling its customer as they believe they have already got your money.

[ZuuGAKz]

Do you guys think ASUS will release a new ROG Phone 8s model to fix hardware related issues? 😅