ASUS Confirms ROG Ally Heat Issues Causing MicroSD Card Reader Failures

ASUS has today confirmed that the MicroSD card reader on its ROG Ally handheld console is at risk of failure under stressful thermal conditions.

ROG Ally SD Card Reader Failures

As reported by twistedvoxel, ASUS has confirmed that high temperatures in the ROG Ally handheld have been causing issues with the SD card reader leading to a complete failure costing some customers their SD cards which can be pricey for high capacities. The issue stems from the location of the SD Card reader being so close to the heat output of the handheld meaning it sits in and near warmer air. ASUS provided a statement in their Discord server, shared by Rypper Gaming, and said the following.

Good evening everyone. HQ has released a new statement regarding their work on the Ally’s SD card reader:

We want to thank the community for the passionate response we’ve received for the ROG Ally. Your support has been both immense and invaluable, so we’ve been hard at work to improve a number of things. After confirmation from internal testing, under certain thermal stress conditions the SD card reader may malfunction.

To alleviate the issue, we will be releasing an update that further fine-tunes the default and minimum fan speeds on the device to improve reliability while keeping fan noise in check, as we know this is a concern for many of you.

If you are currently experiencing issues with your SD card reader, please contact cl-adrian@asus.com (US) or contact customer service for your region to RMA your unit, which we will inspect for any issues and repair.

Fan Curve Update

For owners who have experienced this issue, ASUS is urging users to go through the RMA process so the issue can be inspected and repaired. For users who haven’t been yet affected by this issue, ASUS will be releasing an update which fine-tunes the default and minimum fan speeds to hopefully alleviate this issue. We won’t know how much of an effect this will have on the issue until that update comes out but it is an odd oversight from ASUS to place the SD card reader right next to the exhaust.