ASUS ROG Phone 6D Review – The Dimensity Power

ASUS has been pushing to the limits when it comes to their range of IT products, which on the phone portion, it seems that they have been real active in pushing their phones to the absolute performance everyone might need.

Here comes a review of the ASUS ROG Phone 6D, looks and sounds the same, but not really once we dive in some of the stuff underlying this beast of a phone.

Do take note there is 2 models, the ROG Phone 6D and 6D Ultimate, but the one that we will specifically review is the ASUS ROG 6D, D for MediaTek’s Dimensity, however certain technical benchmark results can still be referenced as the core SOC and Memory remains similar.

Unboxing

The ROG 6D comes with the following

• ROG 6D Phone
• Braided USB C Cable
• 65w Power Adaptor
• Back Case
• User Manual/User Guide

Design

ASUS continues and retain all the same outlook found on the ROG Phone 6. objective remains the same as the previous ROG phone, to bring in all the gaming in mind aesthetics in with the red LED DARE TO PLAY glows up followed by the ROG RGB logo that is customizable for charging, notifications, calls, gaming, X MODE, just to name a few via the Armory crate app which we will touch in to it.

The back of the ROG Phone 6D, the changes they made is by introducing a new color, the Space Gray while retaining the ‘Cyberpunk’ approach which is a theme that represents the imaginative future of cities that we usually seen on games. The rest remains the same such as the form factor and build with extra protection at the back with Gorilla Glass 3. There is a reason why you see the build is bulky, which one of the reason was the Boron Nitride Thermal Compound was inside to constantly keep the device cool and reduce any possible throttling on the SOC. There is also a larger dual cell battery inside, which is a great combination of long lasting gameplay and speed formula for this phone while weight retains at 239 grams with the ever loved candy bar form factor.

Over on the sides, on the right hand side, there is a power button followed by Volume UP/Down buttons and a microphone. While on the left side there is a SIM Card/MicroSD card slot with slightly on the middle there is an additional USB C port and accessories pin ports for charging and attachments.

If you look closely on the left side top and bottom, you will spot a pair of pressure sensitive virtual triggers which acts like L1/R1 like your traditional game controller, giving additional access just like playing on a console with games such as Asphalt 9 and Call Of Duty Mobile. The bottom portion houses the microphone, USB C slot for data and charging and a 3.5mm headphone jack. Over on the top part of the phone there is a noise cancelling microphone .

Accessories

All ROG Phone 6 series phone including the 6D and 6D Ultimate shares the same hardware, which includes the AeroActive Cooler and the Kunai 3 Controller, which can be purchase separately with ASUS authorized dealers and ASUS online store.

Display & Audio

The ASUS ROG Phone 6D display retained the premium fast dynamic 165Hz, 6.78inch, AMOLED 1B screen which is able to display up to 1080 x 2448 pixels with a density of 395PPI. This gives a color accurate display with smooth scrolling when browsing or just your normal day to day replying your social media feeds. Gaming is where the advantage comes with 720Hz touch sampling rate for fast touch responses with Delta-E < 1 color accuracy giving accurate visuals output with HDR10+. Further protection on the display is with the Corning Gorilla Glass Victus.

Audio portion wise, the ASUS ROG Phone 6D has a pair of front facing 5-magnet stereo speakers that is specifically tuned via Dirac HD Sound which is very loud, but clear with good bass and treble in any game or streaming environments, which in return, its an exhilarating experience combined with the displays.

Camera

When it comes to the camera setup, the ASUS ROG Phone 6D rear camera consists of one SONY IMX766 50MP camera with PDAF, one 13MP ultrawide camera, 5MP macro lens, followed by a single LED flash. While the camera got the same treatment as the ROG 6, the IMX766 is known to be a popular choice for some of the even higher end phones till today. Pictures taken were clear during day with good amount of light and clarity produced on each picture with good color reproduction and better contrasts. During night shots, it came may produce some amount of noise on environment shots with clear shadows and details produced much better compared to the ROG Phone 5s. The selfie images are bright and good during day time as well which is powered by a 12MP wide angle shooter with panorama.

A few shots were taken over different modes as above and the result are as above. A sample of 10x zoom, normal and automatic shots taken. Besides that other modes such as Macro and Light Trail shots mode are also supported over the rear camera.

On video recording you get support up to 8K at 24FPS, stutters are very minimal during our test with 4K 60FPS recording but it’s with represented with good amount of details during recording, even walking slightly faster can still capture recording fairly stable although OIS is not present.

Performance

Performance and hardware wise, the ROG Phone 6D is powered by the flagship range MediaTek Dimensity 9000+ 5G Octa-Core Processor, up to 512GB of internal storage and 12GB of RAM with Android 12 enhanced by the ROG UI which comes with Armory Crate app and Game Genie that allows you to customize your game quality, performance settings, RGB light customization, framerate, and the pressure sensitive side triggers.

Over to the gaming side, basically this phone will perform well on games such as Mobile Legends and Genshin Impact with mix medium + high settings applied and with such good lightweight feel on it. With Armory Crate, you can also monitor your game FPS information or even setup your in game recording to capture all you winning moments.

Above is the Benchmark performance, which delivers an overkill scores on each of the test between its graphics, and processor performance. The ROG Phone 6D is suitable for those seeking for a device that does all that is designed for gaming, some social media post, your day to day work, call and entertainment companion. eSports and flagship game titles will have absolute no issues with its powerful Mali-G710 MC10, which is still a competitive choice and yet powerful, to certain extent more powerful than the ROG 6.

Battery performance wise, you will get around 13 hours of it, a mix of calls, surfing, email, streaming, and a few Mobile Legends matches with brightness set to 50%. Turning on the battery saving mode under 20% will get you around extra 3 hours of conservative usage. The ASUS ROG Phone 6D still comes with a 65W fast charger and built in 6000mAH capacity dual cell battery, which will charge up the phone to 60% from 10% in around 30min average. 

Specifications

Verdict & Conclusion 

The ASUS ROG Phone 6D is a gaming phone just with no changes over the ROG 6 series outlook and design, the only changes is the SOC brand from MediaTek and it is still formidable in every task and games you throw at it. By that said, it is still formidable in every corner and ASUS has proved again even with change of SOC only, the performance can still perform on par or beyond against other competitions available which my praise goes towards their sheer consistency of improvement. We definitely look forward towards their next innovation on their Smartphone lineup.

Pros

• Good AMOLED display
• 3.5mm headphone jack
• Large battery standby capacity

Cons

• Definitely a heavy phone
• OIS is not present on the rear camera

Pricing and availability

As of this writing of the review, the phone is selling at a retail price from RM3499 for the 12GB/256GB configuration from various online and ASUS outlet dealers.

For more information on the ASUS ROG Phone 6D, Visit here to find out more.