The ROG XG Station 2 lets Asus laptops use Asus desktop graphics cards to unlock better gaming performance.
The new USB 3.1 / Thunderbolt 3 ports promise high transfer rates for peripherals. Apparently, this also makes the old concept of "external graphics cards" feasible. After Razer has already surprised with an external graphics solution for their new premium ultrabooks, Asus gave us insight to their "eGPU" plans, too. The concept called ROG XG2 has been shown at Asus' booth at the CES. The external GPU case is connected to an ASUS notebook via two proprietary connections in USB 3.1 Type C format. The incorporated GPU gets automatically detected on the fly. If the external GPU is used, the image has to be display on an external monitor, while the notebook continues to use its own graphics card with the internal display.
While you’ve long been able to jury-rig an external GPU setup to game on game-less notebooks by tapping into a desktop graphics card's power, commercial solutions are finally starting to gain traction. It all started with Alienware’s Graphics Card Amplifier, which let you turbocharge Alienware laptops with Titan X power. The MSI GS30 Shadow’s claim to fame was a bespoke docking station. Now, at CES 2016, Asus is unveiling its own ROG XG Station 2—the follow-up to an external graphics solution first unveiled in 2007.
As you can see in the images above, the ROG XG Station 2 takes style cues from Asus’ ROG Gr8 small-form-factor desktops. The docking station will charge your laptop while you’re using it, which is actually the reason why the ROG XG Station 2 uses a pair of USB-C connections; it could deliver gameplay alone over a single cable, but Asus decided it was worthwhile to use a pair of connections to provide gameplay and charging capabilities. You’ll even be able to unplug it while your laptop’s still running in an interesting feat of technical wizardry. And don't worry about gameplay being nerfed simply because you're using an external solution over PCI-E x4. Asus says that there is indeed a slight performance hit compared to slotting a graphics card into a full PCI-E x16 slot in a desktop tower, but only to the tune of 1 to 5 percent, depending on the situation. The product is primarily an aluminum enclosure with steel structural support and stands in tower-like stature; it ships with a 450W 80 Plus Bronze PSU, has 2xThunderbolt outputs, and 2x Expansion slots. The SG Station 2 has a couple of interesting use case scenarios. As a user, you’d be mounting your own aftermarket video card (in this case, AMD) in the enclosure, connecting it via Thunderbolt to an enabled device (laptop), and then effectively exporting your video processing to the discrete GPU.
This is useful for a few reasons. In situations where you want a light/portable laptop, but need some gaming or video encoding prowess when home, you’ll be able to connect the external video card at home and convert your laptop into a desktop. That’s the idea, anyway. The enclosure has a single 120mm intake fan toward the bottom and exhausts heat out the top, where a handle is present for easy transport. As standard, the PSU has its own closed-loop cooling with external-facing fan and is of SFX form factor. The power supply wattage is a bit overkill and might be dropped to a lower wattage in the future, but we’re presently unsure of the finalized specs. The revised Thunderbolt interface (20Gbps V2; 10Gbps per channel V1) is fast enough that throttling should generally not become an issue.
ASUS intends to sell the GPU case separately - in case the sample actually grows out of the concept status. If so, the ROG XG2 will be launched this year according to ASUS
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