Asus launches Thunderbolt 5 RTX 5090 eGPU dock overseas for $2,200
Compact eGPU dock uses RTX 5090 laptop GPU.
Asus has launched the RTX 5090-powered ROG XG graphics dock that it showed at CES 2025. According to IT Home, the dock, known officially as the 2025 ROG XG Mobile, has launched overseas with a sticker price of $2,199.99. As for U.S. customers, there's no launch window yet.
The new dock is reportedly the world's first Thunderbolt 5-powered eGPU dock. It's an updated version of Asus's ROG XG Mobile for 2025, featuring the all-new RTX 5090 mobile GPU. The laptop version of the RTX 5090 packs in 10,496 CUDA cores and 24GB of GDDR7 connected to a 256-bit interface. The RTX 5090 in the 2025 ROG XG Mobile has a 150W power limit.
The 2025 ROG XG Mobile is one of the most compact eGPU docks on sale, thanks to the integration of Nvidia's laptop GPUs. The 2025 ROG XG Mobile measures 8.2 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches (208 x 155 x 29.6 mm), which makes it more portable than a 13-inch laptop. Its small size is a departure from most eGPU docks, which need to be large enough to accommodate regular desktop-sized graphics cards.
Cooling the GPU is a "new" compact copper vapor chamber cooler that is reportedly 30% lighter than its predecessor while maintaining the performance of competing coolers with "50% thicker capillary structures."
Input consists of two Thunderbolt 5 Type-C ports, two USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports, one DisplayPort 2.1, one HDMI 2.1, and one RJ-45 Ethernet port capable of 5 Gbps bandwidth. A 330W power brick powers the dock, and it's been updated for the 2025 model with active bridge rectifier MOSFETs that reduce its weight by 150g.
Thunderbolt 5 integration gives the new 2025 ROG XG Mobile 64 Gbps of PCIe Gen 4 bandwidth (however, GPUs are only allocated four lanes) and up to 120 Gbps of bandwidth in total with dynamic boost. With Thunderbolt 5, Asus's new dock is capable of connecting to USB devices, SSDs, multiple high refresh rate monitors, wired internet, and charging devices all at the same time.
The 2025 ROG XG Mobile will also come in a variant with an RTX 5070 Ti laptop GPU, but there's no word yet on when that model will debut or how much it will cost.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
Aaron Klotz is a contributing writer for Tom’s Hardware, covering news related to computer hardware such as CPUs, and graphics cards.
-
kealii123 If this is the retail price state-side, I assume it will sell out quickly.Reply
If leaked specs are to be believed, the laptop 5090 will be a hair slower than the desktop 4090, with the same VRAM, and its hard to find a 4090 new or used for only $2200 online. If you have a thunderbolt 5 device its a no-brainer, except we don't really know what the performance loss is for thunderbolt 5 yet. -
SomeoneElse23 So, the idea behind this is you have an underpowered GPU on your device (could be a PC as well?), and they throw in a bunch of other "dock" features like a 5Gb ethernet port?Reply
I also noticed it's Windows 11 only. :(
Lastly, it also looks like they have a 5070 version.
https://rog.asus.com/external-graphic-docks/rog-xg-mobile-2025/ -
Notton Reply
TB5 is either 80/80Gbps or 120/40Gbps, so the bottleneck is the 64Gbps PCIe connection.kealii123 said:If this is the retail price state-side, I assume it will sell out quickly.
If leaked specs are to be believed, the laptop 5090 will be a hair slower than the desktop 4090, with the same VRAM, and its hard to find a 4090 new or used for only $2200 online. If you have a thunderbolt 5 device its a no-brainer, except we don't really know what the performance loss is for thunderbolt 5 yet.
This is not a 1:1 comparison, but it does show a 4090 desktop dropping 23% performance when limited over a 64Gbps connection.
https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/gpus/high-end-external-gpus-still-suffer-a-performance-hit-oculink-tests-show-up-to-a-23-drop-with-an-rtx-4090
I wouldn't be so sure about the 5090 mobile being close to a desktop 4090. The 5090 mobile is a GB203 (desktop 5080) with lower clocks, and the desktop 5080 is already 12% slower than the desktop 4090. -
kealii123 Reply
More importantly, I can't find a single Asus product that is Thunderbolt 5 except this one. The only laptops either released or announced with it are the Razer 18 Pro and some obscure Clevo laptop. They only way to run this for 99% of potiential buyers is over tb4, making it even more obscure.Notton said:TB5 is either 80/80Gbps or 120/40Gbps, so the bottleneck is the 64Gbps PCIe connection.
This is not a 1:1 comparison, but it does show a 4090 desktop dropping 23% performance when limited over a 64Gbps connection.
https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/gpus/high-end-external-gpus-still-suffer-a-performance-hit-oculink-tests-show-up-to-a-23-drop-with-an-rtx-4090
I wouldn't be so sure about the 5090 mobile being close to a desktop 4090. The 5090 mobile is a GB203 (desktop 5080) with lower clocks, and the desktop 5080 is already 12% slower than the desktop 4090. -
Notton Reply
TB5 will most likely be attached to an Intel based laptop.kealii123 said:More importantly, I can't find a single Asus product that is Thunderbolt 5 except this one. The only laptops either released or announced with it are the Razer 18 Pro and some obscure Clevo laptop. They only way to run this for 99% of potiential buyers is over tb4, making it even more obscure.
https://rog.asus.com/laptops/rog-strix/rog-strix-scar-16-2025/spec/however Strix 16 already has a model equipped with a 5090 so.... yeah. -
Quirkz Reply
A 'hair slower' than the desktop 4090?kealii123 said:If this is the retail price state-side, I assume it will sell out quickly.
If leaked specs are to be believed, the laptop 5090 will be a hair slower than the desktop 4090, with the same VRAM, and its hard to find a 4090 new or used for only $2200 online. If you have a thunderbolt 5 device its a no-brainer, except we don't really know what the performance loss is for thunderbolt 5 yet.
I suspect you'll be gravely disappointed if that's your expectation.
This is the 5080 desktop chip (same core counts.) - which has half the core count of the 5090, and only 2/3s the core count of the 4090.
At 360 watts, the 5080 desktop is already more than a 'hair' slower than the 4090.
At only 150 watts, this 5090 laptop will be only slightly faster than the older 4090 laptop part.
Basically, without a process die shrink, this generation is stuck with a very small perf per watt improvement over the previous gen. They've bypassed that on desktop by just ramping up the power draw.
On the laptop, they're stuck with the same 150 watt TDP design limitations of the previous gen.
My estimate is more like 5070ti level desktop performance.