Honestly it makes way too much sense for laptop manufacturers to put the gpu inside the power adapter like this. You can't use but a fraction of the power of a dedicated gpu when on battery anyway and the ability to use it separately saves battery life, cooling headroom, thickness/portability...the list goes on and on. I wish EVERY gaming laptop did this
It would also let gaming laptops use standard USB-C chargers if you wanted mobility too. This was the eGPU dream, but it needed more support than what Intel was willing to give.
@@AlejandroLZuvic Right, but if the main power consuming part (the GPU) is separate from the laptop, the actual laptop can use USB-C. You would have a big wall-wort with your beefy GPU in it that supplies 100W of power over USB-C to the laptop and a small just-charging USB-C charger for when you don't need the power. That's literally what the Flow X13 is and how it functions.
@@AlejandroLZuvic actually batteries above 90Wh are becoming less and less popular due to traveling restrictions and such. If I'm not mistaken, any electronic device with a battery capacity higher than 100Wh can't get on a plane. So honestly, I do think this is the best move for the mobile PC gaming industry.
This setup is perfect. I could just keep the gpu at my desk with my keyboard, mouse, monitor and storage plugged in so when I come home I just plug one connector and its game time and when I need to go for work or college just unplug one connector and I am out and about. Genius
Sadly not perfect if you need good battery life. My Flow X13 FHD, Ryzen 7 model is only getting 5 hours on average on battery, wi-fi browsing. Most 2-in-1 laptops and iPads in this price range het around 10 hours, this has half that, which is a compromise you'll need to accept if you buy it.
@@kokunaijin Lucky you! My country doesn't sell xg mobile separately. And only one type in pack with r9 and 4k display nb :( so I'm in waiting for usa.
I hope they make these with more midrange specs someday. Separating the main gpu for extra portability and heat management seems like such a great idea on paper
Even without the external GPU dock, this is still a great buy in my opinion as an Ultrabook. This thing costs lesser than Blade 13 and even a similarly speced XPS 13 9310 while offering more than double the cpu performance and probably 4X the GPU performance than Intel Iris XE IGP. Battery life of 10+ hours with this spec is pretty impressive as well.
Really wish they'd make something like this but with a more business aesthetic. Idk if it would sell better but it seems that many feel the same way I do. If this was something that could be pulled out in a professional setting, it'd be perfect.
@@AArrad The flow x13 already has a sleek, business look hands-on. It looks so clean irl. This laptop really ticks all the boxes for a professional thin and light. Great performance, decent battery life and its versatility is on its own league.
That's what I'm betting on. I'm gonna wait a year or so and see if there's one with a better ssd option. It's absolutely perfect but for that money I want something that can hold more than a couple games
well, I hope they do, I just invested in this thing and absolutely love it. I think this is a huge success because it keeps getting sold out every time it restocks, I was lucky enough to get the LAST ONE IN MY ENTIRE COUNTRY. It is practical in many, many ways and the fact that you only have to upgrade the XG Mobile GPU is the cherry on top.
I bought the g15 with a 3070 from BB. It was my first laptop ever with an AMD chip and I was surprised on how well it does in school and gaming at the same time
The $1500 for the external graphics card certainly is a steep price, but you have to factor in that it also serves as a dock, and the dock alone for the MS Surface Pro for example is already $260. All in all I find this a very interesting concept.
If Asus (or other company) makes an eGPU enclosure with that proprietary cable, but with the ability to put in your own GPU....that would be amazing. Have seen stuff saying that it's a modified OcuLink-2 connection, so maybe not too proprietary as it may seem. Here's hoping for more support in that direction.
This would make for a great mobile workstation/streaming setup for someone like me. A college student who needs an ultrabook for taking notes and doing schoolwork, and also a powerful processor for my video editing work, and a powerful GPU that I can easily connect to turn the laptop into a beast of a streaming setup since I bounce around between my parent's place and take other trips quite often.
5:55 It's not horrible, but it's not good either. Let's start comparing laptop webcams to selfie cams in smartphones, because there's literally more space for them in laptops and many of us actually need them for work meetings now. Same with the microphone. They just can't get away with putting in camera modules from 10 years ago anymore.
I think this is an awesome 3 in 1. Ultrabook, Tablet, Workstation Still great even if there isn't necessarily an upgrade path for the external dock. Would be sweet if version 2 of the dock can get an m.2 slot or two. A second full size sd card reader would be great for mobile creators/editors as well.
This is the best idea out of this year, a desktop replacement to do it all. I rather have this combo rather than a laptop, tablet and desktop pc and it is particularly useful for me since i use my note as a desktop replacement with a standalone monitor and messing with ethernet, power, usb and hdmi cables all the time is way annoying and a conventional gaming laptop is usually heavy and noisy which is not ideal for light or outdoors use. It needs some refinement though.
The external 3080 gpu is obviously there for the sake of working/gaming flexibility, not for future upgradability. However it goes, it's a step in the right direction for all power users who don't want many compromises.
I would even connect this setup to an external monitor with a higher refresh rate because the framerates u get are just so good for a laptop even though it is still with an external gpu. Sadly, I'm just a broke college student.
This is what I've been waiting for. Dope 2in1 with top notch process and a 3080 or similar external that works seamlessly. Sounds like I need to wait for the next gen of this though.
The new one also come with 680 M integrated GPU which on its good for AAA 1080 Low. X16 Flow also got mini-led display. There is also a rtx 40 new GPU option. Also backwards compatible.
Im from the future, its 2024 now and I can say so far they continue to support these products. Love the 2023 version of the x13. I think the 2 in 1 hinge looks much better and these do come with faster GPU's
It would be nice if they make a next gen GPU add-on with the same plug and ofc working on older gen laptops (this one). Also full size NVME support in the dock would be sweet too.
I'm hoping it's because they are preparing stock for the GTX 3050 version. That is now the default GPU on their site and you cant find anything about the 1650 anymore.
For real, if they made this without the internal GPU it would be the perfect price and it would make sense to connect the external one. The XG Mobile is actually very small, so I don't see a problem using it anywhere, not just a desk.
I am using a laptop with external monitor, keyboard and mouse setup and that Asus is now my dream, my biggest issue right now is the weight, if I can have a separate GPU like that, I can just bring my 1 kilo laptop to work with ease and come home plug some stuffs in for some game time.
Great review, level headed, detailed, thoughtful, not over enthusiastic, not presumptuous... I could go on. This whole external GPU thing seems like a revolution to me, if they come out with some more variations of this with more onboard CPU and battery life focus and future upgradability then I'm absolutely sold. It's literally the perfect form factor for someone like me, can perform all the usual tablet tasks, mobile web browsing, email and movies etc, it's got enough power to start 3D design projects when visiting customers, then when I get back to the office I can plug in the XT and do the renders. Then when I get home I can go full man child on it. It seems incredible really, the newest all AMD version seems exciting to me hopefully with the lack of Nvidia GPU onboard it should have better battery performance and may end up being more affordable being all AMD when combined with the XT Radeon version. I want one, I want one now.
you have no idea what you did for me. i wanted to buy a $1300 laptop for this feeling of satisfaction. It was obsessive. your sponsor. i want to transform my build into an itx now. thank you for this inspiration thank you thank you thank you thank you.
I really hope asus continues to at least make new external gpus whenever nvidia or amd comes out with new ones. That would mean that you can upgrade the gpu whenever you want to without needing to buy a whole new laptop and thats really compelling in my opinion and its something more pc laptop manufacturers should do.
This device is so misunderstood by reviewers. This and the Z13 are competing with Microsoft Surface Devices, Productivity 2 in 1s like LG Gram 2 in 1, HP Envy, HP Specter, and so on. Microsoft Surface Studio laptop with RTX 3050 TI and similar specs costs almost 70 percent more money. I was in the market for a 2 in 1 or Surface Pro 8 when I found the Z13 which gives you better specs than Surface for the same money. And then I discovered the X13 which gives even better value for money with having a GPU, a more business look and an option to upgrade the GPU:) I would rather have a surface pro 8 but it is too much:) I ordered the X13 and I am seriously considering selling my PC for the 3080 XG Dock:)
I have the Flow X13 Supernova Edition + 3080 and run it mostly on the Samsung Odyssey 49" monitor and it rocks! There's a video of this setup on my channel if you're interested to see how it looks.
Bought the new 3050ti version. Also purchased the mobile 3080. For someone who uses an ultra book for work but travels a lot, with gaming being one of my few hobbies, this made sense, and I love it. Wish it had the 1080p OLED display of the Razer blade stealth though, I would pay even more for that.
I will say that in turbo mode while gaming, this does tend to get a bit noisy. However, if you're gaming on a laptop without headphones, you're doing it wrong, so I don't mind.
I hope that they will continue with this in the future but there's still a lot of room for improvements. In my opinion they should get rid of the on board GTX 1650 and just let it rely on the APU as it could increase batterylife and thermals dramatically since you can cool the CPU with both fans easily. The GPU dock is nice but a desktop class GPU would have suited this device better. Maybe if they make something that's more similar to an actual Thunderbolt GPU dock where you can insert any type of GPU into the PCIE slot. In that case, I'd definitely consider this device over a desktop.
this is so close to perfect honestly and the biggest complaint i have is with nvidia not asus like please nvidia give us low spec rtx mobile gpu to replace the 1650 already it doesnt even need to be that much faster i just want the rtx stuff in a small thin and light laptop ive been looking for a laptop thats a thin and light preferably a 2 in 1 with a touch screen and pen with a full fat usb c port on the right side i would like it to be a 16:10 and have a number pad even if its just in the touch pad like a few asus laptops have and ideally a 5800u cpu and like a 3050 this egpu is actually really neat in that its not a giant box with a desktop gpu in it i really like the whole switch concept but for laptops a nice thin and light i can take out with me and i get home and just plop a cable in and now i have a full setup keyboard and mouse a monitor and some speakers
It really seems like Asus don't want to restock the 3080 XG Mobile even though its the most important part to rog labtop with rog xg mobile enteral port
I wonder how good the Linux support on this device is with that propreitary GPU dock connector and all that. I'd assume that most of the port connections and PCI device passthrough is handled by the UEFI itself and just slapping on some Nvidia Drivers will make that things run great. This is very cool and interesting device indeed!
i just bought it and yess, portability over everything else. i was thinking about the Zephirus duo, but it was more pricing and the performance was not waaaay better. i hope they keep this ecosystem 'cause it's just easy to handle, the only thing i will do to improve it, it's making the camera an external resource and put more usb ports or smth in that way.
Thanks for not rushing this review out! I'm not sure that the connector is proprietary, despite what ASUS say. It's just USB C and PCIe OCuLink. There might be some proprietary software there and ASUS may have patented the plastic hook nubbins I guess. That said, I don't know of any other consumer devices that use OCuLink and with this being a niche device as it is; I wouldn't bet on anyone making alternative docks. Maybe they will as Thunderbolt 4 just doesn't have the bandwidth. I do wonder what to think of the rumours of a 3050M version. I hear that the 16XXM line has ended production and that ASUS have stopped production of the Flow to adapt to this.
I think the dock would have been better if it was a dock that you actual dock the laptop onto of either that or make the cable exit the connect at a right angle to help keep things tidy.
3070s, remember 3080 Mobile = 3070 Desktop, that means you're getting a 3070 with 16GBs of VRAM for around ~1500$ It is really expensive, but also really cool and really versatile, a thin and light 2 in 1 and a gaming rig, everything you need! I hope this concept takes off and we'll see more of this kinda stuff in the future!
I don't like when manufacturers make proprietary accessories with proprietary connectors. Buying into such an ecosystem is essentially equivalent to entering into a monopolised market, which means everything is expensive and will stay expensive if you ever want to upgrade. And that is assuming said manufacturer actually follows through with their promise of providing upgrades in the future.
I’ll be STUNNED if this device gets more than 1 generation of GPU updates. It doesn’t ruin it, because most people buying $3000 laptops will just buy another one once a new version comes out... but it definitely limits it to normal-for-laptop mentality of “you’re buying THIS setup, don’t bank on ever upgrading it”
It's not really supposed to be upgradeable. In that regard it's really no different to buying a laptop with dGPU these days as there's, what, one laptop using MXM now? Anyway, it's not like Thunderbolt is much better, as despite being free to use now, it is still almost completely limited to Intel CPUs. *Plus* this 'proprietary' connector actually seems to just be USB C and PCIe OCuLink 2, both of which anyone can buy a licence for.
A friend brought an fair point of the issue. Which is weight. 2.9 lbs is good but bringing that along with the egpu would be similar weight to a thick gaming laptop further more is the issue of bringing it. It would be more cluttering to bring 2 or 3 pieces of hardware just to game which makes other thicker gaming laptops more reasonable to bring.
I am not sure why people are concerned about ASUS's future support / upgradability of the XG Mobile. There is no other laptop currently that allows you to upgrade its GPU, so why suddenly are we concerned about upgradability? Think of the XG Mobile as a removable GPU, which allows for better cooling (for both the CPU and the GPU). If ASUS decides to release future version of the XG Mobile with better GPU, that is just icing on the cake. The most important quality of the whole Flow x13 setup is that you can have maximum performance with uncompromised portability, which no other laptop on the market can deliver.
If asus continue to expand this dock connectivity to other laptop, lets say the rog series, that would be great. Just kinda have gpu option for laptop market ✌🏼
Love this machine and REALLY love the concept of it - it brings a whole new meaning to a the term "a good all rounder"! I do think the inability to upgrade the ram from only 16gb is a potential issue though.
