Asus launches new Thunderbolt 5 eGPU dock with open design and plenty of ports

Asus has officially launched the ROG XG Station 3, a new external graphics card dock with Thunderbolt 5. First announced at Computex 2025, the accessory succeeds the previous Thunderbolt 3-based ROG XG Station 2, promising even faster performance for compatible laptops and gaming handhelds.

To recap, the ROG XG Station 3 features an open-frame design, which Asus says offers "unobstructed access to cooling." It supports graphics cards from the Nvidia GeForce RTX 50, RTX Pro 6000, AMD Radeon RX 9000, and Intel Arc series. Compared with competing Thunderbolt 5 eGPU docks, like the Ugreen LinkStation Pro, the ROG XG Station 3 includes a GC-HPWR connector for a cable-free look with Asus BTF cards like the ROG Astral GeForce RTX 5090 BTF Edition.

The ROG XG Station 3 uses a Thunderbolt 5 connection with up to 80 Gbps of bidirectional bandwidth, twice that of the last-gen model. This should enable faster performance for demanding cards like the RTX 5090. Needless to say, Thunderbolt 5 limits PCIe tunneling to 64 Gbps, so real-world performance should still lag slightly behind OCuLink eGPU docks like the Minisforum DEG2 (curr: $247 at Amazon).

That said, the dock can charge connected laptops at up to 140W. It also offers extra ports for peripherals, including a second Thunderbolt 5 port that supports up to three 4K displays via daisy-chaining and up to 36W charging, plus two 10 Gbps USB-C ports. Other highlights include full Aura Sync support and backward compatibility with Thunderbolt 4.

One downside is that the ROG XG Station 3 does not come with a power supply, unlike previously reported. Instead, users must install their own SFX or SFX-L power supply. By comparison, the previous ROG XG Station 2 included a 600W PSU, and Ugreen's LinkStation Pro ships with an 850W unit. Asus has not yet revealed pricing or availability details for the ROG XG Station 3.