ASUS’ ROG XG Station 3 is a truly next-generation GPU dock

With Thunderbolt 5, BTF GPU support and more, the ROG XG Station 3 is everything a next-gen GPU dock should be

At Computex 2025, ASUS ROG showcased its new XG Station 3 external GPU dock, which uses the power of Thunderbolt 5 to overcome the limitations of older external GPU solutions.

With Thunderbolt 5, the XG Station 3 has the bandwidth necessary to maximise the performance of an externally connected graphics card. Older Thunderbolt 3/4 docks only have access to 40 Gbps of bandwidth, and newer (but uncommon) OCuLink docks have 64 Gbps. This additional bandwidth allows users to maximise the performance of external graphics cards, enabling higher levels of peak performance.

Using this dock, laptop users can connect external graphics cards to boost their systems’ performance. Below, ASUS shows that an external RTX 4090 can achieve similar performance levels to a desktop RTX. Compared to a mobile RTX 4090 GPU, an externally connected desktop RTX 4090 can deliver much higher gaming and workstation performance levels.

While the XG Station 3’s external GPU is its main draw, the device also features three USB 10 Gbps Type-C connectors. These allow users to connect more storage solutions and other devices to their PCs.

ASUS has stated that this external GPU solution supports ASUS BTF Edition GPUs. However, it also supports standard graphics cards. ASUS has also confirmed that this dock supports GeForce RTX 50 series GPUs and Radeon RX 9000 series GPUs.

Thunderbolt 5 GPU docks are coming, and they overcome the limitations of older GPU docks. That said, these docks do not come close to the bandwidth levels offered by the PCIe interfaces inside PCs. Note that a PCIe 5.0 x16 interface inside a PC can deliver 512 Gbps of bandwidth in each direction.

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