May 28, 2008 11:00 AM EDT by Jeffrey L. Wilson
It’s baaa-aaack. A couple of CESes ago, the Asus XG Station was revealed to much acclaim, touted as the world’s first external graphics card/multimedia hub that would bring desktop-caliber graphics and 5.1 surround sound audio to notebooks. We even deemed it the Best Notebook Accessory of CES 2007. So it was no surprise that gamers and multimedia junkies instantly began salivating; the bit of surprise was that they’d have to wait . . . and wait . . . and wait. The wait was so long that nearly a year later, we pondered whether the XG Station was beginning to drift into the dreaded “vaporware” category. Patience is a virtue, they say, especially for those that still cling to the hope of the XG Station being released. And it has paid off: Today ASUS lauched the ROG (Republic of Gamer) XG Station. Featuring an Nvidia GeForce 8600GT graphics engine, 4 USB 2.0 interfaces, Dolby sound (Dolby Headphone, Dolby Digital Live, Dolby Virtual Speaker, Dolby Pro Logicllx), VGA, DVI, an ExpressCard slot, headphone and mic jacks, and an LED that gives read-outs of GPU speed, temperature, and fan speed, frames per second, and Dolby Headphone feature status. ASUS claims that the ROG XG Station, when connected to a notebook with integrated Intel graphics, improved performance six-fold with Intel 965M and twelve-fold with Intel 945GM. We’re working on gathering pricing info and U.S. availability. Stay tuned.
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November 25th, 2008 at 6:31 am
still gathering pricing info! huh?
December 5th, 2008 at 7:02 am
This story is just ridiculous…
If there is a problem that makes the product not worthwhile and not ready for the market, someone should say so, and save us all from waiting……
December 6th, 2008 at 1:49 am
No shit. This is bull roar. Two years coming, and no trace. What a let down.
December 30th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Dude wtf when is this shit gonna be released?
January 5th, 2009 at 12:34 am
wow, I read about this back in 07, same issue when they deemed it accessory of the year.
January 13th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
I called in…this was never released in NA. And probably never will be…
January 19th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
Well this is rediculous its been 2 years and development and it still hasnt been released?
Could somebody send me an email when this is actually purchasable
russell_baylis73@hotmail.com
thanks!
February 6th, 2009 at 7:28 am
It is available in Australia. They don’t ship it. I got it through someone. It did not work with my vista system – lattitude d830 (different NVIDIA drivers). I had to create dual boot (Vista/XP) to use it on my notebook. Has been working fine for a month now. Initial installation was not smooth.
February 11th, 2009 at 5:27 pm
“# f suri Says:
February 6th, 2009 at 7:28 am
It is available in Australia. They don’t ship it. I got it through someone. It did not work with my vista system – lattitude d830 (different NVIDIA drivers). I had to create dual boot (Vista/XP) to use it on my notebook. Has been working fine for a month now. Initial installation was not smooth.
—————————–
Hey dude, can you please leave the site name where you got it from, would appreciate it. thanks.
February 16th, 2009 at 7:54 am
There are plenty of online stores in Australia selling them. I have just set an email to find out a little more info before spending the money. Also don’t expect them to be cheap, they are going for a bit under $400(AU).
here is a site that list most of them.
http://www.shopbot.com.au/default.asp?kw=ASUS+XG+Station&position=search
I guess you could email each of them and see if any are willing to send internationally.
February 16th, 2009 at 7:38 pm
On the specification sheet online it said that it is only compatible with Asus laptops, is that true? I have a dell Inspiron 6400 with a express card slot, but with ATI graphics, it should still work, right? As f suri said that it worked on the lattitude d830.
February 17th, 2009 at 9:40 am
hey guys,
I just got an email back. In the guys own words “The product was good in theory but not in application”.
The only supported laptops are “Asus W5F, W6F, U5F, U1E, F3SA, F3SV, U6S, R1E, U3F, Lamborghini” others may work.
Only supported operating system is Vista 32bit.
You can NOT swap the gfx card out for a newer one.
So while it was a great idea concept, asus are far from hitting the nail on the head with this one. So those out side Australia your not missing out on much.
February 23rd, 2009 at 2:14 pm
omg! only for asus laptops!!
no!
May 6th, 2009 at 11:03 pm
Wow had my hope up for a few days until i found the info here and a few other places. If they had don just a few things differently they could be making a lot off of this. if it was what i expected it was i would have bought one for sure. now i guess I’ll just stay home and cry.
July 5th, 2009 at 4:17 am
It seems this is a good idea, but maybe expresscard 2.0 will make this possible in 2010.
It really looks like the original xg station wasn’t released due to poor performance.
August 6th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
Folks – It’s already been released…. in Australia – Buy it here:
http://www.shopbot.com.au/pp-asus-xg-station-price-80897.html
October 3rd, 2009 at 11:58 pm
WHO EVER DESIGNED THE XG STATION SHOULD BE FIRED!!!…. THE DAMN THING IS TOTALLY REMINDING ME OF MY OLD KENWOOD CAR STEREO FROM THE EARLY 90′S I GAVE AWAY FOR CHRISTMAS TO SALVATION ARMY. MAN!…..THE BIG ASS SILVER KNOB FOR VOLUME CONTROL AND THE BRIGHT FUNKY ANALOG SCREEN HAS TO GO!…. IT BETTER BE CHEAP TO BUY!!
November 7th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
They make an external PCI Express housing that can house a graphics card and feeds into a PCI express 54 slot on laptops that can hold graphics cards. It’s really expensive though; around $700. Way too much for me. I’ll just have to be satisfied with my 230m…sigh
November 7th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
Holy hell, I was really looking towards buying one.
God damnit Asus, fuck you.
November 26th, 2009 at 11:05 pm
ATI looks like it’s developing something similar. I looked into an external GPU a couple of years ago, but was dissappointed to find that although companies unveil these technologies at expos, no one seems to be able to release one to the consumer market.
Here’s the link
http://www.amd.com/us/products/technologies/ati-xgp/Pages/ati-xgp.aspx
December 17th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
Real story is that this product was likely a victim of nVidia’s defective substrate mating procedures. Ask any HP notebook owner (w nVidia graphics) or Macbook Pro owner what they think of nVidia (Apple caught them red-tongued & published this fact on their site). 40nm process is junk (for nvoidia – TSMC foundry) now they are begging to use AMD-ATI foundry since Global has no issue w. 40nm
March 26th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
here i am, looking at this article on the date of 26/march/2010 AND NOTHING! not a word from this device….
EVERYONE!! THERES ANOTHER GRAPHICS CARD THATS CHEAP AND AWESOME!! ITS CALLED ViDOCK 2
check it out, its pretty cheap.. i think around $300 anyway, the Asus XG is a lost hope stop worrying yourselves about it. there plenty more like this