Gigabyte's RTX 4090 Gaming Box wants to turn your ultrabook into an absolute monster of a gaming PC

3D computational performance beyond imagination. So says Gigabyte of its new Aorus RTX 4090 Gaming Box, announced at Computex this week, and who are we to disagree?

What you're looking at here, peeps, is a water-cooled Thunderbolt 3 case with an 850W PSU and no less than the most powerful GPU on the planet, Nvidia's RTX 4090. In short, this is the ultimate in external upgrades for any gaming laptop.

The Aorus Waterforce all-in-one cooling system integrates a large copper plate, a 240mm aluminum radiator and two 120mm fans. Gigabyte says the water cooling covers all key components of the graphics card. "We take care of not only the GPU but also the VRAM and MOSFET to ensure a stable operation and longer life," Gigabyte claims.

The RTX 4090 inside is Gigabyte's Waterforce model running at 2,520 MHz. On the rear of the box are no fewer than three DisplayPort 1.4 sockets, an HDMI 2.1 connector, ethernet, Thunderbolt 3 and a pair of USB-A ports. On the front there's an additional USB Type-C slot.

Incidentally, the Thunderbolt 3 interface also provides 100W of power delivery enabling single-cable connectivity to a laptop. Normally, 100W wouldn't cut it for a gaming laptop. However, given that the GPU part of the power profile is offloaded to the external box, 100W might well get the job done, especially for a thin-and-light ultrabook style laptop.

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The box itself measures 302mm by 189mm by 172mm and the whole shebang is compatible with Gigabyte's Control Center software which, among other features, gives access to various parameters including clockspeed, voltage and fan speeds.

Internally, there are four 8-pin PCIe power connectors feeding up to 850W to the GPU. It's not clear if GPU upgrades are supported, but the water cooling aspect and the need for custom cooling blocks and plates would surely limit your options in that regard.

As for pricing, Gigabyte hasn't revealed any figures. But it absolutely, positively won't be cheap. If you need to ask, you probably can't afford it.

Jeremy has been writing about technology and PCs since the 90nm Netburst era (Google it!) and enjoys nothing more than a serious dissertation on the finer points of monitor input lag and overshoot followed by a forensic examination of advanced lithography. Or maybe he just likes machines that go “ping!” He also has a thing for tennis and cars.