2018 Gift Guide: Weird but really useful gadgets
This is a listing of some of the weird, odd gadgets that I've picked up over the years but have found them to be super useful, use them pretty much daily, and have practically become worth ...
Thunderbolt 3 brings a new generation of external GPU upgrades to desktop and laptop PCs.
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Introduction
External graphics processing units -- or eGPUs -- have been around for many years. In fact, the first version of the Asus XG Station was released back in 2007, as a way of enhancing graphics performance on its range of gaming laptops.
The advantage of an eGPU is that it allows you to boost the graphics performance of a laptop or desktop PC that might not provide a more conventional upgrade path. That's increasingly the case with slimline ultraportables that barely have room for a few USB ports, let alone a high-end graphics card and cooling fan. Using an external GPU also means that you can still use your lightweight laptop on the road, and then simply fire up the eGPU to provide desktop levels of performance when you're back in the office.
The increasing popularity of non-upgradeable all-in-one desktop systems, such as Apple's iMac, also means that there are plenty of creative and professional users who need to upgrade their office computers for the current generation of graphics, video and VR software. And, of course, gaming is a key market for eGPUs, as 3D games and VR titles require ever-greater levels of graphics horsepower.
In the past, though, most eGPUs were proprietary devices, typically designed as a dock for use with laptop PCs from a particular manufacturer, such as Asus or Sony. However, the arrival -- and recent growing popularity -- of Thunderbolt 3 means that there's now an industry-standard interface that can provide sufficient bandwidth to cope with the vast amount of data processed by the latest GPUs. As a result, there is now a wide range of eGPU enclosures on sale, mostly using Thunderbolt 3 interfaces, and designed to tackle everything from gaming, professional video-editing and VR development, right up to super-computer-level scientific simulations.
External GPU enclosures aren't cheap, especially as you generally have to buy the actual graphics card separately, but they are still a more affordable option than simply buying a brand new PC or Mac. They have other advantages too, as they can be shared by multiple users in an office, and can also provide a variety of additional features for laptops that may have limited connectivity, such as a USB hub, Ethernet interface, and even spare drive bays for extra storage.
Caption by: Cliff Joseph
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