This hardback book-sized gaming PC has an RTX 5080, costs its weight in silver

Portability and power rarely go hand-in-hand when it comes to your average gaming PC, but the Asus ROG NUC 2025 mini PC manages just that. This PC may be the size of a hardback book but it still manages to house an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 GPU. Pre-orders for the new ROG NUC are now available with units set to arrive around July 2, but its price is startingly high.

We previously saw the Asus ROG NUC 2025 at CES 2025 ahead of Asus' official unveiling of their latest mini gaming PC, and it listed some pretty impressive specs for such a small computer. Along with its RTX 5080 GPU, the ROG NUC 2025 contains an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX CPU and supports up to 96GB of RAM, which should be enough hardware to run just about any of the best PC games on the market.

The ROG NUC 2025 boasts that it can support up to five 4K displays, hopefully without overheating, and supports further overclocking with the motherboard's BIOS - not a given on a pre-built PC rather than a custom PC. How well it performs in the wild remains to be seen, but the pre-installed Armoury Crate software should help alert users to any unforeseen overheating issues once the ROG NUC 2025 is underway in a demanding game like Cyberpunk 2077 or Kingdom Come Deliverance 2.

However, while the ROG NUC 2025 stands a good chance of ending up on our list of the best mini gaming PC options for all of the above reasons, its top-tier price tag won't be doing it any favors. At $2,849, it has a higher MSRP than even the very best graphics card, the RTX 5090, and it's almost as much as the ROG NUC's weight in silver plus 450g.

So, ultimately, is the ROG NUC 2025 worth the cost? Only our final review will determine that, but while you are paying quite a lot of money, you are getting some powerful hardware in a chassis you could stuff into a backpack. As such, for that price, you can turn just about anywhere you end up into a proper gaming room, monitor and other peripherals notwithstanding.

If you are interested in pre-ordering an ROG NUC 2025 ahead of July 2, 2025, you can do so via this link. However, at present, stock has run dry, and Asus only has a "Notify Me" option available, so you might have to wait until the actual release date before more stock becomes available.

On the other hand, if you're looking for a more affordable option without sacrificing too much performance, check out the latest deals on the Geekom AX8 Pro or the Asus ROG Ally X, neither of which come close to the cost of the ROG NUC 2025.

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