RTX 4090 Gaming Laptop 🤯 eGPU Comparison with Desktop!

I’ve connected Nvidia’s RTX 4090 to a 14” and 17” gaming laptop to find out how an eGPU compares against a desktop PC!

Test PC Components:

EVERYTHING I USE:

FOLLOW ME:

RTX 4090 Gaming Laptop Timestamps:
0:00 Laptop + eGPU or Desktop?
0:14 Thunderbolt eGPU Setup
0:26 4090 is Chonk - Mods Needed!
1:50 Specs of Laptops Tested
2:21 Specs of Desktop PC Tested
2:36 CPU Difference in Cinebench
3:20 The 3 Goals for This Video
3:43 BIG PCIe Differences
4:24 Next Gen Thunderbolt Doubles Bandwidth!
4:52 External Screen Used for eGPU
5:16 20 Games Tested at 4K, 1440p & 1080p
5:28 God of War
6:10 Halo Infinite (Important to watch)
6:45 Red Dead Redemption 2
7:17 Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
7:48 Metro Exodus
8:17 Call of Duty: Warzone
9:03 Fortnite
9:32 Watch Dogs Legion
10:06 Total War: WARHAMMER III
10:19 The Witcher 3
10:46 Apex Legends
11:05 Cyberpunk 2077
11:17 Rainbow Six Extraction
11:23 Forza Horizon 5
11:28 DOOM Eternal
11:40 F1 2021
11:57 Spiderman, Tombraider, Borderlands, Dying Light
12:07 eGPU + RTX 4090 Worth it for Laptop?
13:29 New Thunderbolt = Performance Boost?

Disclosure: Purchases made through store links above may provide some compensation to Jarrod'sTech.

[anantnagar]

Welcome to the new episode of which I can't afford

[VSN]

I believe the main reason for the performance discrepancy between the 2 laptops is due to the way thunderbolt 4 is being implemented. The i7-1260P has TB4 build into its main CPU die while the i9-12900HX does not have native TB4 so it requires another IC, the Intel Maple Ridge TB4 controller which may be causing problems

[joelconolly]

Basically, if you can afford a 4090, you can afford a PC.

[hazaelelysion]

Jarrod is just wonderful. All those testing. Massive results.

[Martin]

This is great but I wanted to see benchmark comparison before the Egpu and after Egpu on the same laptop as well.

[abhardwaj]

Jarrod is a tech scientist at this point. Running various experiments to advance the gaming life

[Gerdoch]

I can confirm that resizable BAR is an issue for Thunderbolt eGPUs. Under Linux I've had to outright disable it in order to increase eGPU performance. Fortunately with Linux I can set kernel boot parameters to enable me to do so regardless of BIOS settings or anything. I have no idea if Windows has any similar options or functionality.

[gurshair]

Thanks for the amazing vid.
EGPU's have never stopped gaining my interest, I just wish they got better with new tech.

[Roll_the_Bones]

Jarrod, I bought a Razer Core X several yrs ago as a gamble to boost up my outclassed old i7 7700HQ Omen15 1060MaxQ, using an RTX2060. It benchmarked at approx 95% of the average desktop 2060, and was amazing tbh. Maybe pushing the limits, it was upgraded with a 3060Ti last yr, and STILL benchmarked 95% of desktop average for that card, and (with CPU undervolting, GPU overclocking, & 16GB RAM) I can still play competively with my ancient 7700HQ laptop, eg. 105fps on Battlefield 1 ultra. But, I do think this is the limit for TB3/4, and my next PC will have to be a desktop build, I can't see eGPU being a viable use for an expensive RTX4-series graphics card on any laptop. RIP eGPU beyond RTX3060Ti.

[nukeclears]

Shocker, eGPU's are still a terrible buy if you put anything above a low to mid range card in it. Not changing anytime soon either, seeing as TB4 has the same bandwidth as TB3.

[mikecrawford]

I'd be most interested in testing the 3070ti with the i7-1260p compared to the 3070ti in the tower. I think this is likely true for 95% of others watching this video, as very few want to drop stupid money on a 4090. Some thing even more common such as a GTX 1080 or 1070 eGPU i7-1260p / tower comparison would be even better.

[omegamalkior]

Just as fyi, Halo Infinite needed to have ReBar turned off in Nvidia Profile Inspector for driver 522.25 for it to work right on my eGPU 3070. I assume that's the case here alongside Watch Dog: Legion. With my 3070 I get 70-90 FPS at 4K and 130-160 FPS at 720P, so more graphics horsepower like the 4090 has would have definitely made the eGPU shine as it's not that bandwidth limited.

[fromabovefrombelow]

Can you please test this with Blender benchmarks, and 3D workstations? Thanks

[junaustria]

Very informative video. I'm using an eGPU for work coz I don't own a desktop. So it would be interesting to see how the rendering speed using Twinmotion or Lumion. To explain, I'm an architect by profession. My laptop goes around with me from office, client presentation, job sites and home. And I have eGPU for office and home.

[autoboto]

Be interesting to test again with egpu external monitor instead of video data back to laptop. Considering the egpu would normally be used as a desktop usage and most people use external monitor at home/work with the laptop anyway.

[furynotes]

Yeah. I think it’s the fact that the higher end laptop has a dedicated gpu. I remember in the early years of thunderbolt 2/3. It was easier to install and run a egpu on igpu only laptop vs a laptop with a dgpu.

[DutyFirst]

I got the impression an EGPU works best with laptops without dedicated graphics.

[joaochora]

The question here is, why don't you perform the tests with a usb 4.0 (40gbps)? That's the top tier in egpu market now.

[nnZen]

imagine this is how the future gpu will look like.

[raute]

Very interesting video! Could you do a comparison between thunderbolt and m.2 to pcie x16 adapters? They also have only 4 lanes of course, but they don't have the other thunderbolt limitations.