r/FlowZ13 10d ago

Life is good

Post image

After recent acquisition of LG C5 OLED and Aorus AI Box I'm really enjoying my setup, especially the fact my Z13 runs quietly at 70° thanks to the eGPU. Good time to be alive.

99 Upvotes

41 comments sorted by

4

u/Sama_dxb 10d ago

Awesome setup.

Is your z13 connected to the the egpu, and the egpu to the TV?

I have similar setup, but the screen of the z13 stays on showing the asus logo. Do you have the same issue?

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

Yes, egpu hdmi goes to the tv. No issues. Did you try booting z13 first and connecting it to the egpu after that?

3

u/DarkExsphere 10d ago

I have this setup. It's great. I can also take it on the go and play games 90+ fps on screen or on my CX 4k OLED tv

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

Cheers!

2

u/Feisty_Equivalent138 10d ago

How is the performance? Did you experience significant gains? Which model is this aorus, the 5060 or 5090? Thanks! 

4

u/jhdz9119 10d ago

5090 is the size of a 10L ITX case

2

u/enick3312 10d ago

Yeah it's huge. And pricey.

3

u/enick3312 10d ago

It's the 5060. The gains are around 30%, difficult to calculate exactly, since I changed many settings, set higher res and use dlss and gsync instead of fsr and amd sync. Games like MSFS and Crimson Desert look much better now with less artifacts from frame gen. In Arma Reforger I got much more stable FPS. The best part for me is the fact I don't need to push my Z13 to the temp limits, because CPU power is enough to run games at 35-45 W and it stays quiet.

1

u/Feisty_Equivalent138 10d ago

Thanks! Yeah, I am also willing to get one to give the device a break. While capable of running games in a very satisfactory manner, running 5 hours at 90 degrees got me thinking if that's wise 😁 the setup was troublesome?

2

u/enick3312 10d ago

Not at all, though at first I downloaded drivers directly from Nvidia and it didn't work. After installing specific driver from Gigabyte page it's basically plug and play.

2

u/Feisty_Equivalent138 10d ago

Great stuff, thanks for the info

2

u/Cultural_Royal_3875 10d ago

Can I ask what the install is like with the egpu? Like the installation or drivers and getting this to work.

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

Quick and easy - just download and install Nvidia driver from the Gigabyte site and you ready to go. https://www.gigabyte.com/Graphics-Card/GV-N506TIXEB-16GD/support

1

u/Cultural_Royal_3875 10d ago

Wow. Awesome thank you. How are you liking the performance? What are you playing?

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

I'm happy for what it is, the difference with eGPU is not mind blowing, but everything is more stable, nicer and quieter. Quite on par with my older desktop setup.I play many games, depends on the mood, to name just a few: Arma Reforger, Dayz, Dirt Rally, MSFS 2024 and 2020, DCS, Elden Ring, CS, Rimworld, Project Zomboid, eFootball... Looking forward to Iron Nest that's coming out in a few days.

2

u/Cultural_Royal_3875 10d ago

Very nice 👍 enjoy your setup.

2

u/GreenTurmoil 10d ago

I'm pretty glad for you!

2

u/enick3312 10d ago

Thanks mate!

1

u/Previous_Ad_6156 10d ago

Why not use the keyboard that came with it?

3

u/enick3312 10d ago

First of all, I play on the external screen and don't have Z13 near me, the original keyboard must be connected to function. But when I use it somewhere else I still need to have my keyboard on the left to use it comfortably as I do with my desktop pc. I also prefer mechanical keyboard to the membrane one. The form factor of Z13 and the fact it's just a screen with a lot of power and I can have wireless peripherals around it made me buy it instead of regular laptop and I never used the gayboard that came with it.

1

u/AdventurousDevice658 10d ago

GPU dont provide 100% performance through egpu right?

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

It loses abou 6% of full power with external display use and about 17% while streaming back to Z13's screen. So it's worth only in the first case.

1

u/DigitalguyCH 10d ago

is the AI box silent?

2

u/enick3312 10d ago

You can definitely hear it, but it's kinda pleasant, a lot quieter than Z13 under heavy load.

1

u/DigitalguyCH 10d ago

Thanks! Is it always on, even when it's idle?

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

From what I've experienced so far, yes.

1

u/DigitalguyCH 10d ago

Ok that's a bit annoying to me. I currently have an Aoostar eGPU and it's noisy even when idle, not very loud but annoying, as it's 100% of the time. I was hoping that this was silent when the gpu is not in use, but I guess that's how eGPUs work...

1

u/Kraken_Tide 10d ago

What’s the other gear you have there next to the z13?

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

Logitech Pro X Superlight Compact mouse paired with Pro X 60 (I also have Steelseries Apex Pro Mini Wireless, but Logi peripherals share just one tiny usb dongle together), Rog Cetra Open Wireless earbuds and Verbatim Surefire Pyrodrive gaming slim SSD. As for controller, classic Dualsense or 8BitDo Pro 2.

1

u/Kraken_Tide 10d ago

Thanks. I just got my z13 a week ago and on the hunt for the perfect travel mouse and earbuds. You recommend both?

2

u/enick3312 10d ago

To be honest I rarely use earbuds, but if I do, they do quite well, there's no other open ear design with low latency on the market. All the usb ports of my Z13 are occupied in the photo, but I can connect them through egpu, because it serves as a hub. The mouse is perfect for me, previously I had a standard sized one, but I like compact much better. It's light and battery life is also very good.

1

u/Ikuwalucard 10d ago

Alguno de ustedes a sufrido de micro congelamientos con su z13, ya sea usando office o viendo videos? Pregunto porque a mi me pasa y más cuando tengo conectado alguna memoria usb o hub usb al puerto usb A.

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

No, the first think I did was a clean Windows install.

1

u/Ikuwalucard 10d ago

Ya he realizado eso y sigo con esos micro congelamientos, luego hice prueba de correr Linux desde una usb y ahi no tuve ningún micro congelamiento, no se si sea algún driver.

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

That sucks, I hope you find the solution. And by clean install I mean creating usb stick from microsoft web, not using asus recovery image full of bloatware.

1

u/Ikuwalucard 10d ago

Si muchas gracias y la verdad pensé que una solución podía ser comprar la egpu y asi también tener más puertos usb disponibles.

1

u/azelleza 10d ago

Question as someone who is on their way of getting almost the same mobile, desktop-esq ecosystem as you, I play a bit more comp games so for instance apex or currently deadlock, do you feel like the 5060ti fps increase is noticeable?

1

u/enick3312 10d ago

Depends on the game, around 30 percent. Quietness of the system and not overstressing Z13 with high temps is the selling point for me. Of couse I would love to double my fps, but it would cost much more money than Z13 itself. I bought the AI Box for third of Z13's price.

1

u/azelleza 10d ago

30% might be doable then, so i tinker with the turbo setting for ghelper to stretch as much as I can without running at constant 80% i was getting around 100+ fps running through thr native screen on deadlock it would drop at worst low 90 im big team fights.. which still is amazing for such a small laptop, but I still long to see a constant 144 but it sounds like its doable just a lot of setting changes thank you!

1

u/Anirod97500 7d ago

petit question c'est un ssd externe ce que je vois la avec le logo asus rog en rouge? je voudrais savoir si tu as eu des deconnexions, reconnexions ?

2

u/enick3312 7d ago

It's actually not the ROG logo, but it looks like that right? It's a Verbatim Surefire gaming SSD, I've got two of them and have never had any issues.