Centerfold
50 MAXIMUMPC DEC 2019 maximumpc.com
WE’VE NEVER SEEN anything like this. The ROG Mothership
stands tall, resembling the result of an unholy union
between the Microsoft Surface tablet and a hefty gaming
laptop. Functionally, it sits firmly in the latter camp; with
a ninth-gen Intel Core i9 processor, an Nvidia GeForce
RTX 2080 GPU, and 64GB of DDR4-2666 memory, the
Mothership is ready to handle just about any triple-A game.
The keyboard can either be aligned like an ordinary
laptop or detached and folded in two for more casual
control. The screen (and the computer itself) is held upright
by a metal fin that extends from the rear, enabling you to
adjust the angle at which the screen sits, and improving
airflow to keep the GPU cool. It’s a heavy unit, with two big
power adapters for maximum overclocking potential.
A desktop replacement for the 4K age, it’s equipped
to handle gaming, video editing, and much more.
Its sides bristle with ports: two USB-C, four
USB, an SD card reader, and an HDMI out.
It’s got audio handled, too: The upright
form factor allows for four speakers
along the front, blasting high-quality
sound directly at you for an immersive
experience. –CHRISTIAN GUYTONAsus ROG
Mothership
3
STORAGE WARS
While PCIe 4.0 might not be
available for Intel systems yet,
the Mothership has an inventive
solution: three PCIe 3.0 M.2 drives,
linked together in RAID 0. This
makes for effective read speeds
of over 8GB/s, more than the
theoretical maximum of PCIe 4.0.1
FOUR KARAT
Despite the Mothership’s
bulky tablet-esque appearance,
this isn’t a touchscreen; it’s a 4K
144Hz panel with Nvidia G-Sync
support, and it looks absolutely
stunning in operation. Colors are
vibrant, and open environments
in games look gorgeous, the
Mothership’s powerhouse
hardware having little difficulty
running most games at 4K.2
NUMBER ONE
The number pad is
concealed beneath the vertical
trackpad on the keyboard.
With the click of a button,
the red number pad matrix
illuminates, and overrides
the trackpad functions. That’s
OK—as with any high-power
laptop, most users will plug
in a mouse for regular use,
leaving the trackpad as the
perfect place for number input.