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The new Razer Core X: bigger, more powerful, and three fifths the price. Where’s the catch?

The Razer Core, an external graphics card dock – or eGPU enclosure – was originally launched to pair with the Razer Blade Stealth ultrabook. The Blade Stealth doesn’t include a discrete graphics solution of its own, like its bigger brother the Razer Blade, so the ability to add a graphics card in an eGPU is essential for it to live up to its billing as a gaming device.

The Razer Core makes use of the 40Gbps bandwidth of Thunderbolt 3 connectivity, and generally does the job. But it has limitations on power and card size, and it’s a pricey solution; even more so when you consider you need to buy a graphics card on top of that $499 MSRP.

Enter the brand new Razer Core X.

The Razer Core X is, for starters, far cheaper than the original Core. It comes in at an MSRP of $299, 200 bucks cheaper than the original model.

It also comes with a larger power supply – up to 650W from the original’s 500W – and has the ability to charge devices up to 100W via that Thunderbolt connection, versus the 65W restriction of the original.

It’s also larger and, crucially, features more internal space. The original Core could only fit in graphics cards that were technically two-slot cards – though there was a little bit of room a bit of fan bulge – but the Razer Core X can feature three-slot models. Combined with that increased power ceiling, that opens up the new Core X to virtually any graphics card on the market.

Razer have also included driver support for Apple’s Mac Book Pros, providing you use an AMD graphics card.

And it’s $200 cheaper. You might be wondering whether there’s a catch, and there is, but it’s not too severe: some of the other ports and connectivity options have been removed, including the ethernet port, and additional USB hub ports.

That does, sadly, make the Razer Core X less useful as a more “traditional” docking station, but at that price, closer to cheaper alternatives like the HP Omen Accelerator? It’s hard to argue that Razer has made a smart move.

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