Asus ROG Strix G10DK Review: Pre-built Gaming PC for eSport

The Asus ROG Strix G10DK is a new pre-built gaming PC that grabs attention with its attractive case design, distinct RGB LED array, AMD Ryzen 5 5600G configuration, and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660Ti graphics card optimized for eSport games. We have told its merits, but are these features really useful while gaming or not? Let’s see in this Asus ROG Strix G10DK review below.

The trend of choosing a pre-built gaming PC or case is becoming more and more popular among gamers thanks to the convenience and speed compared to traditional case making. Instead of taking the headache and wasting time choosing each type of component like CPU, graphics card, mainboard, power, hard drive, RAM, etc., gamers now just need to determine a reputable brand. Choose the right configuration for your game computer to fight in the virtual world, and that’s all.

Design and connectivity

The ROG Strix G10DK gaming PC tower has clean, elegant lines on the case but still retains the strength needed in a gaming device. The case facade elevates, drawing inspiration from the armor shields of warriors, which catches the eye as a novelty. With an RGB LED strip shaped like lightning shining from the sky, this Asus ROG Strix desktop makes a good impression on gamers who love simplicity but also efficiency. The unfortunate part is that there is no LED in the ROG logo on the front of the case.

True to the standard of a top gaming PC, on the side, ROG Strix G10DK also uses a transparent mica case, helping to show off the full array of “engines” inside. Of course, this is impossible without RGB LED lights inside the case, helping the components to literally shimmer and shine.

All RGB LEDs on the front and inside of the case support the Aura Sync feature, which helps synchronize colors and effects with compatible Asus products such as keyboards, mice, headphones, and monitors. In order to ensure heat dissipation, Asus’ mica cover leaves an opening compared to the case, allowing air to circulate conveniently.

If you’re an “introverted, self-contained” person who doesn’t like to brag about your “legacy” too much, you can switch to using the traditional metal case that comes with the Asus. The metal case will completely block out the curiosity of the people around, the large grille in the shape of the ROG logo ensures that cool air can still get inside the CPU and GPU.

At 27 liters, the ROG Strix G10DK’s case is just enough to fit key components into a compact body that takes up less space when placed above or below gamers’ desks. The “3-round measurement” of ROG Strix G10DK is 18.00 x 43.00 x 42.80 cm (Width x Depth x Height) respectively and weighs 8 Kg, not too bulky, not entangled when it is necessary to move the machine position. They built the frame and case well, ensuring solidity and sturdiness.

On the top, the ROG Strix G10DK completely seals and arranges the connection ports, including two USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A 5Gbps ports and one standard combo 3.5 mm audio jack used for both mic and headset. True to the traditional sync case so far, the machine has only one power button on the front. When you need to reset, you will press and hold the power button for about 5 seconds to turn off the device, then press the power button again to restart.

On the back, ROG Strix G10DK has a classic design with traditional silver tones, arranged with many honeycomb heat vents. It is noteworthy that the all-in-one gaming PC still has a PS2 port to install a mouse or keyboard.

The number of rear ports is quite diverse with six USB Type-A ports, including two blue ports with USB 3.2 Gen 2 10GBps standard, and four blue ports with USB 3.2 Gen 1 5GBps standard. The remaining ports include 1 x RJ45 Gigabit Ethernet, 1 x HDMI 1.4, 1 x VGA, 1 x DVI-D, and 3 3.5mm audio jacks for speakers, mic, guitar, mixer.

At the bottom, which houses the GTX 1600 Ti graphics card, ROG Strix G10DK provides two more HDMI ports and two DisplayPort ports.

On ROG Strix G10DK, you won’t have any USB Type-C ports. Considering that the Type C port is increasingly popular, especially on phones, the absence of this connection port is clearly a minus point.

Quality components and easy to upgrade

One of the biggest advantages when choosing a pre-built gaming PC over a laptop is the ability to upgrade, and this is especially essential for gamers. Over time, as the graphics of games become heavier, you will need to increase the RAM, buy more hard drives, and upgrade the graphics card, CPU, or power supply.

With the G10DK Asus ROG Strix desktop, the upgradeability is quite potential when there are still many connection ports available on the main, and the case has plenty of room to accommodate large components.

The dominant black color covers the components inside the chassis, creating a “dangerous” look. The layout is airy, and the wiring is neat, ensuring effective airflow and heat dissipation. The frame consists of components made of thick, solid materials, exemplifying the true quality expected from a big brand.

Asus states that the ROG Strix G10DK is designed with two separate air chambers to dissipate heat and optimize the temperature in the case during operation. The upper chamber houses the CPU and GPU, while the lower chamber houses the power supply and HDD. Isolated chambers deliver cooler air to the entire system and prevent heat from the CPU and GPU from heating the power supply and storage drive.

The “brain” of ROG Strix G10DK is AMD Ryzen 5 5600G CPU, 7nm process with 6 cores, 12 threads with a maximum clock speed of 4.4GHz, 16MB L3 Cache, built-in Radeon Graphics graphics core with 7 cores, clocked 1900 MHz, 65W TDP level with basic air cooler.

The strange thing is that Asus does not use the included stock Wraith Stealth heatsink of AMD 5600G. Instead, the CPU heatsink of the ROG Strix G10DK looks quite similar to the stock AMD3 sockets and earlier. However, we think with a top gaming PC desktop like this, Asus should still equip a tower heatsink, it will be more reasonable, both to help the device dissipate heat better, and to increase coolness.

An 80mm fan is installed on the left edge to support heat dissipation and keep the case cool.

One note is that the front of the ROG Strix G10DK will not have a fan, although Asus has arranged a lot of honeycomb heatsink holes on the inside. Due to the almost sealed front, it is challenging to get cool air, even with the fan.

The one occupying the largest area and also the “star” of the ROG Strix G10DK is the Asus NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB GDDR6 graphics card. Asus is quite discreet when it comes to installing mounts to prevent “graphics card sag”.

Quite surprising that the 1660 Ti of ROG Strix G10DK uses a squirrel-cage heatsink design. Asus often utilizes this stock heatsink from NVIDIA on its Turbo graphics card versions. However, as far as we know, Asus does not have a 1660 Ti Turbo version on the market, so maybe this is a “private plot” version for its gaming machines.

When we removed the graphics card, we found that the second M.2 2280 slot had Asus pre-installed the Intel AX200NGW WiFi 6 standard WiFi card through an adapter. So, if you want to install another M.2 SSD, you will need to remove this WiFi card.

Meanwhile, in the first M.2 2280 slot, located next to the CPU, the device has a pre-installed 512GB PCIe Gen3 x 4 M.2 SSD from Micron, the American memory chip manufacturer.

Located near the WiFi card area are 4 SATA 3 6.0Gb/s ports so you can install more HDDs or SATA SSDs to increase storage capacity. There are also 2 PCIe x1 slots for adding expansion cards.

The device has 4 RAM slots, has 1 stick of 8GB DDR4 3200MHz pre-installed, and has 3 free RAM slots for users to upgrade to up to 64GB of DDR4 Dual Channel 3200MHz RAM.

The 8GB DDR4 3200MHz RAM stick pre-installed on ROG Strix G10DK comes from SK hynix, a Korean RAM manufacturer, specializing in providing OEM RAM for laptops, PCs, and phones. This is the basic type of RAM, without heatsinks or RGB LEDs.

Powering the entire system is the Great Wall E500 power supply with a rated output of 500W, 80 Plus Gold rated, and can withstand up to 550W.

The mainboard part of the ROG Strix G10DK, Asus does not specify which model, but according to us, it is very close to the Asus PRIME B550M-K model from design, connectivity to features.

Good for eSports gaming, but a bit noisy

Our Asus ROG Strix G10DK review unit comes with specific configurations:

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600G CPU (6 cores/12 threads, 19MB cache, maximum performance acceleration up to 4.4 GHz), integrated Radeon Graphics graphics core with 7 cores, clocked at 1900 MHz
• Chipset: Asus AMD B550 Chipset
• GPU: Asus NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB GDDR6
• Memory: SK hynix 8GB DDR4 U-DIMM 3200 MHz
• Storage: Micron SSD 512GB M.2 NVMe PCIe 3.0 x4
• OS: Windows 10 Home
• Front Ports: 1x 3.5mm combo audio jack, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A
• Rear Ports: 1x RJ45 Gigabit Ethernet, 1x HDMI 1.4, 1x VGA Port, 1x DVI-D, 1x PS2, 3 x Audio jacks, 4x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A
• Expansion Slots: 1x PCIe 3.0 x 1, 1x PCIe 4.0 x 16, 1x M.2 connector for WiFi, 1x M.2 connector for storage, 4x DDR4 U-DIMM slot
• Audio: High Definition 7.1 Channel Audio
• Connectivity: Wi-Fi 5(802.11ac) (Dual band) 2 x 2, Bluetooth 4.2
• Power Supply: 500W power supply (80+ Bronze, peak 550W)
• Dimensions: 18.00 x 43.00 x 42.80 cm (7.09″ x 16.93″ x 16.85″)
• Weight: 08.00 kg / 17.64 lbs

As a gaming desktop aimed at eSport games, during this Asus ROG Strix G10DK review, we tested it with popular eSpost games today such as Apex Legends, CS: GO, Valorant, Dota 2, and LOL.

We played all the mentioned games at the highest graphics level, Full HD resolution.

With Apex Legends, the ROG Strix G10DK reaches frame rates from 95-100 FPS, games run perfectly smoothly.

With CS: GO, ROG Strix G10DK did not have any difficulty, the game reached frame rates ranging from 160-190 FPS, well enough to balance high-frequency screens from 144Hz and above.

The ROG Strix G10DK handles the FPS game Valorant gently, achieving an average frame rate of 185-200 FPS on the highest graphics settings.

With a Dota 2, when fighting with a lot of people, ROG Strix G10DK achieves a stable FPS at 76-80 FPS, while when there are no people, farming monsters, FPS can be up to 115-135 FPS.

With LOL, ROG Strix G10DK achieves a stable frame of 140-145 FPS even when fighting with people, launching skills continuously.

As evident from the popular esports games mentioned above, the ROG Strix G10DK performs well in running all games, assisting gamers in climbing ranks, honing skills, and confidently reaching the top.

The gaming temperature of the ROG Strix G10DK is also completely cool. Even when the graphics card and processor are operating at a high level, the temperature of the GPU and CPU is around 70 degrees Celsius. The device produces minimal noise when performing heavy tasks due to its reliance on the chassis. Small series of fans, need to run at high speed to get enough cool air.

Of course, a gaming desktop would not only be capable of playing games but would also function perfectly for learning or handling advanced tasks such as video editing, and rendering 2D and 3D graphics.

Next, in our Asus ROG Strix G10DK review, we have more tests with familiar benchmark applications such as Cinebench R23, 3D Mark, and PCMark. Here are the results.

With Cinebench R23, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G CPU on the ROG Strix G10DK reached 1291 single-core and 9906 multi-core points, this result is roughly equivalent to the Intel Core i5 11600 CPU.

With 3D Mark, we tested in 2 articles Time Spy and Fire Strike, the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti GPU in ROG Strix G10DK reached 6,253 and 14,457 points, respectively.

In the final test with PCMark 10, ROG Strix G10DK scored 6,485 points.

While benchmarking, we recorded CPU and GPU maximum temperatures of up to 80 degrees Celsius, which was about 10 degrees hotter than when playing games. It is completely understandable as benchmarking applications will make CPU and GPU more difficult while playing games.

These results show that the ROG Strix G10DK can handle graphics tasks quite well. However, you should buy one 8GB RAM so that the device can run dual channel 16GB RAM, and also allow you to open multiple tabs or open more applications at the same time while browsing the web, and just take advantage of them all. Get the power of the processor as well as the GPU.

Final line

It is a belief that when we buy a desktop computer, we should make our own case so that it is capable of playing as many games as possible, maybe now this is not completely true. With manufacturers having the freedom to own most of the components in PCs such as Asus entering the pre-built gaming PC market, gamers can now find the purchase of a “standard” desktop as simple as buying a laptop. You only need to choose the brand and configuration; the manufacturer takes care of the rest. There is no need to hesitate in assembling, lifting, and placing each component.

Based on our Asus ROG Strix G10DK review, it can be concluded that it meets almost all the criteria for a gaming desktop ideal for esports gamers. This gaming desktop set ensures the look with its sleek design, and RGB LEDs, while the performance perfectly balances all of today’s popular eSport games, it’s easy to upgrade to more power when needed.

Price and availability

The pricing for the Asus ROG Strix G10DK gaming desktop PC starts at $1,099.99, and you can purchase it through the Amazon.com website.

Pros:

• A stylish, neat computer case, eye-catching RGB LED lighting
• Come with a metal case
• Port to connect peripherals
• Available PCIe SSD, WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5.2
• Good for eSport games with high settings
• Easy configuration upgrade

Cons:

• The front is almost closed with no fan for cool air circulation.
• No USB Type C port
• ROG logo without LED
• 2nd M.2 SSD slot is occupied by the WiFi card
• A bit noisy when high-end playing games