I'm not normally one for game-themed graphics cards, but in this case I'll make an exception. Asus has announced the ROG Astral GeForce RTX 5080 OC Doom Edition graphics card, just in time for the launch of Doom: The Dark Ages on May 13, and I reckon it's a bit of a looker.
Asus has partnered with Bethesda and id Software to celebrate not just the "legendary tenure of Doom" but also the 30-year anniversary of Asus designing and manufacturing graphics cards.
Oh, and apparently it represents Nvidia's longstanding reputation as the world's premier GPU designer, too. A trio of celebrations, then, although I'm less concerned about what it represents and more about how good an Asus ROG Astral card looks in some non-standard colours.
Asus says it'll be sold exclusively on the Bethesda Doom Gear store, and you'll also get a mouse mat, a t-shirt, a yellow keycard (!) and an exclusive Doom Slayer Legionary in-game skin. The listing's not up on the store page yet, but pre-orders are said to be starting shortly, although I'd imagine it won't be cheap.
Not that any RTX 5080 is at this point, but still. A Doom-themed RTX 50-series GPU and a cool yellow keycard? Yep, that'll be all the monies, I reckon. Still, at least you can actually buy one, unlike the Starfield-themed RX 7800 XT of yore, which was only available as a giveaway.
It's a ROG Astral edition card, which means you get the full benefit of all of Asus' cooling-related enhancements. This includes four Axial-tech fans, a patented vapour chamber design, a phase-change thermal pad, and what Asus says is a "vast fin array" that helps provide "effortless cooling in the heat of battle."
Not that the RTX 5080 is known for being a particularly hot-running card, even with a significant overclock on the OC-ed Founders Edition. Our hardware overlord, Dave James, managed to push the chip in our FE sample to 500+ MHz with very little effort (or any scary temperature leaps), but the Asus ROG Astral cards seem better equipped than most to deal with any "hotter than hell" overclocking moments.
Speaking of Asus overbuilding GPUs, it's also been revealed the ROG Astral lineup has some hidden hardware. Users have noticed that the included GPU Tweak III software has an Equipment Installation Check feature that uses an onboard gyroscopic measurement sensor to tell if the card is sagging in its slot, and provide a warning if it's off-kilter by a certain amount.
Yep, I couldn't quite believe it either. The ROG Astral lineup comes with an anti-sag device by default (as does the Asus TUF Gaming RTX 5070 Ti OC Edition I reviewed earlier this month, which comes with a weeny little GPU post of its own), but I'm mightily impressed that there's an actual sensor on board to tell if your GPU is on the droop.
The Slayer himself would be proud. After all, if you're going into battle with the demons of hell, it's probably best to make sure all your gear is in tip-top shape, isn't it?
