- Asus has announced the ROG Equalizer 12V-2×6 power cable
- The cable aims to solve melting issues with high-performance GPUs like the RTX 5090
- It is compatible with all PCIe 5.0 power supplies from other manufacturers
It’s no secret that powerful GPUs, notably Nvidia’s RTX 5090, still suffer from reports of connector melting issues, even with upgraded cables that have improved power connectors – but luckily, Asus has apparently introduced a solution.
As reported by TweakTown, Asus has announced the ROG Equalizer, a 12V-2×6 power cable for GPUs that use up to 600W, one designed to further help protect them from melting issues.
Of course, RTX 5090s using 12VHPWR and 12V-2×6 cables usually don’t experience melting issues, but there have been enough cases to cause concern among consumers. Both cables are actually the same, and the only major difference for the revamped 12V-2×6 design is that it has shorter sensing legs and longer current legs, which help ensure that the cable sits correctly. It is a bad connection that theoretically causes the melting problem.
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That’s why Asus has chosen a 12V-2×6 power connector, but with a tweaked design that has been specifically refined for a greater load capacity within each wire, now at 17 amps (it’s normally 9.2 amps with regular 12V-2×6 cables). These are also ‘premium etched cables’ that are flexible to help with cable management.
Combined with the GPU Tweak III software and its Power Detector+ feature, ROG Equalizer should effectively keep hardware safe from melting, or so the theory goes. In an extreme test case from Asus, the company observed that even if the connector was not positioned correctly in the GPU, the ROG Equalizer would still maintain a temperature of 73.4C.
Meanwhile, a standard 12V-2×6 cable would reach 146C in the same scenario, which is a very high temperature likely to result in the plug melting.
That’s a big claim from Asus, and if this can be replicated in other independent tests when ROG Equalizer is available, it might just be the perfect tool to eliminate any melting issues with RTX 5090 GPUs.
ROG Equalizer is compatible with power supplies from “all leading manufacturers”, which is a massive bonus for all PC owners who have ATX 3.1 (PCIe 5.0) power supplies. It also comes with power supplies from the ROG Thor III and ROG Strix Platinum series, but there is currently no release date for those.
Despite the marketing pitch here, Asus hasn’t done enough to convince some gamers, and there are those who suggest that graphics cards linked to connector issues are simply best avoided.
These connector melting issues have been problematic for years, ever since the RTX 4090’s launch in 2022. If the ROG Equalizer can finally put an end to all of this, it should make high-powered GPUs like the RTX 5090 more accessible – well, apart from the obvious stumbling block of pricing, anyway.
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