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therock003

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Discussion starter · #1 ·
What are my options when it comes to using desktop GPUs on laptops? The way things are you give an insane amount of money to get higher end laptopsthat generate crazy amounts of heat and performance wise they last up to a year and then you have to couph it up for the next best thing. From a quick search i made i see there are some eGPU options that you can connect the cards into a pcmcia express cardslot like so.

http://portables4gamers.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/hawkforce-vidock-2.jpg

http://www.techradar.com/news/computing-components/graphics-cards/how-to-make-an-external-laptop-graphics-adaptor-915616
http://lifehacker.com/5851902/turn-a-low+powered-laptop-into-a-gaming-machine-with-an-external-video-card-dock

Why has it got to be an expresscard and not usb3 or sata3 which mprovide more bandwidth and are more common on todays laptops?

Besides these egpu options another think might be to build a small form factor desktop and have it stream the video feed either by some kind of wireless hdmi or with video streamers like splashtop on laptops and tablets.

Is there anybody here with experience to guide me on what solution should be the best?
 
#2 ·
External GPUs arent popular so very little progress has been made in that field. They do have thunderbolt capable external GPUs. But the problem is most of them have their own power supply making them large and thunderbolt isnt a popular connection in laptops.

Sony offers an external GPU on their premium Z series laptops. Which are essentially ultrabooks.

And as for streaming, AMD has a system that allows you to wirelessly stream videogames from a system with any of their new CPUs to another AMD system. Its super low latency as youre the server compared to Nvidias system that offloads it to a centeral sever located hundreds of miles away.

There is no 'best' one, they all have pros and cons.
 
#3 ·
Quote:
Why has it got to be an expresscard and not usb3 or sata3 which mprovide more bandwidth and are more common on todays laptops?
Click to expand...
USB3 and Sata is not capable to support external devices like graphics cards, period.
Quote:
Besides these egpu options another think might be to build a small form factor desktop and have it stream the video feed either by some kind of wireless hdmi or with video streamers like splashtop on laptops and tablets.
Click to expand...
Yes if you have money to build another system.
Quote:
Is there anybody here with experience to guide me on what solution should be the best?
Click to expand...
You can also do this on less expensive laptops, what you need is to make s special connector and switch the wifi card and connect your gpu.
 
Discussion starter · #4 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Martynas View Post

USB3 and Sata is not capable to support external devices like graphics cards, period.
Click to expand...
Well sure not directly, but what if there's some specially written software than translates gpu output into usb or sata. Well that's theoreticatll, a more realistic answer is that were nowhere near there yet, or ever going to be...
Quote:
Yes if you have money to build another system.
Click to expand...
Well i don't, but if its going to be a viable option maybe i could invest into building such a system, if its going to be capable of accomplishing what I'm asking. Maybe get the cheapest board i can find that supports these AMD chips mentioned on the above post and a 7870 and 4gigs of RAM. PSU and a case i already got.
Quote:
You can also do this on less expensive laptops, what you need is to make s special connector and switch the wifi card and connect your gpu.
Click to expand...
Can i have some more info on that? You mean like open it inside and do some modding?

BTW i looked around and found some docks with thunderbolt and usb3 ports, like these 2.

My question here is how do you connect your PC into those docks in order to supoort all these ports?

http://www.belkin.com/us/p/P-F4U055
http://www.caldigit.com/thunderboltstation/


 
#5 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by therock003 View Post

Well sure not directly, but what if there's some specially written software than translates gpu output into usb or sata. Well that's theoreticatll, a more realistic answer is that were nowhere near there yet, or ever going to be...
Well i don't, but if its going to be a viable option maybe i could invest into building such a system, if its going to be capable of accomplishing what I'm asking. Maybe get the cheapest board i can find that supports these AMD chips mentioned on the above post and a 7870 and 4gigs of RAM. PSU and a case i already got.
Can i have some more info on that? You mean like open it inside and do some modding?

BTW i looked around and found some docks with thunderbolt and usb3 ports, like these 2.

My question here is how do you connect your PC into those docks in order to supoort all these ports?

http://www.belkin.com/us/p/P-F4U055
http://www.caldigit.com/thunderboltstation/


Click to expand...
You need thunderbold connector on your laptop/desktop pc to connect something like this.
You can't add thunderbolt to your laptop if it doesnt have it when you buy it.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/e-gpu-external-graphics-discussion/418851-diy-egpu-experiences.html
 
Discussion starter · #7 ·
Couple of quick questions. What are the maximum theoretical throughputs of ExpressCard and Thunderbolt. I have looked on wiki but i'm inexperienced and that left me confused. Thunderbolt if i'm not mistaken should 20Gbit total and ExpressCard 2.5Gbit?

If i can somehow make an implemantation, ViDock or otherwise, whats the best Card i can use? Can i go as high into higher-end models like 7870,7970,GTX680 etc?
 
#8 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by therock003 View Post

Couple of quick questions. What are the maximum theoretical throughputs of ExpressCard and Thunderbolt. I have looked on wiki but i'm inexperienced and that left me confused. Thunderbolt if i'm not mistaken should 20Gbit total and ExpressCard 2.5Gbit?

If i can somehow make an implemantation, ViDock or otherwise, whats the best Card i can use? Can i go as high into higher-end models like 7870,7970,GTX680 etc?
Click to expand...
That depends on the Unit youre going to use for example from http://www.villageinstruments.com/tiki-index.php?page=ViDock
Quote:
ViDock 3 is designed to accommodate PCIe cards with no power connector.

ViDock 4 is designed to accommodate PCIe cards with one 6-pin power connector, or less power cards with no power connector.

ViDock 4 Plus is designed to accommodate PCIe cards with two 6-pin power connectors, or less power cards with one 6-pin connector, or with no connectors.
Click to expand...
ViDock includes power supply in them so you wont need external one, with abit of moding and external power supply you should be able to use ViDock 3 for any GPU.
 
Discussion starter · #9 ·
Power Requirements are the least of my worries. I'm only thinking in terms of performance and scaling. Will i be able to continuously gain the most out of this setup, so i can use the greatest cards and perform top notch? I've even found tablets with thunderbolt.

Imagine having an iconia W700 and using the latest desktop GTX...
 
Discussion starter · #10 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by s-x View Post

External GPUs arent popular so very little progress has been made in that field. They do have thunderbolt capable external GPUs. But the problem is most of them have their own power supply making them large and thunderbolt isnt a popular connection in laptops.

Sony offers an external GPU on their premium Z series laptops. Which are essentially ultrabooks.

And as for streaming, AMD has a system that allows you to wirelessly stream videogames from a system with any of their new CPUs to another AMD system. Its super low latency as youre the server compared to Nvidias system that offloads it to a centeral sever located hundreds of miles away.

There is no 'best' one, they all have pros and cons.
Click to expand...
Can i have some more details on the amd streaming feature?
 
#11 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by therock003 View Post

Power Requirements are the least of my worries. I'm only thinking in terms of performance and scaling. Will i be able to continuously gain the most out of this setup, so i can use the greatest cards and perform top notch? I've even found tablets with thunderbolt.

Imagine having an iconia W700 and using the latest desktop GTX...
Click to expand...
Dude you're in situanion where you want to svae money and this will not work
1. Tablet cpus are way too slow to not bottleneck a high end desktop gpu
2. External PCIe thunderbolt dock costs way over 500 dollas
3. AMD Cloud gpu's are not even for sale for consumers

What i can tell you is, its best to get a high end laptop or a desktop that you can upgrade later, period. Theres no way you will be able to get similar performance cheaper with streaming/external gpu, etc..
 
Discussion starter · #12 ·
No i dont agree. The tablet i mentioned has already got an i5 and thunderbolt, so its not different from a laptop. An egpu setup on a thunderbolt enabled system, is one of few relevant technological leaps that makes sense and should become a standard.

Getting a high end laptop or desktop is the worst possible solution and the reason i started researching this option and posted this topic. Been there done that, never satisfied.
 
#13 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by therock003 View Post

No i dont agree. The tablet i mentioned has already got an i5 and thunderbolt, so its not different from a laptop. An egpu setup on a thunderbolt enabled system, is one of few relevant technological leaps that makes sense and should become a standard.

Getting a high end laptop or desktop is the worst possible solution and the reason i started researching this option and posted this topic. Been there done that, never satisfied.
Click to expand...
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Acer-Iconia-W700-53334G12as-Tablet.91267.0.html
Yes, its an i5 ,but ULV only two cores with HT enabled with max turbo boost of 2.5/2.7ghz.
Quote:
The Core i5-3337U's default clock is 1.8 GHz. The CPU clock briefly climbed to approximately 2 GHz when we started Prime95. The clock rates of the single cores nosedived to just below 1.4 GHz when we added FurMark. It ranged stably between 1.3 and 1.4 GHz for the entire test period. The Boost never came close to being maxed out at any time during the stress test. Throttling was only marginal in a CPU-only stress test. The clock rate of single cores remained above 1.7 GHz. This reduced CPU performance during load explains the comparatively poor benchmark rates.
Click to expand...
Cooling sysem on it isn't good enough for that cpu since it throttles a lot.
Quote:
generate crazy amounts of heat and performance wise they last up to a year and then you have to couph it up for the next best thing.
Click to expand...
You will most likely have to buy a new tablet every year that has thunderbolt since you won't be able to play games for a long time even on low settings with that cpu.
 
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Martynas
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