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Upgrade the DELL Vostro 1700 video card

post #1 of 19
11/29/07 at 6:08am
Thread Starter 
I want to upgrade the DELL vostro 1700 video card (8600M GT). I was thinking for a GeForce Go 7950 GTX (possibly SLI) or a 8800 GTX (again, possibly SLI). Perhaps evena Quadro FX 3500M could be suitable (if there are modifications of drivers in order to play with games). But I contacted them and they were not of any help.

Tell me, is that possible? and what are your suggestions?

(sorry if this is my first post, but I'm at school and don't have time to introduce myself properly)

thank you
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post #2 of 19
11/29/07 at 12:19pm
you can't. Fastest VC the 1700 supports is the 8600M GT, sorry.
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post #3 of 19
11/29/07 at 4:57pm
Thread Starter 
crap. I only have to hope that DELL makes an official upgrade...

what about overclocking it to a 8700M? the only difference is in core and memory speed I think

Here is the laptop
http://www.dell.com/content/products...tab=bundlestab

My card
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-...GT.3986.0.html

the other
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-...GT.3987.0.html

I wonder at which temperature I have to stop, and if you could help me with all the other things that prevent destroying my laptop, that would be greatly appreciated
I know that there are 2 cooling systems, a fan and a bar of material that dissipates the heat, but average temperature is 68°C I read somewhere.

(I searched the web,but found no useful info on doing it on Vista and on my notebook, it's not like I have not even bothered to)
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post #4 of 19
1/4/08 at 5:31am
Thread Starter 
bump. no help avaialble?
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post #5 of 19
1/4/08 at 12:12pm
You can overclock your 8600m GT yes, just make sure to use driver version 169.04, and ATItool.
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post #6 of 19
1/4/08 at 1:29pm
Thread Starter 
simple as that ? no need to flash my bios? why not rivatuner?

and, if I can ask, how much can I increase the core speed, and the other values?
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post #7 of 19
1/4/08 at 2:18pm
There should be no need for a BIOS flash as long as you use 169.04 drivers. All newer versions of the driver are software locked for overclocking. Each card varies as to how well it will overclock.

Best thing to do is take it slow as to not majorly overheat your card. Also make sure to only make adjustments to the 3D Powermode, and to make increasements of 5-10MHz. Every 20-30MHz, run the tool to scan for artifacts, and let that go for 5-10 mins. Also watch the temps too, anything over 85c is a little scary.
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post #8 of 19
1/5/08 at 6:51am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark_Ansem View Post
crap. I only have to hope that DELL makes an official upgrade...
We hear the same thing with every new generation. But they don't. 8600GT is pretty decent for such a machine.
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post #9 of 19
1/5/08 at 12:40pm
The 8600GT is beyond decent, trust me. But I also heard that they were going to release the 8800gts for the Vostro. Hope they do!
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post #10 of 19
1/11/08 at 5:28am
Thread Starter 
really? that would be very useful. but I can also use atitool to overclock if I use 165.01? plus, if I upgrade then to the newest drivers, will it erase my overclocked values? or it will lock them as they are?
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post #11 of 19
1/14/08 at 5:34am
Thread Starter 
sorry I have not osted any upgrade, but I do not have my NB right here, so I am preparing... do you know how much I can overclock the card? I mean, I'd love to pute the shaders and core speed to those of the 8700M... What is my limit?
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post #12 of 19
1/14/08 at 12:18pm
your limit is going to depend greatly on the individual card you have. You're going to have to go through trial and error on different clocks looking for artifacts. When you start artifacting go back down a little. I don't have any experience O/Cing the new dx10 cards but this is the general rule of thumb.

I didn't realize that Dell BIOS unlocked the clocks on this gen of cards. They finally realize that we're going to figure out a way to OC it anyway?

@IsuzuTrooper I may indeed be wrong but as it stands now I don't think the V1700 will be able to handle cooling the mobile 8800 cards.
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post #13 of 19
1/14/08 at 2:52pm
Im going to have to say im highly doubting a 8800 card for the standard notebook line for dell (non XPS) mainly because I cant see a 90watt adapter with a single fan cooling solution being able to handle the beast. The actual videocard is about the size of a deck of cards which would be a whole other issue asside from the ones mentioned so in the meaning time OCing is what you gonna have to settle for. Othe rpeople have already mentioned which drivers and tools you can use and dougadamsfan is on the dot regarding individual successes with card clock speed. Good luck!
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post #14 of 19
1/15/08 at 12:56am
Hi all,

I have a similar question.

I'm thinking about buying a Vostro 1700, but it has a X3100 card. Is it possible to have Dell (or any other store) upgrade it to a 8600M GT? (The laptop is still under Complete Care warranty.)

Thanks!
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post #15 of 19
1/15/08 at 11:10am
Shameless bump.

Just called Dell, and they told me it wasn't possible to go from a X3100 to a Geforce 8600 once the laptop was built. I'm a bit disappointed, since it really was a great deal. Not sure what to do now...

Has anyone tried doing that upgrade themselves?
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post #16 of 19
1/15/08 at 12:01pm
Yea the X3100 is intergraded into the motherboard, you would need to change your motherboard. there is no connections for a card on your board. I have an E1705 thats completly converted and upgraded to an XPS M1710 Inside and out, hardware wise and cosmetics, even have the M170 XPS lid, My wish is that if somehow I could replace my 7950GTX for a DirectX10 card, but as I know of they none of the 8 GO series will fit into my laptop, thats a bummer too.
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post #17 of 19
1/17/08 at 6:55am
Thread Starter 
So, overclocking is ok I hope ATItool is easier to use than rivatuner... but do you think that upgrading my CPU from 2.2 to 2.4 could help?
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post #18 of 19
1/23/08 at 4:52pm
Thread Starter 
bump, but it is important I think: do I have (for overclocking a GPU, not a CPU) to disable C1E and EIST, which are power saving utilities built into the processor (and AFAIK only accessable by the bios) otherwise the overclock will be very unstable?
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post #19 of 19
1/25/08 at 9:25am
Thread Starter 
shameless bump, but it is important. summarizing what I have to do in order to overclock my card is:

downgrade to 169.04
install ATITool (don't know if there is a better one)
overclock 10mhz, double the shader
run 3dmark06 16 times (I wonder if there are other tools)

then I'm done? but what do I have to overclock, 2d or 3d settings? and what if I want to upgrade the core speed?
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