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How easy is it to upgrade notebook videocards?

post #1 of 4
3/25/05 at 5:58am
Thread Starter 
From what I've heard, the Dell XPS, Alienwares, and Sagers to name a few all have upgradable videocards. Is upgrading as easy as going into Best Buy, choosing a compatible card (PCI-E, AGP,..), and swapping it into your notebook, or will I have to buy an upgrade specifically made for my laptop model direct from the manufacturer? Someone please help me out.
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post #2 of 4
3/25/05 at 7:55am
Generally, you can't upgrade graphics cards. There are only a small number of models which have upgradeable graphics cards (some Dells, some Sagers, etc.).
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post #3 of 4
3/25/05 at 11:36am
Yeah, laptop graphics cards are pretty non-upgradeable. The best thing for you to do is to just pick a laptop now, and don't plan on upgrading.

Laptops based on Sonoma technology are just starting to come out. Some of them have the *promise* of being able to upgrade the graphics card, but we haven't been able to see whether it actually works yet.
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post #4 of 4
3/25/05 at 2:04pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by dubcduke
From what I've heard, the Dell XPS, Alienwares, and Sagers to name a few all have upgradable videocards. Is upgrading as easy as going into Best Buy, choosing a compatible card (PCI-E, AGP,..), and swapping it into your notebook, or will I have to buy an upgrade specifically made for my laptop model direct from the manufacturer? Someone please help me out.
There are a few manufacturers that offer or have offered upgradable graphics (i.e Sager, Alienware, Dell, etc.) but you have to buy a compatible card through the manufacturer, usually at a premium cost as well...it is not like going into Best Buy and buying one off the shelf. NVIDIA and ATI both have projects in the works to develop a upgradable graphics format (NVIDIA's is called MXM, ATI's is called AXIOM), but no current notebook features this technology...also, the notebook manufacturers may "tweak" the MXM or AXIOM interface so that only their company cards will fit in it...basically it's an ongoing situation.
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