Question Adding an external gpu to a laptop ?

[GE11]

So I have a Dell Latitude D630 and this model is intel CPU. i want to put an external graphics card on it but i want a low powered card that can run on the laptops battery (or a 12v battery) and it has to use the laptops internal display, and yes i seen the big razor boxes but thay cost too much. Im not getting another laptop (some of you may tell me to).... any ideas? Thanks.

Specs are
windows 7 pro x64
160gb WD scorpio black (going to be upgraded)
3gb ram (2gb stick and 1gb stick) (also getting a upgrade)
Core 2 duo (T7500 at 2.20ghz)
Intel gma 965 (wddm 1.1)

 

[GE11]

bother has the bottom one
But i have two desktops already.


Alright listen please i don't won't a new laptop
I'm fine with performance loss or cpu bottle-necks (im getting new one for the d630)

This is a laptop not a desktop but thanks anyways

 

[GE11]

If pci-e is too new for my laptop why not get a pci or apg gpu

 

[Eximo]

If pci-e is too new for my laptop why not get a pci or apg gpu

Those GPUs wouldn't have much more performance than what you already have, and they would be fairly hard to come by. Your laptop also doesn't offer any PCI or AGP interfaces (at least externally), so the adapter would be very expensive (if it exists) A PCIe adapter from an internal PCIe interface is much cheaper to manufacture, no signal processing or voltages to mess with. I think that computer had PCMCIA slots, but I don't know if any external GPU adapters were ever made for that, still it would be a slow interface.

Other than the act of trying to make it work, there is little value in what you are trying to do. There are also laptops better than yours in the $100 range. Add a little more to that and you might find an older laptop with a discrete GPU. A desktop would let you buy a low power discrete GPU and just slot it in, no batteries, adapters required.

Newegg is a retail site (but it has the best used PC search scheme out there), you can also troll around on Ebay looking for deals. I occasionally like to purposefully misspell things to look for zero traffic items that won't receive bids.

 

[GE11]

This latop has a discrete gpu version but it ran too hot and shorted the mobo so i got the intel one

 

[GE11]

Aright once more Listen two words "defy limits"
I will do this even if performance is bad
oh and my 3gb ram is also going to 8gb (if i can find ddr1-2 4gb x2

 

[InvalidError]

If pci-e is too new for my laptop why not get a pci or apg gpu

AGP is a definitive no-go since your laptop definitely doesn't have an AGP slot or anything that could be converted into one. PCI is also a no-go because any GPU old enough to be PCI is probably slower than your laptop's IGP.

Also, since you want to use the laptop's internal display, the PCI interface would not even have enough bandwidth to refresh the screen: a standard PCI bus is 32bits at 33MHz which is 132MB/s while 1280x720x60 requires ~240MB/s to refresh, so you are already at a massive bandwidth deficit before we even count the bandwidth required to tell the GPU what to do and the half-duplex nature of PCI considerably reducing its effective bandwidth.

The only way you have a remote chance in hell of making an external GPU work for your intended goal is to pray the WiFi module is mini-PCIe. If the slot is 1.0x1, you will just barely have enough bandwidth to handle 720p60 display refresh. If it is 2.0x1, then it could be somewhat usable.

 

[USAFRet]

Aright once more Listen two words "defy limits"
I will do this even if performance is bad
oh and my 3gb ram is also going to 8gb (if i can find ddr1-2 4gb x2

Then stop asking and ignoring what everyone else is telling you, and start making.

 

[hotaru.hino]

Aright once more Listen two words "defy limits"
I will do this even if performance is bad
oh and my 3gb ram is also going to 8gb (if i can find ddr1-2 4gb x2

Let us know how it goes. 😀

 

[GE11]

Those GPUs wouldn't have much more performance than what you already have, and they would be fairly hard to come by. Your laptop also doesn't offer any PCI or AGP interfaces (at least externally), so the adapter would be very expensive (if it exists) A PCIe adapter from an internal PCIe interface is much cheaper to manufacture, no signal processing or voltages to mess with. I think that computer had PCMCIA slots, but I don't know if any external GPU adapters were ever made for that, still it would be a slow interface.

Other than the act of trying to make it work, there is little value in what you are trying to do. There are also laptops better than yours in the $100 range. Add a little more to that and you might find an older laptop with a discrete GPU. A desktop would let you buy a low power discrete GPU and just slot it in, no batteries, adapters required.

Newegg is a retail site (but it has the best used PC search scheme out there), you can also troll around on Ebay looking for deals. I occasionally like to purposefully misspell things to look for zero traffic items that won't receive bids.

AGP is a definitive no-go since your laptop definitely doesn't have an AGP slot or anything that could be converted into one. PCI is also a no-go because any GPU old enough to be PCI is probably slower than your laptop's IGP.

Also, since you want to use the laptop's internal display, the PCI interface would not even have enough bandwidth to refresh the screen: a standard PCI bus is 32bits at 33MHz which is 132MB/s while 1280x720x60 requires ~240MB/s to refresh, so you are already at a massive bandwidth deficit before we even count the bandwidth required to tell the GPU what to do and the half-duplex nature of PCI considerably reducing its effective bandwidth.

The only way you have a remote chance in hell of making an external GPU work for your intended goal is to pray the WiFi module is mini-PCIe. If the slot is 1.0x1, you will just barely have enough bandwidth to handle 720p60 display refresh. If it is 2.0x1, then it could be somewhat usable.

I think it's m.2 or mini pcie but what is wwlan/fcm

 

[Eximo]

Where the wireless card would go.

 

[GE11]

I have two slots one wlan and the other wwlan/fcm

 

[InvalidError]

I think it's m.2 or mini pcie but what is wwlan/fcm

M.2 was introduced in 2013 and most of the early M.2 slots were B-key (SATA) which would be useless for a GPU. Your laptop is 3+ years older than the earliest possible time it could have had one of those.

So your best/only chance at (maybe) getting this to work is to look at mPCIe to PCIe adapters and see if the mPCIe end matches what you have in your laptop for wifi.

 

[DSzymborski]

I think it's m.2 or mini pcie but what is wwlan/fcm

Well, it's certainly not m.2, which didn't exist yet when this laptop was new.

Honestly, all this is a very bad idea.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

The slots in those D series aren't general purpose slots anyway. Even IF you could find something other than what was already present, and it fit, it wouldn't work anyway. But, it's your time and money so knock yourself out.

 

[GE11]

M.2 was introduced in 2013 and most of the early M.2 slots were B-key (SATA) which would be useless for a GPU. Your laptop is 3+ years older than the earliest possible time it could have had one of those.

So your best/only chance at (maybe) getting this to work is to look at mPCIe to PCIe adapters and see if the mPCIe end matches what you have in your laptop for wifi.

Ok thanks