Buying an External GPU. Good idea?

[traxxas4277]

Hello, I have an Asus ROG G752VL that has a GTX 965M in it, in today's standards it is pretty weak, and I am not quite satisfied with its performance.

I have worked out a deal on Kijiji (a Canadian version of Craigslist) for a Akitio Node eGPU, for just $200 CAD ($152 USD). Plus its got an upgraded 550w power supply. These things are going for around $400+ CAD ($305 USD) right now new.

I am most likely going to put a GTX 1070 into it, I found one on Kijiji for $330 CAD.

My question is, is it worth the performance bump to buy the Akitio Node and hook it up to my laptop? After all I am getting it for a pretty good deal and could possibly re-sell it in the future for not much less.

The reason I am opting for an eGPU setup is firstly, because I am in my senior year of high school and will be going off to college soon, therefore I want a setup as powerful as a full sized PC, but one that can be relatively portable as well.

I am just worried about how much of a performance boost that there would be considering Thunderbolt 3's 40GB/s limitations. Plus, I would be spending a total of $530 CAD on this setup. Also, the second reason I am considering going with an eGPU is because I do not want to sell my laptop either, I received it as birthday gift from my father, we're very close.

What do you guys think? Should I pull the trigger and go for it? I mean I can just take the GTX 1070 out of the Akitio Node and put it into a future PC build, but it would probably be obsolete by then, in about 2-4 years time (if I do end up keeping this setup during that time).

Which cards do you guys recommend that are relativity future-proof?

I know there are a lot of questions in this topic, but any advice is appreciated. Since I don't have a "real job" it would be nice to build upon what I have, and I believe the only option would be an eGPU setup.

Thanks!
Liam.

On a last note I do have a 9 year old PC that's lying around with a core i7 860 CPU, 8gb of DDR3, 1Tb HHD, a not-so-ancient Asus motherboard, and a decent 450w power supply. But I don't think that system is even worth building up so I would probably have to start from scratch anyway if I would want to build a decent gaming PC. Thoughts?

Thanks again.

 

[Gam3r01]

I personally wouldnt recommend it. You are going to spend alot of money for marginal benefits.
You would get far more out of your money if you invest that in a nice desktop instead, and keep the laptop as a laptop.

As someone in college currently, desktop+laptop is the way to go.

 

[traxxas4277]

I personally wouldnt recommend it. You are going to spend alot of money for marginal benefits.
You would get far more out of your money if you invest that in a nice desktop instead, and keep the laptop as a laptop.

As someone in college currently, desktop+laptop is the way to go.

But wouldn't getting a whole new desktop be much more expensive than a eGPU? And much less portable I must say. I can always upgrade to a desktop in the future, but for right now at least is it a good way to go?

 

[Gam3r01]

Its even worse of an idea if you plan to upgrade in the near future. Essentially you get very little out of your money in an eGPU setup.
Portability really shouldnt be an issue, thats what the laptop is for. The desktop may cost a bit more, but it would certainly be worth the money.

 

[hang-the-9]

The i7 desktop will be fine with a card like an nVidia 950 or Radeon R9 280 or 290 or so. You'd want an older gen card for it because of a likely BIOS/Motherboard issue with newer cards and of course for used card cost savings. External video cards are never a "good" idea, you will need the external card, the connector for it, the power supply for the card and a monitor to run the card with, so a desktop. For the cost of the stuff, and the laptop current resale cost you can pretty much buy a new $1,000 gaming laptop. Nothing wrong with selling a birthday gift if it's something that gets out-dated. Heck, another birthday gift could be money towards a new system.

 

[traxxas4277]

The i7 desktop will be fine with a card like an nVidia 950 or Radeon R9 280 or 290 or so. You'd want an older gen card for it because of a likely BIOS/Motherboard issue with newer cards and of course for used card cost savings. External video cards are never a "good" idea, you will need the external card, the connector for it, the power supply for the card and a monitor to run the card with, so a desktop. For the cost of the stuff, and the laptop current resale cost you can pretty much buy a new $1,000 gaming laptop. Nothing wrong with selling a birthday gift if it's something that gets out-dated. Heck, another birthday gift could be money towards a new system.

I use my laptop with an external 40" monitor, mouse, keyboard etc. most of the time. But, when I want to bring it to school I jut unplug it and bring it, I love that... The laptop has got an i7 6700HQ in it, 32gb of DDR4 ram, amazingly fast NVMe M.2 Samsung SSD's (500gb Intel RAID 1). I even have an external WD 2Tb HHD if I need any more space for random stuff. I view this setup as a docking station.

I love how fast it is, how whisper quiet it is, how I can keep one copy of all of my games, school work, etc. All I want is better graphics, that's it. I don't want two systems because I see it as a way of unnecessarily doubling everything (if it is another gaming laptop and assuming it can run games well). I just want to come home from school, plug it, and game.

Thoughts on that?

Thanks.

 

[Scottray]

You're over-thinking it. As long as your laptop has a Thunderbolt 3 port, get the eGPU and enjoy it.