Laptop ExpressCard 34 To PCI Express x16 Adapter for Desktop Graphics

[erek]

Many laptops have a lot of horsepower in terms of CPU, RAM, and SSD performance, but are lack luster in terms of gaming performance compared to their desktop counterparts. I wanted to share with you all my first working setup using a Lenovo W520 and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 Desktop Video Card.


ExpressCard 34 to PCI Express x16 Adapter

ATX PSU

(Also works out of the box in Linux) :

https://vimeo.com/115534204

 

[suiken_2mieu]

Show a video playing some games. This is really cool.

 

[FnordMan]

Note two things:
1: ExpressCard is all but dead
2: ExpressCard is a x1 1.0 lane so the video card is fairly crippled there.

Other than that it's neat looking and likely cheaper than those expensive adapter boxes i've seen in the past.

 

[Abit667]

1: ExpressCard is all but dead
2: ExpressCard is a x1 1.0 lane so the video card is fairly crippled there.

A lot of machines, like the OPs W520, have pcie 2.0 lanes to the expresscard slot. I've run this setup before and it's not nearly as crippling as you'd expect. Even a "crippled" semi-modern graphics card is significantly faster than anything in the kind of laptops you'd want to do this with.

It's already really cheap to do this with expresscard. Thunderbolt offers a lot more bandwidth, but there are very few nice non-Apple laptops with thunderbolt. The enclosures are also way too expensive to make it worth it.

 

[erek]

A lot of machines, like the OPs W520, have pcie 2.0 lanes to the expresscard slot. I've run this setup before and it's not nearly as crippling as you'd expect. Even a "crippled" semi-modern graphics card is significantly faster than anything in the kind of laptops you'd want to do this with.

It's already really cheap to do this with expresscard. Thunderbolt offers a lot more bandwidth, but there are very few nice non-Apple laptops with thunderbolt. The enclosures are also way too expensive to make it worth it.

what about the W510? does that also have PCIE 2.0 Lanes to ExpressCard 34 slot?

 

[erek]

Here's another setup I did
Lenovo W510
16GB DDR3
Core i7 (first gen)
128GB SSD
AMD Radeon HD 4850 1GB
Windows 7 Enterprise x64

 

[primetime]

you may want to re-size those pictures as not everyone here is running over 1080p displays