Rethinking the video card. Going bare bones and modularizing I/O.

[Rock&Roll]

Just wanted to post something for pure discussion, and see what others think.

 TL:DR

The TL;DR question would be....
What if you could buy a GFX card void of a pre-supplied cooling solution and I/O ports?
Just a pure stripped down graphics processor board with:
-No manufacture applied cooling solution
-No preinstalled I/O Ports, except for one to communicate with a dedicated I/O board

This past week, I installed a water block on my GTX480 (Microcenter had it on clearance). While doing so, I was reflecting back on some of my past video cards. Back to the days when the cooling solution for a card was probably a 2"x2" heatsink with a 40mm fan stuck on it. We'd pop off the weenie heatsink and strap on a Blue-Orb, or whatever we could find that was bigger and better. It took almost no time or effort.

Ever since the 8800 series GPU's came out, we've been given pretty much full-encompasing cooling solutions from the factory. While us overclockers may not hold modern stock cooling in the highest regard, you have to admit, it's a far sight more advanced than what you'd find on legacy hardware. I have to imagine, a substantial part of the price we pay in buying a new video card is the material and R/D that went into the stock HSF.

As well, video cards of the past usually came with one or two D-SUB vga ports, and maybe a TV-Out. that was it. Now, we have HDMI, DisplayPort, DVI, as well as external adapters for D-SUB vga, and active DP adapter dongles. It's a bit of a mess.

All this got me thinking....every time I buy a graphics card, I'm paying for a cooling solution I don't want. As well, I'm paying for connectors and RAMDAC's that I may or may not have a use for. Seems to me, there's a substantial recurring cost we are penalized with, every time we buy a new video card.

What if it was more common for new graphics cads to come to us customization-ready? No prepackaged cooling solution. We'd have to source one ourselves. And we would have to purchase, for a one-time cost, a separate nVidia/AMD made I/O board that has all the connectivity we want. Have an in-case dongle that connects the I/O board to the graphics card, and away you go. Seems to me, these ideas would reduce the cost of any video card substantially.

 

[TheBuzzer]

this seems like a crappy idea to be honest. the different io are not what makes the gfx card price high

 

[Rock&Roll]

That was more of a tertiary idea. An idea partially spawned by recognizing the days of RAMDAC's even being present on high end cards are probably numbered. A concerning thought, for us who still like to rock CRT's

The cooling solution part is the bigger deal, to me, at least. It's a cost we pay for what essentially becomes a paper weight after changing out to aftermarket cooling.

 

[XTF]

Most people don't change the cooler. If the standard coolers don't suffice, wouldn't it be better to get better standard coolers?

 

[LigTasm]

This is a terrible idea for manufacturers. Extra bits that need to be attached = more things for people to mess up. More RMA's, less money made. Average Joe manages to screw up simple plug in cards all the time, can you imagine what would happen if they had to plug in a power cable?

 

[Melon]

This is a terrible idea for manufacturers. Extra bits that need to be attached = more things for people to mess up. More RMA's, less money made. Average Joe manages to screw up simple plug in cards all the time, can you imagine what would happen if they had to plug in a power cable?

You realize that most video cards require a power cable, right?

 

[CaptNumbNutz]

You realize that most video cards require a power cable, right?

That's not what he is talking about. If you read the OP, you would understand the context of the comment. He is implying you attach your own connectors to the bare circuit board...e.g. soldering them on yourself as you needed them.

 

[jeremyshaw]

That was more of a tertiary idea. An idea partially spawned by recognizing the days of RAMDAC's even being present on high end cards are probably numbered. A concerning thought, for us who still like to rock CRT's

The cooling solution part is the bigger deal, to me, at least. It's a cost we pay for what essentially becomes a paper weight after changing out to aftermarket cooling.

Are RAMDAC in their original form even used anymore? Anyhow, the GPU dies are massive, today, along with transistor count. Changing or removing (on a high end AMD card), any one of the six display outputs in the design is just not feasible in terms of time required to execute and validate. nVidia integrated the video I/O into the GPU die during the gt200 series, iirc.

If you are thinking about the PCB, that's less than 1usd worth of connectors and traces on there to support so many outputs. A majority of the cost is delved into the main GPU itself, the GPU memory, and maybe, the power circuitry. Well, development cost, too, however, there are people who are insistent on a VGA connection (to connect to a high end CRT for extremely competitive gaming), some who use DVI (or DL DVI on high end monitors that did not have Displayport), some who want HDMI without adaptors (since a few nonref designs have managed to screw that up before), and some who want DP. Best to create one SKU pleasing as many as possible, rather than many to please a few people at a time.

 

[Melon]

That's not what he is talking about. If you read the OP, you would understand the context of the comment. He is implying you attach your own connectors to the bare circuit board...e.g. soldering them on yourself as you needed them.

"Have an in-case dongle that connects the I/O board to the graphics card"


You apparently have never heard of Daughter boards -- He wasn't talking about soldering anything.

 

[l3thal6]

I can see where the OP is coming from and I would love to see a product like this, but enthusiasts like us are maybe 0.5% of the overall computing world. I couldn't see a big company getting behind something like this for such a small market segment.

 

[CaptNumbNutz]

"Have an in-case dongle that connects the I/O board to the graphics card"


You apparently have never heard of Daughter boards -- He wasn't talking about soldering anything.

I said e.g. (exempli gratia) which is used as "for example." I was providing one of many examples. Daughterboards are another example. Daughterboards or solder, both accomplish the same thing which is attaching something that wasn't there before, which is exactly what the OP was talking about.

LigTasm mentioned what would happen "if they had to plug in a power cable" when he was clearly referring to something more than just your average power cable according to the context of the OP. For example, what if they had to attach a daughter board that held all of the power circuitry? Average joe would obviously mess that up.

We are obviously talking about the same thing, no need to argue about it.
My post's intent was merely to point out that it was probably a typo on his part.

 

[Melon]

I said e.g. (exempli gratia) which is used as "for example." I was providing one of many examples. Daughterboards are another example. Daughterboards or solder, both accomplish the same thing which is attaching something that wasn't there before, which is exactly what the OP was talking about.

LigTasm mentioned what would happen "if they had to plug in a power cable" when he was clearly referring to something more than just your average power cable according to the context of the OP. For example, what if they had to attach a daughter board that held all of the power circuitry? Average joe would obviously mess that up.

We are obviously talking about the same thing, no need to argue about it.
My post's intent was merely to point out that it was probably a typo on his part.

Plugging a connection into a Daughterboard is akin to installing a video card. Soldering, on the other hand, is an entirely different ball game.

If you can plug a 6 pin, 8 pin, or Molex connector to a device, you can install a Daughterboard without issue.

OP wasn't talking about any kind of procedure that required more-than-basic knowledge to attach anything from the end-user (Soldering).


Let's just agree to disagree, shall we?

 

[LigTasm]

You realize that most video cards require a power cable, right?

It was pure sarcasm. I have a computer illiterate friend who literally snapped the 8-pin PCI-E connector off of a GTX 580 by trying to force the 8-pin CPU connector into it. My point was, for many people this could be a difficult or confusing task and not worth the R&D to make it happen for a big company. They would just end up absorbing more warranty requests due to user error than they already do. AIB partners make most of their money with enthusiasts like us, but the big-name companies that make our chips (you know them) make most of their money on mobile integrated and OEM parts that will most likely never be touched again after they are installed.

EDIT: My argument is not against the idea, just the likelihood of us seeing something like it. I like the idea, and have wondered about similar setups. Its just not feasible, even if the AIB partners could design it (I know the OEM's wouldn't) I doubt they could get the licensing to sell something so different from the reference design.