PICTURED: Gigabyte's M1405 with External GPU

This actually makes some sense. Example, college student can take it on the go but come back to his dorm room and link up for some gaming.

Cool but how about something with a bit more punch.

is that the external graphics?

Where is the message 'can it play crysis'?

I betcha it'll play Mass Effect 2 and right now.. that is the only on this planet that actually matters.

Just stop. Please just stop.

I'm down to getting one of these when it hits the market, if the price tags seems right. I love the brush metal finish on it.

Why has it taken this long for a manufacturer to come out with a docking station with an external GPU?

why not a 5870... $$$ that's why. A 5870 costs about as much as the laptop by itself.

this seems like the first generation of a platform that i hope becomes extremely popular. I'm sure the gt220 is just a trial run and if they sell well, there will be much more powerful upgrades in the future.

hmmm.... i wonder if there's a way to change/mod the gpu for a different one like the gtx 260 or the HD 5770.

Well at least from the sounds of it, the gpu works on the laptop screen and not just an extranal screen like most other external gpus for laptops.

That's not entirely true - a looooong time ago, my Dell C600's docking station provided you with a PCI card so that you can add an external graphics card.

Asus actually came up with the idea first on a project called the XG Station. Gigabyte just turned their version into a docking station and also into a project that didn't fail. Good Job.

Cool.

Dual ATi 5890's on a Acer Aspire One anyone?

The GPU might only have a PCIe x1 connection to the graphics. If it does, then anything faster than the GT220 will be bandwidth limited. Now, if they used the new intel CPUs with integrated graphics when undocked and then used the available PCIe x16 lanes for the external GPU (if such a mobile chipset allows this and exists), then that would be nice!

That's a really, really good idea. I never comment on news here but this is great - I am a college student, and I would like to take a small laptop with good battery life to school. If I could simply add an external GPU when I got home, it would safe having a desktop. That's the only reason I have a desktop and laptop - gaming laptops are prohibitively expensive compared to gaming desktops.

For now, they developped the 220. Who says they won't do it for the ATI line in the future? This is more like a proof of concept for now.

I'm liking this, hope to see more like it in the future.

Hm.. I remember the old Apple Powerbook Duo's docking station that had it's own videocard seperate from what the PB Duo had onboard. It also allowed up to 2 NUBUS videocards to be added, for a total of 3 monitors. Plus space for another SCSI harddrive. So I'd say they were closer to the first than Asus, etc.

Hm.. I remember the old Apple Powerbook Duo's docking station that had it's own videocard seperate from what the PB Duo had onboard. It also allowed up to 2 NUBUS videocards to be added, for a total of 3 monitors. Plus space for another SCSI harddrive. So I'd say they were closer to the first than Asus, etc.

I like the concept, but it will be expensive (maybe too much) to attach a powerful GPU with a Notebook (power reqs. and special case). Also, we need more details of how they're making it work IMO.

Cheers!

This is a good start. Looking forward to user-serviceable docking stations where you can swap the graphics card to whatever is the latest and greatest.

i've been waiting for this...
but now my laptop is broken cuz of an overheating Nvidia 9600m gt.
Thanks Nvidia.

It's think it's a smart move, because now on there are plenty powerful notebooks out there that could easily handle the PCIe x16 lines, there for with a good CPU and ram running inside, they could even manage to give the buyers a standard docking station for those who want to change GPUs overtime and still be able to play nice games, of course i wouldn't spend much time waiting for that kind of tech, they actually may want to sell more notebooks rather to sell the docking stations my guess. But well.. As I see it gaming notebooks are not as interesting as a desktop PC is for me, too expensive, too much limitations and face it who wants to buy a gaming notebook who will not last longer than 2 years running good games and that will lose about 3/4 of it's initial worth... to resell. Again, I'm seeing this in a gamer who builds his own PC.

In short: Why not provide an "empty" docking station with a PCIe x16 slot leaving the user at the discretion of installing an optional 5870 or any PCIe based GPU he would desire?

all they need now is to make one with tablet and multi-touch and I'm sold.

I believe the Toshiba Dynadock USB docking station has a built in video card. You can dock any laptop via USB to it and it'll output to two separate DVI ports in full 1920x1200 res to each. Not exactly gaming quality, but I've found it does preform well.

It doesn't need anything drastically more powerful that a 220, maybe a 5770 at most (any more and I think it will begin to get CPU limited with the c2d). It only has a 14-inch, 1366 x 768 resolution screen unless you buy a monitor for it. Anyways, I am sure this thing will be crazy expensive. I think it would still make since to have a separate desktop and cheaper laptop. But for those who want to spend the money, knock yourself out - it is a cool idea in theory.

I'm sure someone will do it. I never liked the idea of ditching parts (eg optical drives) and just using an external 'when you needed it,' but this is definitely an idea I could get behind. Like so many people have pointed out, definitely handy for those who like to game occasionally but don't want to haul around a super heavy laptop.

I am curious as to why they chose the Core 2 Duo SU7300 (1.3 GHz)....

I will say this is a good idea if you have a mobile core i7 or C2Q. I don't think they will ever have a dock for 5870, 5970, etc. They are just too big, too hot (for a dock), and require to much power (it would have to have a large power adapter which would further increase the cost).

That is a great idea to put the video card in the docking station. Since the video card adds weight and drains power, why not put it in the docking station! Excellent idea, I see this catching on with other vendors.

Hm. I like this idea but I'm pretty nervous at the same time. This could be a really cool device for people who want a mobile machine but would also like to play games when they are at home. But, it could also be an excuse that laptop makers use to stop designing laptops with powerful internal GPUs and just direct the customer to buying one of these docks for a separate cost.

I'm puzzled as to why they chose the SU7300 to show off the GPU. That's not a very fast processor at all. I'm also pretty interested to know why they went with the GT220. Methinks this will be pretty bandwidth limited for the time being.