Will we ever get external video cards for laptops?

[Dickie Dee]

Am I the only one that would find this to be an ideal solution? Laptops are have been getting sleeker and sezzier for a while now but gaming desktop replacements are still big, clunky and fugly.

I like/love my ROG G73 but it seems to be on it's last legs and I don't think I can bring myself to get another one like it. Never thought I'd be one to trade performance for form factor but here we are.

I've been wanting some sort of external enclosure for GPUs forever now. Understanding the difficulties in establishing a new standard to use (Blah blah, niche market, network effects, barriers to entry....), is there anyone that could make money with this?

Don't mean to be *that* guy asking for something wildly impractical and dumb. Just a big fat port and an external enclosure to connect to it. That's all I'm friggin asking.

[Dickie Dee]

dp

[cool breeze]

I think there was a sony (or samsung?) laptop that tried this years ago, but I guess it hasn't caught on if we're not hearing about it today.

I'm with you on this.  If I didn't have to switch between my laptop and desktop to cover all my bases, that would certainly be nice.

[Stoney Mason]

Yeah I never understood how this concept never caught on.

[ToxicAdam]

I'm not technically savvy, but wouldn't it have to be more of a docking port with a specialized cable?

Seems like the trend is heading towards more of a miniaturized desktop (ala Steambox) than this solution.

 

[Sho Nuff]

PCMCIA for GPUs would be hot like fire

[G The Resurrected]

There's been a lot of prototypes, but they all had the same issues. Data speeds required to give you a smooth seamless experience just weren't there yet. But now it is: http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2013/06/06/silverstone-external-graphics-card-case-deb/

[maxy]

Nope.

[Positive Touch]

  a fellow g73 brother