New External Video Card Solution - ViDock2

[Justin@XoticPC]

We have recently started selling the ViDock2 a External Express Card GPU Solution. The "Dock" holds Desktop ATI cards at this time. A nVIDIA Solution will be available in the near future along with more powerful ATI Cards. At the present time the maximum card supported is the ATI HD4670 512MB DDR3 GPU. We will be posting some scores with this item next week. This is a good solution for:
1. Those that want a small portable notebook with a lower end GPU for business or travel purpose and still want to game at the highest settings when needed.
2. Those who are unable to get a new notebook and have a older notebook with a older GPU and want to play the latest and greatest games on the market.
3. Those who want to keep up with the current GPU curve and continually upgrade the GPU in the dock rather then relying on upgrading the laptop. (as history has shown the limited upgradeability with mobile GPU's.)

Presently it only powers the external monitors. Soon there will be the ViDock 3 that will support cards like the ATI 4770 and the ViDock 4 that will support the biggest and fastest cards like the current ATI 4890.

The "Dock" has two DVI outs. Using these 2 DVI Outs on the ViDock along with the external display your laptop supports + your laptop display, you can have up to 4 Displays running simultaneously. (For the ultimate in productivity and multi tasking). :)

Here is a link to more info on the ViDock (http://www.xoticpc.com/vidock2-wati-hd4670-512mb-ddr3-upgradeable-external-express-card-graphics-card-controls-dual-external-displays-p-2593.html). We have it available in all configurators for every laptop under "External Graphics Card".

We anticipate on posting scores on this next week. :)

[powerpack]

You know this is what all mobile guys want and have waited for. The previous offerings just did not work. I hope this does.

But I truly fear that the bandwidth will not allow this to work for the gaming you mention. Why? Well PCIE 1.0 x16 has a theoretical bandwidth of 4,000MB/s? Express Card 250MB/s? Is that not a problem or do I connect the dots incorrectly?

I do hope it works and want those benches.

[fallenxlionheart]

i was curious about the same thing...i wonder how this issue is resolved

[Justin@XoticPC]

Here is some information provided directly from ViDock.

ViDock2 made huge efforts in designing/manufacturing their own cables for the ViDock. It has many special features, such as tight tolerances for impedance match, low loss for high frequencies, special mechanical construction so that daily mechanical use will not create intra pair length imbalance. Most importantly ViDock removed 4 connectors from the cable which are in any other design. This helped it to keep a clean eye diagram (no retires necessary with loss in speed) and they did not need to add PCIe switches (repeaters) to clean up the signal, which would cause latency thereby reducing speed for graphics cards.

Some have said that the single lane that ExpressCard provides you will not perform as well as when plugged into 16 lanes directly as supported by the ATi card in a Desktop. However we can demonstrate that Aero works just fine in 1 lane with all features. In addition, when testing with 3DMark06 it only looses 6.5 % on the same graphics card when using ViDock2 as opposed when plugged into 16 lane directly in a Desktop. So what they say is somewhat true, but only losing 6.5% still puts the desktop card's performance well above the same model laptop card.

[Anewbus]

:eek:Woah! Wait a minute! What is this I am reading!:wideeyed:
Are you kidding me?!:wideeyed:
You mean I could do this with my little Force3298?:wideeyed:
You mean eventually I could stick on a Nvidia 260GT or something on my little XoticPC Force with the 512MB 8600GT GPU in it currently? Would it support it and would this give me at least a DVI out port? (HDMI would be nice).

[Justin@XoticPC]

Your right Anewbus, you can even use it on your laptop. Here are some 3D Mark 06 Scores on a MSI 1651 (Force 3551) It was tested on. The MSI has a 9600M GT 512MB DDR3 and the ViDock2 has a ATI 4670 512MB DDR3. Both scores below:

[Anewbus]

Your right Anewbus, you can even use it on your laptop. Here are some 3D Mark 06 Scores on a MSI 1651 (Force 3551) It was tested on. The MSI has a 9600M GT 512MB DDR3 and the ViDock2 has a ATI 4670 512MB DDR3. Both scores below:

:biggrin:WOOHOO!!!!!!!:yes: *flip flip flip flip* :biggrin::yes::laugh::wink2::smile2::D

XoticPC :XPCS::notworthy:notworthy:notworthy

A little pricey currently and I would wait for the Nvidia version and the prices to come down a little. (I just have problems trusting ATI after my experiences with their desktop cards).
That said, I love this idea!!!!

[ahatfulofhollow]

I saw this the other night and had some questions that the crappy design of the ViDock website would not tell me.

I have a Thinkpad X41 ultraportable running Windows XP and an Intel 915 integrated chip. This thing *can* run WoW in all low settings at about 25fps while questing. I'd love to be able to plug an external card in via ViDock and run it on a TV if I go somewhere. I had read the first version of the ViDock on anything less than Windows 7 required an ATI card in the machine already because you could only run one set of drivers at a time. I cant tell if they fixed that with the ViDock 2 or not.

Would the ViDock 2 support a Windows XP machine with an Intel chipset like I described above?

Also this computer has what I believe to be a PCMCIA slot. I never use this slot so I know nothing about it... is it the same as an Expresscard slot? Would it work? If not, are there any converters out there that would do something like turn a USB 2.0 into an Expresscard slot?

[Hanzo]

It would be bad ass if you can Tri/Quad Sli your GPU's if you have a current high end laptop.

Like say the NP9850 dual Nvidia 280 GTXs + ViDock2 with another 1 or 2 Nvidia 280 GTXs.

Or am I only dreaming....?

[afrak]

i was wondering if this would work for an aging hp pavilion 8000. i cant find any information anywhere if the card slot is compatible with pcie 2. i bought this laptop 3-4 years ago and she has a trusty p4 hyper thread with 2 gigs of ram and right now is being used as a door stop because of its weight. i would love to hook it up to my 55 inch tv to play hw2 and sins of a solar empire but she cant handle 1920 x1080 would this vidock be a soultion to my problems it least to be able to get some moderate games running on my tv? thanks for your help.

[Woody]

i was wondering if this would work for an aging hp pavilion 8000. i cant find any information anywhere if the card slot is compatible with pcie 2. i bought this laptop 3-4 years ago and she has a trusty p4 hyper thread with 2 gigs of ram and right now is being used as a door stop because of its weight. i would love to hook it up to my 55 inch tv to play hw2 and sins of a solar empire but she cant handle 1920 x1080 would this vidock be a soultion to my problems it least to be able to get some moderate games running on my tv? thanks for your help.

I think you would get much better value by simply looking for a new computer. You can buy something for well under $1000 that would have considerably more power than your old P4 laptop.

[Kaidis]

Presently it only powers the external monitors. Soon there will be the ViDock 3 that will support cards like the ATI 4770 and the ViDock 4 that will support the biggest and fastest cards like the current ATI 4890.


umm...
So does this means ViDock2 doesn't support ATI 4770 or ATI 4890? There is a limitation for graphic card upgrade? Does this support nVIDIA?
:eeek2:

</B>

[powerpack]

umm...
So does this means ViDock2 doesn't support ATI 4770 or ATI 4890? There is a limitation for graphic card upgrade? Does this support nVIDIA?
:eeek2:

</B>Yes.:p:)

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