ATI XGP (eXternal Graphics Platform) Radeon 5830 Demo At CES

[Apoptosis]

ATI's XGP technology (eXternal Graphics Platform) is an external graphics solution for notebook PCs. ATI XGP is designed to deliver enthusiast-class graphics performance, true multimedia upgradeability and multiple connectivity options, revolutionizing GPU performance on a notebook PC equipped with an external PCI Express 2.0 connector. This video is of a demo system that they had setup at CES 2010 showing off Radeon 5830 graphics.

[shamrok3]

Cool! I can see this going far, although it does rather defeat the purpose of having a 'portable' notebook. I, myself have no use for is (9800 GTS 1GB in my laptop) but the applications for people with netbooks/low end laptops are great. I wonder when nVidia is going to steal this?

[skier]

i could totally use it, my laptop has a 2GHz Intel Dual core with 3GB Ram and, you guessed it, Intel integrated graphics i think this is a great concept, and hope it gets to be released for retail

[shamrok3]

Skier, it already is out! Just very very limited. I think one laptop supports it, and the XGP is like a 3000 Series.

[mx6er2587]

its a shame this can't interface with a normal express card slot. I know lots of people who would love to plug their current laptops into an xgp and monitor for gaming at home and then just unplug them and take the computer with them when they needed to.

It's a nice idea if it catches on but I fear the required hardware support on the laptop manufactures part may kill this idea again.

[DMB2000uk]

Sadly the expresscard slot doesn't have enough bandwidth for it to be feasable, which is probably why Asus never released their version of external graphics card that used an expresscard interface.

I've used an original Fujitsu XGP laptop (an Amilo sa3650 with an ATI Mobility HD3870) and I've got to say, the setup really does work, but like you said, it really needs to take off with hardware support, which I really hope it does.

Dan

[shamrok3]

What they really need is some like USB 3.0/eSata Hybrid + More to make it feasible.

[hark]

Cool! I can see this going far, although it does rather defeat the purpose of having a 'portable' notebook. I, myself have no use for is (9800 GTS 1GB in my laptop) but the applications for people with netbooks/low end laptops are great. I wonder when nVidia is going to steal this?

Well it's not like ATI is the first to make an external graphics device.