Is XPS 17 (L702X) GPU Upgrade?

I just got my new laptop and am wondering was this a good buy and is the gpu on the laptop upgradeble.Am a gamer and mostily a hardcore one but i want to be mobile, but i want something that will last me years and not be limited. Please help me make thing clear for me. i still have time to return it.

 

No unfortunately not. Only about 3% of laptops sold can upgrade the graphics via MXM or some proprietary version of it. What's more compatibility declining between OEM cards and say Dell branded MXM cards (Alienware cards).

XPS 17 has the GPU soldered onto the motherboard, the fastest being the GT555M. There are better laptops for the same price range as the XPS 17 that have a much better card, like the Sager NP8170.

 

what soldered? and would you say this isnt a good gaming laptop? I am also tring to keep it on a 1700$ under budget.

 

Also is there a way we can chat, am facinated with computer and laptop and i want to be able to expand my knowledge with this technology and i believe you can help me with that. thank you

 

As said its soldered to the mobo. Look here for info and benchmarks on the card NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M - Notebookcheck.net Tech

Im a gamer and feel this card serves me well, i can play any game so far maxed out with atleast 30 fps apart from the most demanding ones like crysis and metro 2033.

The sagers are a lot more expensive, dont look as good, not as good speakers and i question there quality. But the gpu's are generally better.

 

If for game, please buy alienware. or other lower price brand, such as Asus G Series.
All display Card come with high-end GTX-570-580. the nvidia card GT series without 'X', all is mid-end, for multimedia.

If, xps good for real gamer, dell not need release alienware for game.

for notebook think what you want to do ? choice you right series.

on the next one-two year, game performance on 3d mark 06 >20000.
crysis and metro one and 2 year may release crysis 3 and metro 2066, you think that enough ?

GT555M, not current only 12xxx. and GT540M, just overclock to GT555M, not more special.

you also can ref, game, cpu history.

GPU market 3 month update one time, Notebook gpu can't update, you can't just think 'now' !

 

As has been said, you CANNOT upgrade the GPU on the XPS 17. In fact, even on the rare system that is upgradable, the upgrades are limited because the interface standard keeps changing, and there is likely another one soon to emerge.

For mild/casual gaming, the XPS 17 is plenty with the 555m. You won't pull 60fps on the newest game in max detail, but they are all plenty runnable. A heavily-tricked out XPS 17 will run you around $1300-1350 before warranties and taxes, depending on the coupons you find. There are sometimes coupons floating around for $350 off a $1600 system, so if you configure the BASE system to what you want and apply the coupon (the other "upgraded" base systems will lose their discount with this coupon, but you make out better this way anyway), plus the $100 off one that is usually around, you can make out pretty well. My system in sig. (minus the SSD and only with 4GB RAM) came in right around $1500 this way, and I got 2-year full accidental warranty coverage.

You can get a Sager 17" with the GTX 560m, a much better GPU, for around $1700 through Xotic or the like, but honestly I like the build quality and the overall look of the XPS.

 

GT 555M gets beat in some benchmarks by a 260M, a 3 year old video card.

If you are a casual gamer, or want to play the latest and greatest but not in the highest detail/resolution, the GT555M is perfectly fine. But if you want to game at the highest detail/resolution then the GT555M is not sufficient.

I hope you know Sager rebrands Clevo, which from what I have seen have some of the better build qualities out there. I don't recall exactly who makes XPS for Dell, but they outsource it to an ODM. Sager's upgrade AND warranty prices are VERY fair. 150 dollars gets you 3 year warranty through Clevo resellers, parts and labor. There is not an accidental damage warranty offered, but 3 years parts and labor on an XPS would be alot more.

Basically there are only 4 major gaming brands that offer "upgradable" video cards, Clevo rebrands, Alienware, MSI, certain Toshiba. ASUS newest G74 series are now soldered onto the motherboard, no more ASUS proprietary reverse MXM video cards. Acer stopped using MXM after Intel's Huron River (1st generation Core i series). Several high end mobile workstations utilize MXM but are more restrictive in terms of vBIOS flashing, Lenovo's W series, Dell's Precision line and HP's Elitebook W series.

 

I think it depends what your preferences are when gaming. I play at 1600x900 res and think its awesome but a desktop gamer would be probably playing at double that. It also depends what fps you are happy with as again coming from a console im happy with 30fps, but a desktop gamer would prob want atleast 60fps. I feel the 555 easily beats my ps3 which most ps3 games only support 720p, playing at 900 res with atleast 30fps for me is very good. I can play at 768 res which i think is fine aswell. So overall i think it highly depends on the users needs as to what card is good for them.

Thanks for the info on clevo/lenevo but in the uk we have a 20% tax rate so they work out quite a bit more expensive than dell. And their also not as widely available. So us uk users probably get channeled into the bigger brands, so forgive my lack of knowledge of smaller branded systems. But if i were buying a notebook again, i would still buy the l702x.

 

Agree.XPS is killer.And as far as i know no clevo and sager for Europe.And problem with MXM slot is that no one sell such cards.5-6 mont ago i search for such cards and find in ebay 9800 gtx wich is no update

 

You can get a Sager through a reseller such as Xotic PC or Mythlogic, I know at the very least Xotic ships internationally to pretty much anywhere. But there is still the tax mentioned earlier.

The l702x is a solid system, not meant for hard-core gaming. For what most people do though, it is sufficient. Can it play Crysis in FHD at 60fps? No, but few systems can anyway. And this thing weighs about half of an Alienware of comparable size...

 

I've overclocked the 555M... now it beats the GTX460M in some benchmarks, it's not a better card, but suppose it depends on what you're looking for

for me the GT555m is the best of both worlds, and I'd rather pay £1000 now for a laptop that will play all the latest games for the next year or two (until the inevitable ps4/nextbox release kicks the graphics war into overdrive again) and then another £1000 in a couple of years for a laptop that would beat any £2000+ laptop I'd be buying now

depends how much you have to spend, what you want the laptop for, how long you want the laptop to be ahead of the curve - the l702x isn't top of the line in any sense, but a combination of design, audio quality and customisation options along with the fairly good performance of the GT555M and optimus technology basically makes it a great all-rounder imho

 

There are Clevo resellers in the UK. PC Specialists is one. Kobalt is another but I can't recommend them as they have been called out over shady business practices as of late.

 

What are you talking about? MXM Upgrade is one of the largest online site based in the EU that sells MXM cards. Sure 9800M GTX is an old card, affected by the Nvidia BGA issue, but the point is you just need to find out which MXM version you have.

Well again depends on your situation. If your budget is already 1300, why not spend it on something where you can at least have somewhat of an upgrade down the line? Also many Clevo resellers allow for you to buy barebones, only the motherboard/LCD + chassis. You can add in your own RAM, CPU, HDD, Windows COA, MXM card if you have 'em. You would just need to call them up and special order it.

 

thats mean we cant upgrade the gpu

 

I was looking for an upgrade too.
Well at least I can play MW3 and BF3 pretty good, but BF3 sometimes freezes, I think I will have to do a clean install of OS and drivers.
BTW, good answers, you are specialists!

 

Jon- Just wondering what OC 'ware you are using? Also, can you recom
mend settings? Thanks

 

Can the GPU be upgraded?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2

 

Lol ))) No Necromancer, can't be upgraded as stated in second post of this thread.

 

hi everyone....i have a problem,please help me my laptop:dell xps l702x .i7 2630qm,ramm 4gb.nvidia gt550m 1gb non 3d. my motherboard
burned.and i tried to upgrade my laptop with new motherboard,with gt555m 3gb.3d capable and with 4 diimm slots.after instaling new motherboard....put in my old cpu...ram 6gb,it turned on...cooler is working like crazy but screen is black...is not working.please help...i dont no what to do...is posible to install this motherboard..and what i have to do?