How do you want your next laptop to be built?

Yeah, you definitely don't want to brick the EC. That's generally not a super easy fix like a system BIOS or vBIOS brick.

 

I don't mean to sound like a selfish, greedy entitled jerk, however you do NOT know my life. So you really should not say this to me.
i'm disabled. i have a metal bar in my spine with extreme swelling. I may die in a few years. I've been homeless almost half my life. I have my own issues to deal with. And I'd like to have a little hapiness or good news for once, instead of always roadblocks or bad news. Yes I made a poor choice but I've made much, much worse. I can barely EAT food. I'm weak as hell. I'm extremely skinny. I have to force myself to eat. Sometimes I have to take tramadol just to be able to eat. Sometimes that isn't enough. I can't even ENJOY my day without having pain 24/7 and being unable to sleep because of pain. a GT73VR 7RE with an unlocked EC would be 1 less thing for me to worry about and would help me to at least be able to SMILE a little bit instead of having yet another stress on top of all the OTHER stress I have.

You really shouldn't blindly judge others when you don't know who they are. I'm probably the absolutely worst, most pathetic gamer and overclocking in all of these and overclock.net forums. Everyone else has all these shiny rigs, nice pads and well kept places for their battlestations and supercharged hardware.

I'm sorry if you feel I'm begging for an unlocked EC and complaining all the time.
@Mr. Fox @Prema @Papusan @Mobius 1 @ryzeki

 

I've never thought that. If I were in your shoes I would want what I have to work correctly as well. There is really no excuse for it not to. If they buggered it up on purpose, that's even worse.

 

Now relax a bit, he never stated that he knows ur life, he merely said the following:
- It's a known issue which you could have prevented by informing urself better
- Desktop based Notebooks also have issues, if not worse issues than your current one
- Be happy with it, despite throttling it is still a great performer.
- Other people work with far less than what you got and would fall on they knees and beg for just a couple of ours playtime on it.

I know people who have nothing, they try to play games on Core i5 5200U notebooks with 720M GPU's which are enjoying games with horrid resolutions, FPS etc.

Also I wouldn't worry to much, it's only a matter of time until svet whipps out a fix, he's a russian beast. If I were in your shoes I'd start and see if there are other solutions to fix your problem. Maybe considering undervolting your GPU. Sure a TDP of 150W is nice and all, but it's not needed on a GTX 1070, you could settle with 125W and that alone may be enough to run the system stable. Honestly you can literally play any game maxed out. Right now your issue isn't the maximum power draw, it's more that you didn't finetune it yet. I'm pretty sure you can overclock both the GPU and CPU while still staying within the limits and gaining acceptable results.

So don't get emotional over your sitation, I know it sucks, but you shouldn't let it out on hmscott, it's not his fault alright? So chill a bit and look at what you can work with, that way you can find a nice balance where you can be satisfied with the results, once svet whipped out his fix, then you can go even further.

Oh and one thing before I forget it:

You are the person that makes his own happiness. You decide wheter or not u're happy. I personally am a happy human being because I choose to be. There are tons of people who are unhappy, even tho they got a big house, wife, children, decent job etc, still they complain about everything, yet there are happy people who live on the street and are about to die because of hunger as well. If you really want more happiness in your life, then start appreciating the small things in life, start being happy that you're not homeless anymore, be happy that you do have a throttling MSI notebook, that despite throttling literally runs every game on ultra anyways, that you're alive.

 

Am fine with BGA as long as it's reasonably cool (preferably around 85-86*C as max temps during gaming), reasonably quiet (current laptop runs at about 41dB(A) and is a fully-powered chip. No Max-Q/ULV crap.

 

I would want an ultrabook with Thunderbolt 3 and ULV is fine. 13-14" matte screen size, with ample battery size (at least 50Wh).
Would like good cooling design(max temp 70C) and case that doesn't get roasting on the bottom.

 

ULV cpus are bottleneck for egpus. check the dell latitude 5480 with i7-7820hq and 940mx. it is not an ultrabook (14" and 1.776 kg/ 62.65 oz / 3.92 pounds) but it has a 68 Wh battery and thunderbolt 3 port

 

sadly they have VERY dim screen, so I might instead wait for Coffee Lake to come up, if Intel makes TB3 readily available.

Sent from my HUAWEI VNS-L31 using Tapatalk

 

The problem with TB3's interface is that it limits anything above a 1060 making the whole endeavour semi-meaningless. Currently, Alienware's proprietary connector is the best eGPU solution on the market as it runs the PCIe lanes through the CPU rather than the slow chipset like TB3.

 

Hmm r u saying that TB3 has its own chipset?

Sent from my HUAWEI VNS-L31 using Tapatalk

 

No, I mean that, if I recall correctly, TB3 uses the chipset's PCIe lanes rather than the CPU thus being painfully slow for anything above a 1060.

 

Guys, it's a KNOWN ISSUE BECAUSE I'M THE ONE WHO FOUND THE ISSUE MYSELF.

NO ONE ELSE KNEW before me.
Why? Because there was no such thing as a TDP modded GTX 1070...

It's really disgusting to blame the victim and assume that type of circular logic...

"hey it's a known issue because YOU FOUND OUT about the issue therefore it's your fault for buying a laptop with an issue that NO ONE Could have possibly known about before since it wasn't possible at the time to test for it".

Come on people.

4 am in the morning and I simply could not get these comments out of my mind...

I'll say it one more time if it wasn't clear enough to begin with.

I'M THE ONE WHO FOUND OUT ABOUT THE PROBLEM.
I read each and every single post about the GT73VR in its own thread before making my purchase to buy it. No I didn't know about the clevo systems yet (now I do), but there was NO mention of such a max AC power limit problem on the GT73VR because there was NO WAY TO EVEN TEST for such an issue before the TDP mod came out for the Pascal video cards. You can't draw 240W of AC Power with a 115W video card, without pulling 100W through the CPU. And you aren't going to pull 100W through the CPU with this cooling system without it crashing or almost instantly reaching 100C.

This is why @hmscott 's comment pissed me off so much.
"I should have known about the issue..."

Yeah, the person who found out about the issue (me) should have known about the issue before anyone had the ability to find out about the issue....

the only originally KNOWN issue with the MSI firmware, found by @Prema and @Mr. Fox through debugging the barebones unit, was that forced PL2 throttling at 4.7 ghz-4.8 ghz, along with other stuff I never thought would affect me on a BGA unit.

 

There is something that confuses me.

You're saying the EC is setting a limit on power draw, but why is the 7RF version capable of running a GTX 1080? it's the exact same board, with the exact same EC firmware and the exact same BIOS. The 7RE and 7RF are both the exact same notebook, just with different card, with your logic the RE version should throttle hard. Which is doesn't.

How did you get to the conclusion that the EC is fault? I'm interested to know.

 

It detects the videocard then sets the absolute power limits And I didn't come to that conclusion. Prema found out himself when trying to fix MSI's cancer firmware in the F5 barebones. All credit goes to the Great One. @Prema

I wondered the same thing myself. The EC firmware is also what sets cutoff for "Hybrid Power", where it starts leeching power from the battery. These limits are not in the main Bios. That's why all of the boards use the exact same Bios and EC firmware. But yep, video card detection
If the 1080 is inserted, the EC will not start using hybrid power until about 250W of power draw. With the 1070, it's somewhere around 150W. Also at <30% on the battery, the EC will throttle CPU (not sure about videocard) hard if power draw reaches the "Hybrid" cutoff. (same thing happens if you disconnect the battery and try to run on pure AC power). it's the EC doing its magic

Originally I tried using negative IMON offsets to make the CPU report it is using less power than it really is. This can work to trick the Bios power limits from the CPU reporting less wattage (you can use this trick actually on the HQ processors) but not the EC! In one of my old posts, I thought it was fooling the EC, but I found out it was simply erratic power balancing issues from Chessbase/Stockfish. When I switched to Prime95, which actually puts an balanced load on everything, combined with Firestrike Stress test, my fun was over. When I tried using the Imon offset (maximum value which worked without 'resetting' was -31999), after some FS loops, the EC had decided to power cap the TDP at *25W* when Power Limit 1 got triggered and due to Imon offset, the 45W limit was still exceeding 230W (boy that was fun and interesting). And i was only running a *four thread* prime95, with AVX and FMA3 disabled, so power draw was realistic.

The EC firmware can override anything in the Bios, if it chooses.

 

I'm sorry for your situation, but it doesn't change what I said, and I'm not sorry I said it because it was said to help you.

You are asking for something no one has been able to do, and a lot of people have tried.

MSI after a huge push finally gave a small power increase concession to a few GT80S 980 SLI owners because it was clearly a case where MSI should have given 2x 330w PSU's to power it, and instead MSI made it work with 1x 330w PSU, which of course it couldn't - instead it pulled power from the battery at maximum rate for a short time to make up the performance shortfall.

MSI didn't recall the laptop, they didn't make a modification to retrofit 2x 330w PSU's, they didn't offer a trade-in to a new 2x 330w PSU powered GTX 1070/1080 laptop, they only offered what amounted to a 15w power bump through the single 330w - probably more than was available.

So I said those things to let you know you are banging your head against a wall and won't have success in this, and instead to change course and do something else.

Enjoy the laptop you have for what it can do, or sell it and get a more powerful laptop.

If I thought it was possible to help you get your laptop to do what you want I would offer suggestions or paths to success through other people, but there aren't any.

Try to work with whoever helps you with physical stuff to get them to return the laptop if possible - it might be possible given your condition if the vendor is told - and give a try with a GTX 1080 laptop.

There is a lot of help in this thread to get you set up with a LGA CPU + MXM 1080 laptop, 15" or 17".

Good luck

 

The thing is, an unlocked EC already exists. MSI has it. They admitted it in email. And I'm fine. I'm more concerned about wearing the battery out. I can keep the power draw under 230W but it's annoying to get that GPU power limit flag and the battery is getting hit pretty hard.

The only reason I got upset was because i felt that you attacked me by saying that "I should have known about this problem by research" when it was me who found out about the problem in the first place (only possible because of the Pascal Bios Editor).

 

Yup, MSI effectively said the same thing to the GT80S 980 SLI guys too, but they wouldn't release it for safety reasons.

These laptops are designed with certain engineering limits and exceeding those limits would expose them to liabilities - multiplied by the number of units shipped - that could quickly make a huge dent in their costs.

Also, they've learned the hard lesson that many still need to learn, you can't trust customers with unreleased software anymore. The internet and ease of exchange of software has over the years turned against the better nature of people, and they will upload and share stuff that's not supposed to be shared with hardly a thought. And, companies lose control of their product that way.

I'm old school, and don't share alpha or beta code, or anything that costs money or requires registration - so basically nothing except Open Source software that's meant to be shared.

There are a couple of tricks, you've probably already tried, but in case you haven't... put the power / OC where you want it, don't split it over everything else.

OC the CPU to find out how far it will go, then undervolt it, then set it back at stock and move to the GPU. OC the VRAM until it sparkles and then back off note the settings and put it back at default. OC the GPU core for stability and note the settings.

Now you can choose which OC you want for which game and mix and match as power allows.

To power the max GPU core might not allow CPU OC or VRAM OC at the same time, and MAX CPU OC might not allow either MAX GPU OC or GPU VRAM all at once.

All you can do is make the best of the power budget you have and dole it out to the part you need OC'd the most.

Just so you know, there have been instances where people have unlocked their power limits and fried their GPU, CPU, wires, power supply, board traces, and random VRAM / power parts, so if you look at it that way, you are avoiding a whole host of worries, just like MSI is doing

 

Whether you found the posts or not, it's a known problem. People have done the simple test of plugging in a 330w PSU and tried to solve power issues and found that the laptop doesn't draw even an extra watt from the wall.

Relax, I wasn't attacking you, I was letting you know the lay of the land and giving you realistic options.

Let it go and move on, there's plenty of alternative laptops out there, or the opportunity to accept you've hit the limit with your laptop and enjoy it as is.

There's nothing to do about it, so let it go. Every laptop has a limit that once reached and realized, at some point it won't be something you can do something about, every laptop.

So be happy with what you've got, the other choice is this anger which isn't the purpose of a gaming laptop, it's supposed to provide joy and happiness, let it.

 

You've had a really tough life from what I've read, don't let a BGA notebook ruin your remaining sanity, it sounds like you've really tweaked it as much as you can, enjoy it for what it is if you can. I'm the same way with my desktop, I suppose I'm a bit obsessive in some ways, and I'll keep testing different fan configurations & different fans to try & get the lowest temps, and after a while it drives me up the wall when I realise I've not got anywhere! I've since realised I need a better/different case if I want better cooling, and there you are with your laptop where you've probably reached a limit to how you can tweak it too.

 

Had to look this one up, that is the smallest laptop I have heard of with the 7820, but it's not an HK and it's only 35w, so not sure how it fits into the range of performance to be expected from a CPU.

Intel® Core™ i7-7820HQ (Quad Core, 2.9GHz up to 3.9GHz, 8M Cache, 35W, CTDP) Windows 10/Linux only

Here's the link I found:
http://www.dell.com/en-us/work/shop...7/spd/latitude-14-5480-laptop/cto03hl548014us

I'd want more CPU performance info and TB3 GPU performance results - maybe set up a test and give it whirl to see what's what? @pdagal ?

 

@hmscott
That CPU has a 45W TDP, just like the 7700HQ. 35W is 'TDP down'. I don't even know how to use TDP Down. TDP Up apparently can only be used on Extreme Edition processors (?)

 

It is what I was talking about!

 

From Intel's handy ark entry for the 7820HQ:
https://ark.intel.com/products/97496/Intel-Core-i7-7820HQ-Processor-8M-Cache-up-to-3_90-GHz

" Configurable TDP-down
Configurable TDP-down is a processor operating mode where the processor behavior and performance is modified by lowering TDP and the processor frequency to fixed points. The use of Configurable TDP-down is typically executed by the system manufacturer to optimize power and performance. Configurable TDP-down is the average power, in watts, that the processor dissipates when operating at the Configurable TDP-down frequency under an Intel-defined, high-complexity workload."

If Dell are quoting CDP of 35w and not mentioning 45w TDP, then I assume it's always limited to CDP of 35w due to the thin chassis.

It's possible that you could unlock it? But, in that frame with that cooling it's likely not designed for the 10w bump.

Also since it's HQ and not HK, it's likely all locked down except for undervolting.

 

If you're looking for the smallest thing with a 7820HK that's probably the Aorus X3 v7. It comes with a 1060, as well. That whole lineup is another nice example of power starved units. I've been hanging around their subsection looking at Kaby Lake units, and it's common for them not to be able to hold a CPU/GPU overclock simultaneously because they'll choke on power limits, even if you try a 330W PSU. The X5, which ships with the same CPU and either a full fat 1070 or 1080-mq gets either a 200W or 230W PSU, I believe. I'm guessing it will take many of you only a second to realize that's not close to enough to give the system the juice it can potentially demand.

 

This would be better http://hwbot.org/submission/3613447_ ThreadRipper 1950X @ 5.2GHz or 5.4GHz http://hwbot.org/submission/3622692_ in P870 with 1080 SLI

 

Or, even better yet... TR killer... 7960X @ 5.5GHz
Cinebench R15: http://hwbot.org/submission/3629660_
wPrime 32M: http://hwbot.org/submission/3629663_

 

This is the one I find really amazing to have any votes at all. Other than a mechanical HDD, GPU is the component with the highest likelihood of failure before you are ready to retire an otherwise healthy machine. I am basically flabbergasted that anyone is OK with that and would choose it on purpose. I expected to see the option above it (BGA CPU + MXM) be right behind the top one.

 

FWIW thanks to Intel forcing iGPU on absolutely everything, faulty dGPU does not render most machines useless anymore - they are still good for most tasks, as long as dGPU is disabled in BIOS or OS. And boy, is MXM pricey! A working motherboard with dGPU soldered may actually cost less than an MXM module carrying the same dGPU, at least in some parts of the world.

I do not want to undermine the importance of MXM. The idea is great, absolutely positively yes. But honestly - its realization is too lacking to force MXM everywhere, at least in my opinion. It's not much of a standard per se, there are too many problems that come with it. And it was like that since its very introduction; MXM was plagued with compatibility problems right from the start!

 

Best fix is to get rid of the junk bro @Falkentyne. MSI was the major idea Box for Frank Azor and his dear Dellienware. Remember the 180W psu and 980M + Hybrid bios ? Yeah, all should by now knowing MSi always crippling their laptops JokeBook's with cancer like Battery Turbo Boost!!


Edit. FYI. @Falkentyne has worked hard and now have learned how to swim. +rep

 

Really? I didn't know that. Maybe I have been fortunate to have had a relatively trouble-free MXM experience all of these years. Maybe it was the brand of machines I have used have not been nearly as finicky as some others might be. Until MSI and Clevo started pulling goofy shenanigans to intentionally mess us up with GPUs that won't fit, it has been an amazing and wonderful experience for me.

Yes, if he can manage to do that without taking too big of a loss that would be best. Just get rid of it and chalk it up as an expensive lesson learned. From things I have experience myself and seen with others, I do not intend to ever give MSI any of my money for anything in the future, including desktop parts. The crap they pull with their cancer laptop firmware is absolutely unforgivable. I thought Clevo was stupid (and still do) but nowhere close to as retarded as the MSI power gimping crap. Alienware did the same stupid stunt with the Alienware 18 (Viking) to where it would ignore any power provided to it beyond the capacity of the 330W AC adapter. It only takes once and I'm done with idiots like that... screw 'em. I only need to see one example of a outfit run by losers to scratch them off my list.

 

I'm pretty sure the Intel® Core ™ i7-7820HQ has some unlocked bin. But not 100% sure how many bin are available for the Tragedy. But I mean at least i7-7920Hq have 4 bin. Probably the same for i7-7820Hq. I think the low entry model of the BGA junk i7-6700hq for Skylake and i7-7700hq for Kaby is fully locked down. Although this is called High end by reviewers

http://hwbot.org/submission/3599927_stratoscz_xtu_core_i7_7820hq_1160_marks

Normal clocks for 7820hq is (4 cores up to 3.5 GHz, 2 cores up to 3.7 GHz).

 

That's because everything mainstream is more pathetic i3 or i5 with no unlocked bins. So, high end is only a relative term and not an actual indicator of excellence.

 

I think Master @Papusan is right.
I forgot the 7920HQ existed.
Looks like it can do 4.3 ghz on all cores.
Big question is, can it even exceed the TDP? Because HQ processors are supposed to have power limit ranges between minimum and "TDP Limit" while HK / K processors have power limits between min and "package_SKU_Limit" (MSR) or something. The only way the 7700HQ can exceed 45W TDP is by hacking the EC and changing ALL of the power limits (including the MCHBAR *and* PECI ones).

BTW this topic has gone the way of the Titanic, as far as following the thread is concerned. Now we're discussing BGAbooks inflicting us with Klingon Pain Sticks! Ouch.

If anyone wants to go into outerspace with me into Warp Drive, anyone have any idea how I can use RW Everything to change or disable the 230W power cap in EC Ram ? (can't brick that way) Is that even possible? @Mr. Fox @Prema ? Am I having a fairy tale?

 

Boy, has it ever. We (including me) should stop it. This happens in almost every thread.

 

Well there has been some useful information, including some things I never knew and I'm grateful for that
And grateful for your, Prema's and Papusan's help as well.

 

I expected way more people to go with the last option in the poll. There's still plenty of people on this site who only want long battery life, a great screen, and a good port selection, because the most demanding things they do are watch videos and maybe some Excel sheets with VBA.

 

I am one of them.

Thunderbolt 3 is fine for me, despite its limitations. I do not play very intensive games, so I hope this gets widely available from Coffee Lake. I prefer carrying ultrabooks / portable laptops with better battery life.

 

Well, that's very smart if that's all they need it for. If I were not interested in overclocked benching and a nice AAA game title now and then, that's all I would have for a laptop. I'd spend as little as humanly possible on web browsing, watching online videos, email and Micro$lop Office activities.

Anything more than this is a waste of money for that kind of stuff. In fact, this is a little more than I would prefer to spend for a mainstream notebook. But, it's still cheap enough that I can laugh all the way to the bank and back home again. This is a perfectly acceptable, appropriately priced and very intelligent use for BGA junk. I'd use it until it broke or I just got sick of it, then toss it into a dumpster and get a new one. If the price starts to go north of $500 that's about where I start viewing it as pathetic BGA filth.

 

My current daily laptop (HP Elitebook 820 G2) was gotten for $500 + tax. Well worth the premium over that Walmart special due to the business-class build quality and (for those who need it) business-grade aftersales support.

 

I suppose the people that chose that option were thinking: MXM notebooks are not really upgradeable to next gen GPU, what's the point in MXM as long as I'm getting full performance from the GPU. Of course there's the argument for replacing just the GPU if the GPU dies when using MXM, but I think people expect these goods to be reliable over the 3-5yrs (or less) that they keep the laptop. Also, a good number of people are happy with the performance level of a BGA CPU - from a gaming perspective they don't really limit your gaming fun, at least at 60Hz, but with a 120Hz gaming notebook then you'd probably want a desktop CPU in there. Now if there was laptop manufacturer out there that would purposefully design a notebook with the upgradeability factor of a desktop, in terms of future compatibility with future GPU generations, then MXM would be all it could be!

Oh, not that dreaded NOS power rubbish! I remember when this was first marketed, I was just thinking that this was poor, lazy, and inadequate engineering masquerading & marketed as a performance enhancer & added bonus for the consumer. A terrible idea, I mean who wants to drain their battery while it's plugged in and gaming, then when you're done with your gaming session you unplug your laptop to do some mobile work & find that the battery is probably sitting at 40% or something, not to mention the extra burden it places on the battery & thereby shortening it's useful life!

I think Falkentyne can still enjoy his laptop though, I mean after all it'll play games just fine, he shouldn't feel like he has to buy a new laptop - I mean if money grows on trees then why not, otherwise....

 

This has got me thinking, what's the most consecutive graphics generations that a notebook has been able to have its GPU upgraded? Going back to the i7 920 + GTX 1060, if I had such a rig I'd probably wait for whatever architecture follows Volta before upgrading. That'd be an 10-12 year useful life for that i7 920, starting with Tesla, and living on through Fermi, Kepler, Maxwell, Pascal, and Volta before being put out to pasture once Volta's successor arrives. This life cycle is probably out of the question for laptop CPUs, BGA or not, due to a lack of thermal headroom. But regardless, if you told me I'll be able to upgrade my GPU multiple generations out, that'd be very exciting to me. Guaranteeing only the generation subsequent to what the laptop is equipped with is a lot less exciting.

 

3 generations is the max I think (or 4, not sure), and that title belongs to the Alienware M15x from I think 2009'ish - Fermi (as shipped)/Kepler/Maxwell. The original M15x was an outlier though, other Alienware notebooks could sometimes do two generations max I think, e.g. my M17xR3 shipped with Fermi, and I upgraded to Kepler (with workarounds & compromises, unofficial upgrade!), but wasn't compatible with Maxwell unfortunately. As notebook technology is becoming more & more locked down, the chances of compatibility with next gen GPUs is diminishing. At the moment I don't see an MXM notebook as a means to further upgrade the GPU with future generations of GPU down the line - to me MXM currently just means the ability to swap your GPU out if it fails with either the same GPU or the next GPU up from the same generation.

 

There was a wide range of upgrade and downgrade functionality. Flexibility to use almost whatever you felt like using was really nice. Alienware M18xR1 worked with 6970M/6990M, 480M, 580M, 7970M, 680M, 780M, 880M. Alienware M18xR2 also worked fine with all of those GPUs and 980M. There were some Clevos that can make the same claim to fame and then some. @Prema even had a 1060 in his P150EM. If I am remembering correctly, M17xR2 (Gen1 Core i7) got upgraded from 4870M all the way up through 7970M and 680M. So, a lot more than 3 @Robbo99999.

 

Successful MXM GPU Upgraded Laptops
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/successful-mxm-gpu-upgraded-laptops.805136/




.

 

It's not really more than 3 generations of GPU though is it. Your M18xR1 you listed: 480/580M are both Fermi, 680M/780M/880M are all Kepler, so for that example that's only 2 generations of NVidia GPUs. Your M18xR2 worked with the same GPUs as previously mentioned plus the 980M, so that's 3 generations of NVidia GPU. So, I don't see "a lot more than 3" like you said? (unless you count 680M - 780M - 880M as different generations, but they're not really, it's all Kepler). EDIT: and unfortunately I don't really see that trend happening in the future.

 

alienware m17x r4

GTX 680M ---------------> GTX1070

-m17x r4 with MSI Gtx1070 https://www.techinferno.com/index.p...x-r4-another-socket-victory-against-bga-crap/
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...other-socket-victory-against-bga-crap.803637/

 

680M (Kepler) => Maxwell => Pascal = 3 generations.

To be honest, the ability to upgrade to 3 generations of GPU is nothing to sniff at, but a lot of those upgrades come with compromises/hacks, but I'd be surprised if current MXM laptops will retain the ability to upgrade in the same way to later generations of GPU.

 

yes, not bad

 

I don't count it that way. I include product refreshes in "generations" of GPUs. Going forward between GPU models is an upgrade and that counts for a lot without a change in GPU chipset. I also did not mention the GPU models in between like 660M and 675M (as only two examples). Any time you increase performance it is an upgrade.

You don't have to go from Fermi to Kepler, and Kepler to Maxwell to count it as an upgrade, and you can throw ATI/AMD into the mix. Today we consider 1060, 1070 and 1080 as an ascension path. And, it is all about user choice and flexibility as much as upgrade. If you had one of those machines that experienced a GPU failure and had a spare older GPU, you could use it if you felt like it. You would not have to replace the motherboard and CPU. Flexibility and autonomy are as important as upgrades. With MXM and a good underlying product you have the ability to upgrade or downgrade, or side grade. With BGA you're just screwed.

 

Fair enough, but I don't see the incremental upgrades between 680M/780M/880M as particularly countable/worthy/significant, but you can see it that way if you choose of course. It's not really financially practical to buy a laptop for gaming with a 680M, and then upgrade to 780M, or the same is true from GTX 1070 to GTX 1080, it's not really worth the hassle & expense for a small incremental upgrade - that's why I don't count those as "upgrades" in our discussion of MXM - I count true generational upgrades as "upgrades" - from Kepler to Maxwell to Pascal, where the biggest performance differences are seen - where the hassle & expense of the upgrade make more sense.