Upgrade to 8970m or 8990m ?

Hi,

This is my first new thread at NoteBookreview so have patience...

I am going to buy a new Alienware m17x when Intel have released their new Haswell in a couple of months. I am also waiting for AMD to launch the 8970m around the same time as Haswell gets released. My question is if you guys think it will be possible to upgrade later down the road to the 8990m, or should I just wait for the 8990m to be released and buy the m17x then? Rumour has it that the 8990m will be released around October. I have a good computer (i7 2600k - HD6970 - 8GB - 128GB Vertex II) at the moment but need to get a laptop before this year is over, so I´m not really in any rush.

What would you do?

 

Get the 8970m version when you can get a good deal, then upgrade to something faster in a couple years when you need the power.

 

Thanks for you fast answer. I am fairly new at Laptops (when it comes to changing cpu and gpu atleast). I have built my stationary computers the last 15 years but I have only changed harddrives and memory in my laptops. If I buy an Alienware m17x with the 8970m, when the 8990m (if I want that card) releases is it then just for me to remove the current card and insert the new one? I´m guessing it´s just like a stationary computer or is it something else that I would have to do?

 

I've heard changing MXM cards is usually fairly straightforward, but there are definitely issues that can come up if you have an inadequate cooling system or the wrong vBIOS. With a bit of research, you should be able to straighten those things out and upgrade the GPU in an m17x, but it's gonna cost more than an equivalent desktop upgrade would.

If you're on a budget and your timeframe is "before the end of 2013", I would suggest waiting until the 8990m comes out (assuming it's actually going to happen) and then buying the laptop with either an 8970m (for less than its initial release price) or an 8990m for the latest and greatest AMD has to offer. Either way, you can upgrade in a year or two when the 89x0m is no longer up to your expectations.