Maxing out a 8470p

Hey all,

Before I get into the details, I just want to make my situation clear: I will be in China for around a year, so buying a desktop is not an option that I have at this point. I am not a huge fan of gaming laptops and prefer to have a docked, cheap laptop perform heavy lifting and a ultrabook for other uses.


I have a HP 8470p, i5 , 8 gb ram, 500 gb hdd.

I'm planning on the following upgrades:

i5 > i7 quad
8gb ram > 16 gb
Additional 256 gig SSD as boot drive (does the 8470p support msata?)
diy egpu solution through adapter.
upgrade 720p display > 1600 x 900 HD+ display (not sure about this)

My goal is to make this a capable video editing and gaming machine (with egpu attached) and dual boot mac OS as well as Final Cut X works better with low end hardware. There is a chance I will keep this permanently docked, and buy a cheap Chinese ultrabook for casual internet and writing.

Is this laptop a device that it makes sense to invest this kind of cash and effort on? The only reason I'm doing it is that I already have it and bought the egpu expresscard adapter a while ago, though never used it, and have a 970 lying around.

Also, it seems to be quite versatile in that it will allow a lot of updates, is easy to perform maintenance on and also buy spare parts for.

 

It's been a long time since I've messed with the 8470p and, as you're doing, I upgraded from the i5 to an i7.

i5 > i7 quad
8gb ram > 16 gb
Additional 256 gig SSD as boot drive (does the 8470p support msata?)
diy egpu solution through adapter.
upgrade 720p display > 1600 x 900 HD+ display (not sure about this)

The 8470p does not support mSATA. I do recall trying to add one near the wireless but it wouldn't accept it. I could be wrong as it's many years ago. As far as I remember you cannot upgrade from the 720p to the HD+ display. Something to do with extra lanes or whatever it was called.

I'm wrong. Just looked at the maintenance manual that's freely available from HP:
"Intel 24-GB mSATA module (Intel Smart Response Technology (SRT), not available on computer models equipped with WWAN or SSD)" Still not sure about the screen.


Ideally, as you mentioned also buying an ultrabook, I'd honestly just sell the card, the laptop as well as the card to buy an MSI GE60 or GE62. Not the strongest gaming machine but it would be easier for you instead of doing the above. The MSI would start with a 1080p screen, which even being way below the usual top quality, would still be better than the HD+ screen, or 720p, on the HP. Plus the Quad core MSI would leave the i7-3840QM way behind.

 

Thanks a lot for the response. Since you have done what I am trying to do, maybe you can help me with a very annoying issue I'm having. So this laptop is on Windows 10, egpu seems to be working just fine. Its just that the display brightness is set to max. I cannot change it through the hotkeys (all other hotkeys are working fine, drivers installed from the HP site) and have tried the driver update tricks that google pops up. It is even grayed out in the power management panel. I currently have it set on night mode to make it usable without blinding me. Please let me know how this can be fixed.

It seems like I'm on the exact same path as you. It is a disappointment about the display. I will eventually get one depending on travel plans, right now the plan is to get the most mileage out of this tough little machine.

With something like this I can also solve most harddrive issues: https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-2-5-Inch-Adapter-Converter-25SAT22MSAT/dp/B00ITJ7WDC

I was even thinking of dual booting mac OS since this laptop is a good candidate due to being pretty much the same thing as a 2012 macbook pro.

Have lived with a gaming laptop before, but using workstation class machines with their stability and build quality has spoiled me. Might even buy a Mi Notebook Air (770 bucks, i5 U series, Geforce MX 150, macbook pro 13 esque body).

My dream machine was the MSI GS30 but its just not made anymore (i7 Quad in a 13.3 inch chassis, Iris Pro and a full pcie x16 proprietary port and dock).

 

Maybe install the hot key driver by right clicking and running as Admin AFTER setting the compatibility settings to Windows 7? Pretty damn poor to be stuck on max brightness. Other than that try to manually update the Intel graphics driver from the Intel website. intel should still have an updated version somewhere. Remove the eGPU and get everything working on the laptop first?

 

For the Egpu to work properly you will need to get a DSDT that will allow more gpus to use with the 8470p. If you don't modify the DSDT you will be limited to 2gb of ram with certain Gpu's.

Other than that it's got a lot of potential for a solid all round laptop.

I'm currently waiting on a 8470w I just purchased, not going the egpu route but the CPU and ssd will be upgraded and it will be awesome!

 

I had an 8460p that I wanted native USB 3.0 for macOS High Sierra and the biometric fingerprint reader, so I swapped out the board and other things so it's essentially an 8470p in an 8460p shell. I pretty much did everything you wanted to do minus mSATA. Let me tell you...it was NOT a direct swap. You will NEED to buy a few extra things to get the swap to work correctly. I will get to eGPU after I run some tests. but my new build is running as follows:

HP EliteBook 8470P
Intel Core i7-3820QM Quad Core CPU w/8MB L3 Cache (45W TDP)
16GB PNY DDR3 1600MHZ CL-11 RAM
2x 250GB Samsung Evo SATA III 2.5" drives (one in main caddy bay for Windows 10, second in Optical drive via ODD Drive caddy for macOS)
Broadcom BCM94352HMB Wireless-AC Mini PCI-E card (867Mbps...BT will not work from the card since the machine already has built in adapter)
1600x900 HD+ 14" display (using available HD+ cable *for* the 8470p...standard cable for the 8470p or the HD+ cable from the 8460p will NOT work)
Swapped the original top bezel to get the ability to use the fingerprint reader.

I have Windows 10 and macOS High Sierra 10.13.3 running on dual boot perfectly fine. it was not an easy task but I don't see any other way of upgrading it unless I get larger capacity SSD's. It runs like a champ. Let me know if you have any questions, hope this helps.