Clevo D901C nvidia 260/280M Mxm type III 2.1 variant anyone ?

Hi,

So I've bought a rebranded Clevo d901C some years ago (2008). It came with a MXM nvidia 8800M GTX graphic card which is now out of order. I'd like to replace it without spending much than needed (my computer reseller which are true s ask something like 1000USD for a 260M GTX).

Ok i know this might be the true price and that those cards are overpriced in this variant but i'd like to spend not that much as a replacement card. So is there any option around for a replacement card somehow a 260M a 280M or even a 9800GTX would do the tricks.

Thanks by advance. (BTW i've a used MXM 3 260M card for sale around 160USD).

Regards

 

Easy solution - go for a quadro 3700m. Almost the exact same specs as a 9800m GTX/280m and cheap as dirt on Ebay. I picked up one 3 years ago for my 901c and it was straight gold. You can usually find them for ~$100~$200 on ebay.

Fire away with more questions if needs be.

 

Hello WarrenJS,

Thanks for the quick reply, does it need some sort of bios update hack ?
A quadro 3700m for 100$ would be amazing but the only one i found on bay with the right MXM format was 1200$. I'll make more search !

 

i have a question that is basically in the same area I have a d901c that the video card has completely failed on I have done extensive searching on this and this seems to be the only site with any kind of info on this area besides mxm-upgrade.com which informs me I can upgrade to a 280m otherwise very little information I had been looking at used alienware cards in the same form factor because they are built off the same chassis I was wondering if i would need some sort of bios flash etc to support the cards I am looking at a 260m which should work under this logic however i am still missing some pieces of info and any help would be greatly appreciated in this sorry dont mean to hijack your thread just looking at a similar question

 

@Set33 - as far as I know all 3700m's are mxm 2.1 he. Some differ in whether their bios's were based for a lenovo or HP but I believe all should work with your d901. When I purchased mine it was a straight swap in, no problems. I upgraded twice, once to a 2700m then to a 3700m, no problems either time. The majority of the discussion regarding 3700m bios's on this site is whether it is possible to flash the card into a 280m GTX. I personally appreciated the quadro drivers for CAD-esque programs, thus I never needed a flash. With regards to a system bios flash I doubt you would need to do so as most of the d901 had the capability to run those cards right off the production line.

A quick search on Ebay gave me this: NVIDA Quadro FX3700M MXM Video Card S N 0323808046818 | eBay .


@angelice1987 - I am no expert on bios's unfortunately and cannot tell you definitively whether you would need to flash the cards. Seeing as the cards did come out somewhat late in game for the d901 you may require a system bios flash but perhaps not. We may need to find someone with a little more knowledge. The cards I upgraded with were from Lenovo machines and required nothing, whether that holds true with an alienware card is a different question. The generation of 260m and 280m had two different interfaces, mxm-2.1 and mxm-3.0. The only thing I will stress is make sure you get one with a 2.1 interface (three tabs instead of just 2 big long ones). I know it sounds like a keep them, but the 3700m's are the equivalent of a 9800m gtx with actually a few extra shaders. This puts them somewhere in around a 260 but not quite a 280. The big selling feature though, the cost. So maybe consider them, and if you can figure it out later, it may be possible to flash a 3700m to a 280m.