docking bay with desktop graphics card?

[jb20thae]

Is there such a thing as a laptop docking station that uses a standard (pcie or agp) graphics card so one can get teh benefit of high performance graphics while docked? As long as the interface between the dock and laptop is fast, it seems like this would be the perfect solution for gamers. Heat/cooling would be offboard also.

 

[RobsTV]

There was for PCI.
Had one with my Toshiba Terca.
The Voodoo 2 really played games well.
Push a button, and laptop ejects.
Haven't seen any others.

 

[slugg]

omg that would be amazing

 

[Trippytiger]

The Thinkpad Advanced Dock allows you to install a half-size PCI-Express graphics card, and the Thinkpad Dock II allows you to install a half-size PCI card.

 

[Treyshadow]

Yeah there was a dell doc for C-series laptops that did the same, but not for the d-series.

It was PCI only though.

 

[trikster2]

Did not realize the Thinkpad dock has PCIe. Cool. Is that the 16x graphics version/AGP replacement or the slower kind?

Anyone know when dell whill update the D/Doc (if ever) for PCIe?

 

[jb20thae]

Ya I'm amazed nobody has brought this back. Total graphics upgradeability when docked.

 

[fbrdphreak]

Originally posted by: Trippytiger
The Thinkpad Advanced Dock allows you to install a half-size PCI-Express graphics card, and the Thinkpad Dock II allows you to install a half-size PCI card.

Bingo. Only one I've heard of. Not many companies develop their docking stations as much these days

 

[trikster2]

DOH

After further research found out the Thinkpad Advanced Dock w. PCIe is not compatible with the T43 series. Bummer. Begining of the end for everything IBM....

 

[RedBeard]

I think that the BIOS on the mainboard has to support this feature BTW.

 

[Trippytiger]

Originally posted by: trikster2
DOH

After further research found out the Thinkpad Advanced Dock w. PCIe is not compatible with the T43 series. Bummer. Begining of the end for everything IBM....

...what? The dock must be intended for the T60 series then. Not a big surprise; how does that signal the end of everything IBM?

 

[1kayaker]

dell d610

 

[trikster2]

Originally posted by: Trippytiger

Originally posted by: trikster2
DOH

After further research found out the Thinkpad Advanced Dock w. PCIe is not compatible with the T43 series. Bummer. Begining of the end for everything IBM....

...what? The dock must be intended for the T60 series then. Not a big surprise; how does that signal the end of everything IBM?

T60 is the first post IBM laptop. T43 is Pre lenovno.

Loosing support for old IBM laptops like the T43 signals an end of an era.....

That may be good or bad depending on your point of view. As a T43 owner that would like to use the latest and greatest like the PCIe capable docking station, it's bad....

 

[WackyDan]

Originally posted by: trikster2

Originally posted by: Trippytiger

Originally posted by: trikster2
DOH

After further research found out the Thinkpad Advanced Dock w. PCIe is not compatible with the T43 series. Bummer. Begining of the end for everything IBM....

...what? The dock must be intended for the T60 series then. Not a big surprise; how does that signal the end of everything IBM?

T60 is the first post IBM laptop. T43 is Pre lenovno.

Loosing support for old IBM laptops like the T43 signals an end of an era.....

That may be good or bad depending on your point of view. As a T43 owner that would like to use the latest and greatest like the PCIe capable docking station, it's bad....

You've got it all wrong. 🙂

The T60 was part of product plan under IBM. In fact, the whole 60 series was. I'm sure Lenovo made some final decisions on them too though.

Here's the reality..... The old docks sucked. But- the old docks had been around for four or more years which is the typical cycle EVERY vendor has on their docks, and ultimately they change their docks as well, with the same issue of no back model support. -because of new chassis designs, and the attempts to perfect what was wrong with their old docks.

Back to the previous docks sucking. The way they were designed to accomodate the ThinkPads with the various battery offerings was cool, but it was a pain in the ass to put the ThinkPad onto the dock properly the first time, and for some users, repetitively.

I understand your POV as a T43 owner, but don't hold anything against them for coming out with what may be their best ThinkPads ever. These new docks are well designed and don't suffer from the issues of the old, and take up less space which is a huge plus.