Desktop Graphics for Any Laptop
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2017-05-06
·
1,905 words · ~9 min read
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Thunderbolt the wicked fast interface developed by Intel which you can learn
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more about here has always been based on
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PCI Express yes the same PCI Express
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that you use to add internal expansion cards to a desktop computer so to say
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that I've been amped about the idea of being able to staple a video card to a
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laptop for a long time would be an
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understatement well it's finally a
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reality let's take a look then at the razor
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core the Phoenix otor is a full-sized
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minimalistically designed keyboard complete with goldplated Cherry MX Brown
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switches check out the link in the video description to learn more laptop CPUs
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have for about three generations now been available in quad core variants
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that boast sing SLE threaded performance that's fast enough for them to avoid
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being a gaming bottleneck while being power efficient enough not to require a
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nuclear reactor strapped to the bottom of your computer to run for more than an
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hour or so laptop gpus or video cards
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while they've made enormous strides are a different story
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altogether relatively speaking they are hot either thermal throttling during
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real world use or requiring large cooling systems and they suck so much
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power that if you're running on battery they not only drain it during operation
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but in the case of very high-end ones they can't even run at full capacity if
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they wanted to due to battery power delivery limits well that's easy lonus
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just buy a desktop I mean yeah you could do that but not everyone wants more than
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one computer and lots of people actually
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prefer to use a laptop and this problem
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of how to satisy the people who value portability and battery life and who
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also like PC gaming is one that the industry has been trying to solve for a
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long time some of these Solutions never
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made it to Market this really cool prototype from Gigabyte used proprietary
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connectors on high-end shielded cables to take a full PCI Express 16x interface
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to an outside box While others did
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Alienware designed a proprietary PCIe 4X
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cable and and interface that was implemented on a couple of their gaming
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laptop models and the MSI gs30 Shadow
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rocks a PCI Express 16x connector hidden
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by a dust cover on the back that plugs into a proprietary box that not only
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supports an expansion card but also additional storage and IO neat but while
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they both addressed the heat power and
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upgradability issues that plague gaming notebooks they introduced cost
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compatibility and usability ones since
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PCI Express cannot be hot plugged requiring a full system shutdown
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whenever the user wanted to unplug it or plug it back in enough history lesson
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though let's take a closer look at the core razor solution that promises to fix
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everything including doing away with proprietary interfaces in favor of
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Thunderbolt 3 using a USB type-c
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connector man these guys are good at industrial design this thing could be in
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a cardboard box with holes punched in it for all the difference that would make
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to Performance but instead Razer turned out what is in my opinion a shockingly
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attractive piece of high-tech art that I would be happy to have on my desk it's
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constructed almost entirely from thick black anodized aluminum with two LED
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lighting zones on the bottom and on the inside by the left side mesh window that
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can be configured to any color and effect you want from with synapse even
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off if you care less about the Flash and more about the dash on the subject of
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speed I couldn't actually believe how fast it was to get started with the core
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a complete graphics card installation can be done in less than 5 minutes even
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if you've never installed a graphics card before just open the lock at the
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back that doubles as a handle pull it out revealing a single PCI Express 16x
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physical slot and a customized 500 W enhanced power supply remove the back
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plate screw slot in your new video card plug in the power connectors screw it in
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and bippity boity Boo that is it thanks
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to ample Headroom and the inclusion of two 6 Plus TW pin connectors you can
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install almost any graphics card on the
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market though it wouldn't be a terrible idea to consult razer's compatibility
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list before making a purchase for my part I went ahead with a GTX 1080
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Founders Edition that wasn't on the list but worked just fine though your mileage
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may vary with the graphics card installed we can take a look at the
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business end of things the back here you'll find a standard PC power input a
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USB type-c connector that is carrying Thunderbolt 3 four USB 3.0 ports and
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Hallelujah a gigabit Ethernet port yay
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setup was actually pretty straightforward you'll need the latest drivers for the video card you installed
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from AMD or Invidia website you'll need Razer synapse driver utility and in the
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case of the blade 14 but not the blade stealth you'll need the GPU Switcher app
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that sits in the system tray it's beta right now but functionality wise it does
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what it's supposed to allowing you to select which dedicated video card you
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want to use and even remembering your preference through a system reboot or
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you can just leave it on auto mode but
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how much of a performance boost can you expect how well does a video card
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operate over this Rinky Dink little cable the short answer is well I guess
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it depends on what graphics card you put into it and the long answer is much more
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complicated and actually looks like I'm sorry it's going to end up in a separate
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video but in the meantime here are some numbers with a GTX 1080 as a point of
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comparison against the 970m that I use in my blade 14 let's talk about the
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usability a bit though notably absent from the core is a power switch instead
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it simply detects when the device that it's plugged into turns on and Powers up
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alongside it this is the first thing that stood out to me as a potential area
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for improvement for the Next Generation it would be nice to be able to power up
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just the USB hub and Ethernet port to use the core as a more basic dock which
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is something I actually wouldn't desire if it weren't for complaint number two
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the core is not very quiet and surprisingly it doesn't seem to be the
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video card's fault I mean it's certainly quieter Under full game load than a
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blade 14 under full gaming load using its dgpu but the enclosures fans are
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significantly louder at idle than a blade 14 at idle making light
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productivity applications kind of frustrating number three is both praise
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for the core and a huge complaint about the blade 14 2016 I assumed the core
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would require an external display connected to the back of it to work but
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it actually doesn't which is awesome you can use the power of your
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external video card to drive that 3200
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by 1800 onboard display sick
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unfortunately the type-c connector is on the right on this laptop meaning that
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the cable can get in the way of using the mouse and this is made worse by the
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pathetically short cable that Razer includes in the box and there are other
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niggles at the moment as well mostly to do with transitioning between your IG
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dgpu and what I'm going to call egpu the
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one in here the Switcher app can be hard to dismiss sometimes um I plugged in
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while the computer was asleep and my trackpad buttons weren't working until a
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reboot once running fire strike back to back on dgpu then egpu yields a massive
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Improvement in scores but going the other way resulted in a black screen
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after the first segment of the second test until I rebooted the system I was
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able to repeat that several times and there were a few little things like
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that but with that said my experience
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using it now and we're still a bit early by the way gives me a lot of Hope
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performance improvements are real thermals look great and while at CES
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2016 I managed to force a hard reset on
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the demo system by pulling the plug while running
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a 3D application impressively 6 months
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later with Heaven running not only does the system not fully lock up but after a
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little while oh no it did crash that time I've seen this work though after a
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little while Heaven actually managed to get back up and running albeit slowly on
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the igpu a lot of progress has been made
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and while Esports titles will probably be fine with a blade 14's built-in
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graphics for years to come making the future proofness argument for spending
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this kind of money a moot point for a
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gamer who wants to play the latest AAA titles and heaven forbid VR games on his
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or her notebook the core looks on the surface like a superbly elegant albeit
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expensive solution but as I alluded to before
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there are a lot of deeper questions that I found myself asking about this product
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during my time with it so many in fact that I'm going to set aside a
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significant chunk of time four the core is available to you guys to buy to
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attempt to answer them all speaking of
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answers you were probably asking yourself wow where did lonus get that
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sexy pink skin for his razor blade to
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which the answer is of course from dbrand dbrand is your source for awesome
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vinyl skins for your phone tablet console controllers and more they're
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affordable and they ship worldwide but the best thing about dbrand is the
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configurator on their site you pick your device you pick all your colors and you
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can actually mix and match colors which I personally think looks freaking
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awesome but your mileage may vary with that you get to preview what it's going
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to look like you place your order and boom their robots pack it and ship it to
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you and if there's anything wrong their customer service robots are Ace so go
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ahead and check out the link in the video description and start skinning your devices today so thanks for
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watching guys if this video sucked you know what to do but if it was awesome get subscribed hit that like button or
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check out the link to where to buy the stuff we featured at Amazon in the video
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description also linked in the description is our merch store which has
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cool shirts like this one and our community Forum which you should totally
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join now that you're done doing all that stuff you're probably wondering what to
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watch next so click that button in the top right corner to check out our latest
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video over on Channel Super Fun