Asus XG Station - External PCI-Express 16x Slot for Laptops

po0k

FarEastGizmos.com DailyTech
ExpressCard.org

Laptop + ExpressCard slot = External block with standard PCI-E 16x slot, external power, knob for clock adjustments, lcd display for temp & info.

It can be used with a PC via an ExpressCard adapter. This opens a bit of flexibility for desktop, SFF & laptop users w.r.t. overclocking. You can now fit whatever sort of chunky cooling you like onto the card without worrying if it'll fit in your case. If you're a laptop user, you can have your juice-sucking gaming set-up/docking station at home and still retain the mobility and battery-life of your laptop while travelling.

L31mr0d

hmm... they look a lot different to what I was expecting. Can they be upgraded? Or are they just like external HDDs, compared to external HDD caddies? It looks liek they are an all in one solution (i.e. p&p) rather than a station that you can plug any PCIe card into.

po0k

Look at the white DVI connector. The unit is kind of L-shaped, with the slot being in one of the Ls. But you're right, it does seem to be enclosed.
Also Expresscard 34/54 is PCI-E 1x + USB2.0, so you're not going to have full 16x slot bandwidth.
So this is basically to let you slap in a 7300GS or similar single-slot, low-heat card to replace your Intel GMA300 PoS, or for some extra displays (eg. financial sector).

{edit}

TheArticleIshould'veFinishedReadingBeforePosting wrote:

The Asus XG Station is currently scheduled to be released at the beginning of Q2 2007. A full package will include the XG Station graphics docking station, one ASUS EN7900GS graphics card and assorted accessories.

Not bad I guess.{/edit}

PCI-Express cards can be routed out of the case, the signalling standard allows for quite long trace lengths. See PCI-Express: Form Factors.
I've a picture somewhere of a ~10ft PCI-E riser sticking out of a case with a working card stuck at the top.

Cuddlesworth

SyxPak wrote:

I've a picture somewhere of a ~10ft PCI-E riser sticking out of a case with a working card stuck at the top.

But at what cost to performance from latency?

conzy

Doubt there would be much more latency, probably nanoseconds....

If this is cheap im getting one and a 6600gt for my Inspiron 1300

Anti

This is interesting tbh. As i have a viao with a 7300 in it, which is becommnig useless. If its not silly price i would consider buying this so i dont have to waste money on a new laptop. Or will this be one of them products that never really takes off.

po0k

Does your vaio have an express card slot (prolly 54mm wide required)?

Krazy - the PCI-E standard is similar to the modern thinking in that an interface specification should be robust enough to scale from short distances (pcb traces) to long (between cabs in comms rooms and further) as this is both practical and desirable in enterprise where all the new stuff starts first and the money is available to sink into it.
Also, as PCIE is a serial bus, and a 16x slot is just a bunch of them working together (but not in parallel) they don't suffer from clock skew and latency as much as a 10ft PCI riser would.

Compare max cable lengths for sata v pata.

There are plenty of applications where it would is desirable to have a single homogenous interface specification for various tasks, anything where a common fast, scalable I/O spec is needed (clusters, blade, interconnects).

This particular component is more for "How handeh!"-ness than balls out performance, and a 7900GS is a grandiose step up from GMA900 graphics.

Anti

Yeah it does. Thankfully

po0k

PCI SIG Proposes External PCI Express Graphics Cards.

astrofool

Thats what I call a connector cable (the 16x on the right). None of your pansy ass USB/firewire there.

It even puts SCSI connectors to shame.