Gigabyte Notebook Features External Graphics

[Charles P. Jefferies]

Gigabyte Notebook Features External Graphics

Gigabyte has introduced its M1305 notebook, which features external graphics via a docking station. The Booktop M1305 has a 13.3-inch screen (1366x768), Windows 7, and is available with Intel Core 2 Duo, Pentium, or Celeron ULV processors. The notebook itself features integrated Intel GMA 4500MHD graphics, however its docking station features an Nvidia GeForce GT 220 graphics card.

Other features of the notebook include an eSATA/USB combo port, HDMI, up to 4GB of DDR3 RAM and a 320 - 500GB hard drive. The M1305 weighs four pounds and measures 13" (H) x 9.1" (D) x 1.2" (H) with a six-cell 3800mAh battery. Gigabyte claims it can get up to six and a half hours of battery life.  There is no word on availability or pricing at this time.

Full Story (DVHardware.net)
Via (Engadget.com)

[coldmack]

I like how you can easily swap the optical drive for more battery life. We need to see more companies do this, beside Lenovo, and the few other that offer it on their business line.

[Sailor Moon]

I feel like I have seen that notebook somewhere before in another brand's clothing...

[Rahul]

This is what many users are looking for. They may not want to have a gaming laptop that is a monster and so purchase a notebook like this that has all the "gaming-ready" components except for a powerful GPU and is still mobile. Then they can just connect it to a docking station and it becomes a gaming system.

This offers a lot of flexibility and who wouldn't want that?

[Serg]

Interesting concept.

I am wondering the range of the GPUs you can use on this, cause the GT220M is not much of a power thing.

[Lithus]

External graphics as a GT220 that's embedded in the docking station. Not external graphics as in connect whatever GPU you want.

[Serg]

Then the point of this is just to up a little the graphics?
I thought it was like the ViDock that at least has a good GPU inside and IIRC can be upgraded

[MidnightSun]

Originally Posted by Serg

Then the point of this is just to up a little the graphics?
I thought it was like the ViDock that at least has a good GPU inside and IIRC can be upgraded

Although this dock does have ViDock-type capabilities, I think that was not really the point of it. The main focus of this dock, is, well, just a dock - except in making the dock, they decided to add another feature to it, to make it even more useful for consumers.
Think of it as if Lenovo added a GPU to its UltraBase for Thinkpads - at heart, the main purpose is still a port-dock, with video-out along with a plethora of other ports, not a ViDock device.

I do wish this was more of a trend - putting a powerful external graphics solution in a notebook's dock, so one can have 3D capability at the desk, and long battery life on the go. The advantage of this solution over switchable graphics is that then the laptop would not be limited by cooling constraints that a switchable graphics solution would still impose on laptop design.

Imagine a small Thinkpad X200 docked on an UltraBase with a top-of-the-line GPU for powerful CAD rendering at the desk, while maintaining ease of portability for the business user, letting him take it easily to the next meeting.

[Red_Dragon]

First it was Fujitsu now its gigabye.

Can we get this thing in a mainstream brand option? Man, i hope Dell, HP, Asus or someone actually makes the jump to utilize this tech

[toshiki]

Product page says GT220 in the dock - not GT220M:
http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/...ProductID=3233

Really need to see the inside of the dock to draw any conclusions.
Even if the card is soldered in, it might be easy enough for a laptop tech to desolder it and add a PCI-E x16 slot like this one:
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Flexible-PCI-...item5189d68ca9