Laptop for an eGPU

[MinDBlastR]

Hey there.

 

This is actually my first post. I haven't found enough help around Google, so I thought I should give it a try. So here's the thing: I have a Razer Core with a Zotac 1070ti extreme amp! and a Dell XPS15 with a i7-7700HQ with a Nvidia 1050 and I was wondering, which laptop would be the best to pair with my eGPU?

 

I bought the laptop maybe around 2 years now with having in mind that someday I'd like to upgrade with an eGPU, which I did. I'm pretty happy with the performance it delivers, but I'm sure I'm not running the best set up. I'm not into 4K, though I have an External 144hz 1080p Monitor connected to the GPU, and I might be going into VR at some point. I think the best way to get a better set up is to get a better laptop with a better CPU (and more PCI lanes for the TB3). I also require the mobility of a laptop to actually work outside of home, but I've not put past the possibility of keeping the laptop and building a desktop based on the GPU I already have.

 

So is it worth it upgrading the laptop in the next few years? Is another option really that worth it? I don't mind paying a few extra bucks just to keep the same kind of set up I have. I've been looking at laptops with no dedicated GPU, but usually they don't carry the best CPU's out there, would be happy with a beast 13inch laptop that I come back home connect to the eGPU and game at ease.

 

Thanks in advance!

Edit: I also love having a "lightweight" laptop.

[genexis_x]

6 hours ago, MinDBlastR said:

 I've been looking at laptops with no dedicated GPU, but usually they don't carry the best CPU's out there

That's the issue

 

Where are you from? Budget? Any preference on display size and battery life? Mind low sRGB display and non-upgradable RAM?

[MinDBlastR]

13 hours ago, GeneXiS_X said:

That's the issue

 

Where are you from? Budget? Any preference on display size and battery life? Mind low sRGB display and non-upgradable RAM?

Europe. I mean, I payed 1750€ for the Dell XPS15. I would be comfortable paying around the same. I've been fond of 15 or 13 inch laptops. And I use the laptop screen as a second screen, honestly it would depend on the price. And non-upgradable RAM honestly depends on the amount of it. 

 

Thanks so far for the answer!

[genexis_x]

13 hours ago, MinDBlastR said:

Europe

Any links of online stores?

13 hours ago, MinDBlastR said:

And I use the laptop screen as a second screen, honestly it would depend on the price. And non-upgradable RAM honestly depends on the amount of it. 

You didn't really answer my questions

[MinDBlastR]

3 hours ago, GeneXiS_X said:

You didn't really answer my questions

Sorry. You are correct. I don't mind if I have at least 16gb of RAM, and no I don't mind a low sRGB. 

3 hours ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Any links of online stores?

I usually order from Amazon. Do you have any models in mind?

 

Thanks again mate.

[genexis_x]

Preferred max weight and min battery life? Which country are you from?

 

Actually why you don't want to buy a thin and light gaming laptop since you have the budget. No need to store eGPU and no need to worry about bottlenecking due to TB3 bandwidth (GPU higher than 1060 will have performance drop)

[MinDBlastR]

On 4/24/2019 at 1:36 PM, GeneXiS_X said:

Preferred max weight and min battery life? Which country are you from?

 

Actually why you don't want to buy a thin and light gaming laptop since you have the budget. No need to store eGPU and no need to worry about bottlenecking due to TB3 bandwidth (GPU higher than 1060 will have performance drop)

As thin as possible and well at least 6h of battery life i think, sorry for the delay in the reply there mate, also I'm from Portugal. 

 

I already have the eGPU, I have a Zotac 1070ti extreme amp!, I was thinking that i might be able to save a buck if I don't require an internal GPU and get more out of my money, and I believe that the eGPU doesn't throttle if you connect the output directly into a monitor, as long as the TB3 has enough PCIe lanes dedicated to them. Usually the reported throttling when using eGPU's is due to having the video signal return to the laptop through the TB3. 

[genexis_x]

Max weight in kg/lbs?

 

The CPU will throttle in most cases since it will be stressed hard due to powerful GPU. And TB3 will have bandwidth bottleneck with higher end GPUs

[MinDBlastR]

2 minutes ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Max weight in kg/lbs?

 

The CPU will throttle in most cases since it will be stressed hard due to powerful GPU. And TB3 will have bandwidth bottleneck with higher end GPUs

3kg i'd say.

 

That's the whole point of me asking in the forum, I'd like to pair with eGPU with a CPU that doesn't throttle. If the eGPU throttles (not due to connection) I can replace. But are you sure that TB3 with 40Gbps will throttle with the higher end ones? Because of the Pcie lanes?

[genexis_x]

1 hour ago, MinDBlastR said:

That's the whole point of me asking in the forum, I'd like to pair with eGPU with a CPU that doesn't throttle. If the eGPU throttles (not due to connection) I can replace. But are you sure that TB3 with 40Gbps will throttle with the higher end ones? Because of the Pcie lanes?

I prefer gaming laptop more as I said before

 

Like I said above, CPU will probably throttle as the CPU will be stressed heavily (little to moderate bottleneck depending on the GPU) and due to limited cooling

 

Yes, higher end GPU = more performance bottleneck. x8 PCIe lanes is min for GPU (highest end ones might require x16), so there will be some bottleneck via x4 PCIe lanes TB3

[genexis_x]

If you already have eGPU, just use it. XPS 15 9560 is still a capable machine

[MinDBlastR]

On 5/19/2019 at 9:43 AM, GeneXiS_X said:

If you already have eGPU, just use it. XPS 15 9560 is still a capable machine

That's what I'm doing mate. The only problem is that my brother will need a laptop soon enough, and I can give this one to him and buy another one. So I've been thinking ahead. I'd love to get a 13 inch Razer Blade, but seeing those CPU's puts me down.

[genexis_x]

13 hours ago, MinDBlastR said:

That's what I'm doing mate. The only problem is that my brother will need a laptop soon enough, and I can give this one to him and buy another one. So I've been thinking ahead. I'd love to get a 13 inch Razer Blade, but seeing those CPU's puts me down.

Hmm...then go for gaming laptop: Asus GL504GV - not that thin but has ~6 hrs battery life

 

Alternatively you can take a look at AW m15 90Wh battery, however cooling isn't that good

 

Can up budget to 2000€?

[DarkDragon2K04]

On 5/20/2019 at 8:49 PM, MinDBlastR said:

That's what I'm doing mate. The only problem is that my brother will need a laptop soon enough, and I can give this one to him and buy another one. So I've been thinking ahead. I'd love to get a 13 inch Razer Blade, but seeing those CPU's puts me down.

The Razer blade 13 has an i7 8565u proccesor. After that is Intel's i7 H series and those comr paired with a dgpu already. Except you are willing to still have an egpu and waste it then that is what you have to do to get a better cpu or get a laptop with a GPU and waste it by using the egpu. If you still will be ok with the i7 8565u cpu then get a Razer blade stealth, LG gram or dell XPS 9380 or HP Spectre x360 with igpu or Nvidia MX 150. If not then get the HP Spectre x360 with Nvidia gtx 1050ti Max q or the Dell XPS 15 9570. 

 

I am not entirely sure that there are H series laptops with igpu

[Kisai]

I wouldn't recommend trying to deal with an eGPU, as it's likely to be run at 1x or 4x via Thunderbolt3 if it's a TB3 chassis.

 

13" and 14" laptops are not gaming laptops, at all. They have weak CPU's, and are nearly universally low-spec iGPU models. They also tend to only have one USB-C/TB/DP port currently.

 

Start at the 15" model and get one with the GPU already spec you want, but if you want to actually play games on it, it will still be worse than desktop with the same CPU and GPU configuration due to the lower thermal and power requirements of being a laptop. 

 

If you want a "portable desktop" just go straight to the 17" models. But then you're looking at probably $3000.

[genexis_x]

8 hours ago, Kisai said:

13" and 14" laptops are not gaming laptops, at all. They have weak CPU's, and are nearly universally low-spec iGPU models. They also tend to only have one USB-C/TB/DP port currently.

They have decent CPUs. The problem is the CPU will bottleneck the powerful GPU, might cause overheating too due to heavy stress. Some of them do have x4 PCIe lanes TB3

[DarkDragon2K04]

21 hours ago, Kisai said:

I wouldn't recommend trying to deal with an eGPU, as it's likely to be run at 1x or 4x via Thunderbolt3 if it's a TB3 chassis.

 

13" and 14" laptops are not gaming laptops, at all. They have weak CPU's, and are nearly universally low-spec iGPU models. They also tend to only have one USB-C/TB/DP port currently.

 

Start at the 15" model and get one with the GPU already spec you want, but if you want to actually play games on it, it will still be worse than desktop with the same CPU and GPU configuration due to the lower thermal and power requirements of being a laptop. 

 

If you want a "portable desktop" just go straight to the 17" models. But then you're looking at probably $3000.

If you want a 17" laptop you have to check out the new razer blade pro starts at $2300 - 

If you really want an egpu I recomend you go with a H series laptop with an nvidia gtx 1050. If you are considering this tell me so I can advise you with some good options.

[Kisai]

22 hours ago, GeneXiS_X said:

They have decent CPUs. The problem is the CPU will bottleneck the powerful GPU, might cause overheating too due to heavy stress. Some of them do have x4 PCIe lanes TB3

 

Rarely. Usually 13" and 14" laptops have terrible CPU's like i7-7Y75, or other dual-core parts. That's why I'd recommend NOT looking at 13" and 14" laptops to begin with. 15" laptops have the i7-xxxxH parts, and so do 17" models.

 

A single 4x TB3 port is not sufficient for gaming, and I mean this in a "this is not a gaming solution", the TB3 ports are designed for direct-attach NVme drives. eg Video capture and editing. If you use an eGPU without having at least two TB3 ports, the GPU in the enclosure is completely wasted. Still, you can get away with that if you're using it for compute.

 

The cost of an eGPU enclosure is $400-$1000, if you're already willing to spend this money on what is basically a desktop without a CPU and RAM, to get a wimpy 4x PCIe connection via TB3, you are far better off just putting all the money into a desktop.

 

Now what I do expect at some point is that there will be "USB4" (TB3) docking stations that provide a dummy x16 slot to allow any GPU to be used with the dock so that you can use a "smaller" laptop. 

 

But as I stated previously, the CPU's in the 13" and 14" laptops are super-weak. In one example with a 13" laptop (the aformentioned i7-7Y75) the cpu performance was less than a 5 year old laptop i5 dual core part. The only reason the newer laptop was better was because of the NVme SSD, otherwise they would have been better off holding onto the old laptop, even with it's DDR3L memory.

[genexis_x]

20 minutes ago, Kisai said:

dual-core parts

Most of them comes with 4c8t ULV