Modular graphics cards

[theroflcopta]

   To start off I don't know a lot of the inner workings of graphics cards so this might not be possible.  Alright I was at work being bored brainstorming what upgrades I wanted for my computer depending on my budget. And as I was crunching the numbers I just thought of how much easier it would be if I could just get a new GPU core and plug it into a card like you can a CPU with a mother board. And I got to thinking would you guys buy graphics cards that were just blank PCBs with sockets where you place components.

 

    Up gradable GPU and V-ram, power, more custom tailored shrouds things like that. You can hand pick every component that goes into your graphics card making them more suitable for your uses. The GPU you want not come with the amount of V-ram you want? No worries just pick up an extra GB of it and snap it right in. Than I thought if GC's (graphics cards) could than gain more functionality from these kinds of changes. Say for example you have a mid to low end card and you are okay with playing your games at medium graphics but cant turn on filters like AA and anisotropic filtering but don't want to buy a whole new 250-300 dollar card just to enable them. Have no fear your PCB has a vacant addon slot in which you can plug in a dedicated filters chip for 50 dollars to help alleviate some of the load off your GPU and allow lower end cards to run filters at lower setting without tanking the system. Don't have a slot open for a capture card but don't want to buy a whole new MOBO to use it? just whack in a capture chip onto you GC and you are good to go man! Hey want to cross fire two mid to low end GPU's but don't want to have 2 cards in your system? Don't worry buy the XFX dual GPU block and run 2 650ti boost GPU's in sli saving space and possibly money.

 

   things this will do imo is drastically drive down the prices of upgrading your graphics now instead of having to fork over 300-450 dollars every 2 years or so to stay competitive just pay up 100-150 dollars a year which would make upgrading more affordable and a easier choice to make on the fly. another thing is build quality and customization will become huge. I'm sick of paying 300+ dollars for a graphics card and getting some cheap plastic shroud that feels like it will break if i push down just slightly too hard. Imagine being able to select from a wide range of custom shrouds everything from cheapo 15 dollar plastic reference coolers to high end 70 dollars full metal that has a paint scheme to match your build perfectly. I want to live in a world I can get a full metal vapor X sapphire cooler that is lime green with bright orange LED fans because I can!!!

 

   I thought this was a cool little idea and if it happened I for one would be a very happy camper and would bring a whole new level of customization and maybe an increase in sales as it becomes more readily available for people with lower amounts of income to still upgrade and have a good experience. problems that could arise, possible hardware incompatibilities or driver issues of course. IMO this is something that would take a gen or 2 to iron out but would get better. Loss in sales of stock cards. Though I think as time goes on cards wont be refrence or be slight over clocks or just have a custom shroud on it. Cards from ABPs will become sleek power houses, kinda how in farcry 3 you can get a stock gun and customize it yourself, or you can buy the tricked out baller guns that while expensive and might not be perfect for you will perform amazing and be cool while doing it. 

 

   I know this was a lot to take and I included 2 rough diagrams to give an idea one is a unpopulated card the other is one where the "parts" are installed to give an idea of what im talking about, what are your thoughts?

 

[Blade of Grass]

Sounds cool but, it's going to be a pain in the ass to get it to work with all the different things that you suggesting. Don't get me wrong, it's a great idea, but it would be expensive to make and would take awhile to develop.

I would love for this to be a reality and to work, keep thinking of things like this!

[theroflcopta]

I mean the way I look at it is, you can constantly change your CPU or your memory and it auto detects and works fine, i mean yeah it isnt really the same thing haha but i mean would it be that far of a stretch?

[Godlygamer23]

I mean the way I look at it is, you can constantly change your CPU or your memory and it auto detects and works fine, i mean yeah it isnt really the same thing haha but i mean would it be that far of a stretch?

Some motherboards don't work with certain RAM and CPUs.

[sk8ermanblue]

Some of the issues i see is that the vram chips have to be soldered in, The level of detail that has to be taken to solder in expansion cards and the vrm's might have to be changed out for higer end gpu's of the same socket if we want to talk about them as such but I don't see this becoming a thing for graphics card dev's. they make so much money forcing you to buy new graphics cards that they wont necessairily be willing to let you swap parts on them. they would have to grow in size by a lot at first just to accomadate hot swap sockets unless people are going to be expected to unsolder and resolder the chips themselves and in that case I don't see that becoming very popular for mainstream more of an elite class enthusiast to do.

[Opsilon]

This would be epic, but the problem is for the people that change their GPU every 3 years or something like that, you can't use the same PCB with for instance 200 series and 600 series, plus that would be very expensive anyway