What is Digg?62 Comments
- dynamit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9I would like an easy eay to change my graphics card.
- the-rip, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4the notebook compaines arent gonna want to do this, beacause they have lots of dumb users who buy a new laptop when something like this fails... the OEMs arent going to want users to be able to simply buy a new universal part instead of fork over a load of cash
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I think this is a good idea. Dugg.
The ability to change out displays would be great. If my laptop was upgradeable like this, I sure would change out my XGA screen for an UXGA screen, I'm sure.
As for your commend, lobbster, my dealing with a certain company that rhymes with "Hell" had my laptop for around 3-4 weeks. That was a pain. - Ghost_MH, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Are you talking about the dumb users who are going to know what's wrong with their laptops and know which replacement parts to buy???
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6just buy a ibm they can already do all of that. the optical drive simply come out with the flick of a switch smae wiht the hard drvie. also who would want to like trade laptop parts "i will give u my battery for your screen" "wooow dude sweet yea" i dont see the point
- SuperSloth, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"If done correctly, companies could offer laptop form factors based on set standards as options, and us as consumers would understand that the internal components would be upgradeable with other components that fit that form factor's standard."
In other words, you could build your own laptop just like you can build your own ATX form factor PC right now. This would drastically lower the cost of laptops for those of us who know how to build PCs, since we could suddenly get bare bones systems that would be expandable.
It always annoyed me that after I bought a $1500 laptop that I'd want to buy another one in four years and I'd have to buy stuff again I don't honestly need to, like the keyboard, LCD screen, battery, and chassis.
Being able to go to Newegg, pick your system board, chassis, screen, input devices, HD, battery size, and so on all a-la-carte would be great. - thirdtenor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Thats whole point....
Intel knows that if they lower the cost of upgrades (by not having to upgrade an expensive screen, battery, etc) they can sell more chipsets and cpus to the lucrative and (currently) intel dominated mobile market. - SniperX, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3When was the last time you bought a laptop directly from Intel anyways?
There is actually a great idea in my opinion if it could be done correctly. PCs have been standardized (minus some unnamed companies that love proprietary components) nearly completely, and the only reason i believe laptops had never gotten to this point is because:
A) Laptops *used* to make up only a small part of the PC market and,
B) Every vendor has their own spin on how they could best decrease the size of laptops more efficiently.
But to completely discredit an idea like this would be absurd. If done correctly, companies could offer laptop form factors based on set standards as options, and us as consumers would understand that the internal components would be upgradeable with other components that fit that form factor's standard. - DoubtfulSalmon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3That applies to all major manufacturers. My issue with IBM computers (laptop and desktop) is their "designed to fail" approach. I have boxes full of dead stinkpads that died at, on average, three years and three years of age (just after the lease on a business machine runs out). You can't tell me *that* happens by accident!
- fuzzweed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3There is a new European directive (WEEE) that states that all manufacturers should be moving towards this upgrade/reuse/replace model to try and stop us throwing sooooo much electronic stuff in the bin when it's working fine, but is just a year or two old. I'm not sure if Intel are really doing anything wonderful and innovative, or just putting their own positive marketing spin on what the EU will require them to do anyway in the future.
- dylanrjones, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I don't want to be one of those digg guys who just criticizes posters spelling and grammar instead of their opinions, but if you just spent another 30 seconds looking over your post, or at least clicked on check spelling, it would make it a lot easier for us to try and decipher what exactly it is you are trying to say. I had to reread your post several times before I got your point. I value your opinion, I just had trouble figuring out what it was. (That goes for others out there too).
Having said that, upgradeable parts are the main reasons I hauled my PC to Australia with me when I moved from Canada instead of just buying a laptop. I like upgrading one part at a time so it doesn't hurt my wallet so much. - 1the1, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2my old dell p3 laptop could do all of that as well except the screen of coarse, but i think it should be standard that laptops dont have permanent drives etc etc so they can be replaced or upgraded.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2you all fail to miss the obvious point that it also means it's easy to people to fix broken parts themselfs. THAT is the real issue.
- dynamit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2How did you change it? Did you send it in to Dell or did you do it your self?
- Elranzer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2When you're paying for them with your own money, rather than your parents' allowance, then they're not so disposable...
- r3tex, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Aren't most of those parts interchangeable all ready? Within the same series of course, you don't want to switch a stupid HP screen with a Thinkpad one ;) IBM has 3 years warranty and they switched my motherboard for me in 3 days when I shorted the USB bus. Very nice!
- veritech, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1finally!! Now apple just needs to shoehorn this upgradable goodness into a 12" core duo mac book pro, and i'm happy
- geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Laptop video card replacements are done by removing the old laptop video card and inserting the new one (kind of like AGP/PCI-X, but on a laptop scale).
Dell isn't the only company who offers these newer replaceable laptop video cards, they just sell the most of them (because Dell is a wholesale builder/purchaser of near Intel-standard implementations [though because of Windows, Dell has refused to add innovations such as EFI support to their motherboards]). IIRC, there are AMD boards that support this card level upgrade as well, and I believe Alienware used to ship them. - MrKite, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Interesting... I didn't see anything about being able to swap your cpu, video card, or memory... which is the stuff that I upgrade the most.
- ericesque, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1wrong. Thirdtenor sees through to the real point... it's about people being able to upgrade their intel chipsets and CPUs. It's creating consumables for laptops much like these things are already consumables for desktops. Intel doesn't care if the average person can do it him(her)self. They figure if people can upgrade their mobo and cpu--be it on their own, or at best buy-- they sell more hardware.
Only serious techies like a lot of us are willing to put 2,000 in our yearly or bi-yearly budget for computers. Most other people may only be willing to put out a couple hundred which = a processor or mobo. (read: upgrade mobo also upgrades integrated video, wireless, audio, etc...) The average user may find more value in this than in buying a whole new laptop. - rexxars, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Like ericesque said, most laptops lets you switch the HDD, CPU and RAM. I don't really see the point in changing the optical drive, as most new laptops come with a DVD-burner capable of most formats. Unless you really want HD-DVD or Blu-ray. Switching a screen is pretty useless concidering it would have to be the same size as before. Also, new screens cost a fortune, so unless intel made the screens cheaper, you'd more likely just throw in an extra buck and buy yourself a brand new laptop. Just my two cents.
- VSKBadCRC, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I'm curious on how they plan on making upgradeable screens. Would you maybe replace your screen with the same size XGA screen? Given the cost of these screens, why would anyone bother? I've had several laptops sent into repair for things such as cracked screens, with repairs costs going as high as $600-$1200 to replace, often exceeding the selling value of the laptop. I fail to see how this benefits anyone.
The harddrives are already easy enough to replace, same with RAM (most systems at least, some still place a stick under the keyboard, making it difficult to upgrade), after which there's not much else to upgrade, save for a new video card, which isn't available anyways on most systems.
That being said, I don't see a viable market for this kind of improvement, it's hard enough to sell the benefits of an upgraded CPU. People like to see numbers, and when people see memory capacity of a video card, they think that's the quality of the graphics card. Or they assume that because a Celeron processor has the same clock speed as a system running an Athlon64 or PentiumHT that it's just as good.
There's so many options out there for computers that when most people walk into a computer store they have no idea what they need, or want. So they focus on price, because they can understand price. A system like this would only add to the consumer confusion.
Then again, I could be wrong. - harism, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1dynamit: Is there an easy way?
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Portuguese / Brazilian : http://www.htk.com.br/noticia.php?noticia=359
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http://www.htk.com.br/ - DoubtfulSalmon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1oops, that's a typo. IMTS "three years and three months of age"
- DoubtfulSalmon, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I think the Intel guy who is talking about 10 week wait for spare parts has been smoking a few too many psychoactive pharmaceuticals. I buy all of my Dell kit with 3yr next day on site warranty whassname and 3 yr complete cover guard. If the machine gets broken, cracked screen, etc, a techo comes out the next day and fixes it for me. (I can buy the same support on a 4 hour basis, and I can extend the support to Asia/Pacific for the staff that travel there (I'm in Australia)). If the machine gets run over by a bus they just put an order for a new one in the system, 10 working days.
Ten weeks? Lay off the crack pipe, Mr Intel Guy! - ericesque, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I really don't see a market for upgradable laptops. You can already swap out the hdd, cpu, and ram. If you're looking for a gpu or display upgrade, you're probably in the market for a new notebook anyway. I think that notebooks are such a quickly changing market that few people need or want more upgrading capabilities.
Also, setting standards for laptops are more than likely going to cause an increase in size and weight. In addition, standards would slow the process of parts becoming smaller and lighter because in order to achieve this, you would have to set new standards. ATX has been a standard for a long time--despite obvious advantages of BTX due to heat management. - drizek, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2get a dell. I switched the x300 on my 9300 to a 7800gtx.
It might even be possible to upgrade to the 7900gtx once it comes out, but i cant see myself spending 500 bucks on a 10% performance boost. - mjrpes, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Laptops aren't fully analogous to desktops, since design and size is much more varied in laptops. So I'm curious if this unified component initiative will affect the design and style of notebooks. For example, if LCD displays are made easily accessible in laptops, would this mean the display component would have to be bulkier to give it more accessibility? I notice that Intel has in mind 11 different design possibilities, so maybe they are trying to cover all possiblilities here.
- raccettura, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I just wish my IBM T43 would let me swap out my HD... when I did, it gives a 2010 POST error on boot... I can still use it, but uber annoying to see that on boot. Makes me cry each time.
- thirdtenor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Well you got ripped off, though in single quantities its hard not to pay an arm & leg for laptop TFTs.
If the displays were easily swapped, prices would come down.
There is a serious lack of standardisation when comes to LVDS. Both the board and panel have different signal paths, so you need a custom cable for each pair. Getting the board mfg.s to standardize would be a step in the right direction, but still not solve the problem. Maybe intel is looking to push a mobile DVI standard - good luck! - johndi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This is the sort of thing that might make me consider a laptop. I like to be able to repair things myself, and many laptops make that impractical, yeah I want to be able to replace anything that breaks like I can on my desktop, with parts that aren't overpriced.
If they'd just do something about the price to performance ratio I'd be sold. My wife says I'm careful with my money, but I'd say I'm a cheap bastard. I have Denim patches on my computer chair that I got for free! - vertigoblue, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1w/e its just stupid the only thing that needs to be different is the video cards, otherwise the notebooks wouldn't last as long and would end up being junk anyways...
someone argues: "but if something broke i could fix it."
i say: "things are stronger when they are not meant to be taken apart easily, the little plastic tabs and ***** would break, and all you would have is a "fully upgradeable", loose, duct tape covered laptop, keeping the drives in the chassis and the screen hinges propped up right."
Its like Lego "bricks" when they are new they are harder to put together and get apart because they seal together so perfectly but after you use them a couple of times they get looser. after a while they don't hold together well enough to support the weight they used to hold, and if you try to travel with something you built, like an Lego airplane, or say a notebook, you have pieces sliding out and flopping all over the place, and then stuff would break because the pieces couldn't stay in the correct spots and would be loose or fly out when you take the things out of your case, and you would be replacing stuff as much as you would be upgrading it.
AAAahhhhh! -end of rant - theblackgecko, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1One issue is that laptop parts are very high margin parts for laptop manufactures. For example, most replacement batteries run $100 and replacement power cords run $50. A company can make as much profit on accessory bundles (or more) than it did on the original machine.
- CRASSPUNXTEXHTV, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1i have laptops as old as 3 years that i can easily change the possessor ram hard drive and somenootbooks have upgradeable gc's
TO cahnge your processor just go under the key board it is quite easy just look on the bottom and the screws labeled "K" and unscrew them and crack open your key board you should see your CPU
if you dont know how to upgrade a hdd or ram Please read a book - vertigoblue, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1i upgrade mine and everybody else's notebooks just fine, and in a matter of days, even when i have to order parts... the only thing that really needs work is the video card situation.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I'd like a (laptop) graphics card where i could just add more memory as and when it's needed. I know something like that exists for desktops, but it'd be cool to have the same thing for laptops.
- Legion303, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1It's called MXM, nVidia's swappable laptop PCI-e format.
- ramjet1959, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2It'll be good for Microshaft = upgrade 3 pieces of hardware , and you need to buy a new copy of XP /Vista for the same hardware.....
- Elranzer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Pentium M based laptops (including the Core Solo/Duo) series have always been upgradable. They've just been a pain to replace the CPU, but it was possible.
- deepsub, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Socketed CPU's in notebooks is not a new thing. And, they never caught on, as can be witnessed by the general amazement in this thread.
http://www.google.com/search?q=laptop socketed cpu
BTW - there should be pluses between the search terms, but Digg strips them out for some reason... - kloud213, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1i think this is awesome, i upgrade my main pc all the time and just recycle parts down the chain, i have like 5 computers all with their own task. when i buy like a new graphics card the they all get shifted till the geforce 4 mx got put out of its misery. i would loveto be able to do this with laptops.
- TuxFan, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This could help advance the DIY notebook kits that are available (yeah, I know "buy Dell" but I'm not lazy). With interchangable parts, upgrading AND building notebook PCs would be easier and companies could produce better and more innovative products.
Standards are a good thing too, guys. Otherwise, imagine every company using a different measurment system. - notkevin, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Many notebooks are already upgradeable. The problem is it can be difficult to find replacement parts.
- Player0ne, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I don't know about the rest of you but id like to pay less for a laptop. Just pop off my Screen and get a new base. probably saving tonnes of coin. Don't get me wrong being able to buy a new video card is nice but Like buddy said if your laptop video card isn't good enough its probably time to buy a new one anyways.
- thegsa, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1That's True
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3just buy a ibm they can already do all of that. the optical drive simply come out with the flick of a switch smae wiht the hard drvie. also who would want to like trade laptop parts "i will give u my battery for your screen" "wooow dude sweet yea" i dont see the point also the example they use i stupid. "When your notebook display cracks on an airplane you are talking about a 10-week waiting period for a spare part. You are without your notebook for too long," said Intel director of American Distribution and Channel Sales and Marketing Steve Dallman. ummm my ibm screen cracked and a number of other things broke they fixed it in 10 hours. also if you on a plane what do u do ask the air hostess for a spare screen ( extended version of last comment)
- ArchonMagnus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@ SuperSloth:
I totally agree with your comment. Being able to choose lappy "cases" (enclosures) and the like would also be great for the modders out there. I know that I would rather have a completely custom laptop built like I want without OEM logos on the case, OEM bios boot screens, and case badges on the palm rests by default. Could you imagine a standardized clear acrylic laptop case (maybe the LCD bezels could be black, but clear overall)? - dynamit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Well changing it might not be that hard actually if it's like pci-express that some manufacturers use on some models. Finding a card that fits your computer seems to be harder though.
Unless you have a card with MXM specs like the 6800Go or newer of course. - jthayes, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I'll be interested to see how this pans out. Most companies already offer certain series models that have many configuration options. Acer for example, offer the 1690 series which can be configured around different variations of hard drive size, ram configuration, bluetooth option, variations on the ati PCIE card used, processor speed and so on. This is not new, pretty much every laptop manufacturer produces models like this.
No matter how long you look for a laptop, you narrow it down to a few models that have almost everything you want. But dont' have it all. The ability to swap out the battery, display or possible even graphics card would be a big bonus. You might really like a particular model laptop, but want an nvidia card instead of an ati, or vice versa. -
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