G74SX Graphics Card upgrade via mobo/professional help.

[Clouduck]

Hey all,

So I've done some reading on the forums recently about the G74sx series laptop and upgrading it's graphics card (To which i've read that it's somewhat impossible to replace by yourself). I'm well aware that the GTX 560M graphics card is soldered onto the mobo. I was wondering if it were possible and not ridiculous (in both price and effort) to get a new mobo from the newer laptops (ie. the G75 series or next year's model) and have the new graphics card in place.

Either that, or get a compatible graphics card and get the card professionally replaced and re-soldered onto the mobo. I'm not sure how motherboards and graphics compatibility works 😕

Is this viable at all? Or will I only be able to upgrade my CPU, memory and Hard drives? (The GTX 560M is the weakest component in my system. I have the i7 2670QM processor)

Much Thanks,

Clouduck

[gilbert]

everything is possible with money , you can always find a local shop to do it for you, here in arizona there is a lot of little shops that would do it for me all i have to do is get them the part i want to replace the original with , i'm not a gamer so i have no need for a better gpu now the cpu is another story im hopping that next year i will b able to upgrade to the 2960xm .

[Clouduck]

gilbert wrote:
everything is possible with money , you can always find a local shop to do it for you, here in arizona there is a lot of little shops that would do it for me all i have to do is get them the part i want to replace the original with , i'm not a gamer so i have no need for a better gpu now the cpu is another story im hopping that next year i will b able to upgrade to the 2960xm .

All right, thanks for the reply! So do I have to worry about getting a certain graphics card? I'm unsure as to how compatability works. So could I buy a GTX 675M, get it professionally replaced and re-souldered and it should work? Would I need to worry about any thing else?

[electric0ant]

gilbert wrote:
everything is possible with money , you can always find a local shop to do it for you, here in arizona there is a lot of little shops that would do it for me all i have to do is get them the part i want to replace the original with , i'm not a gamer so i have no need for a better gpu now the cpu is another story im hopping that next year i will b able to upgrade to the 2960xm .

if the GPU is soldered onto the board you're not going to be able to upgrade it. resoldering individual chips on motherboards is possible but when the graphics card is integrated in, no upgrade is going to be possible for that.

the G75 series motherboard is not going to fit the G74 case.

general rule for notebooks, only the motherboard for that notebook will fit that notebook. anything that is integrated on the motherboard will never ever be upgrade-able.

[jonfl1]

Does anyone know for sure if the G74S machines use a true Nvidia MXM port for the video card?

This site/page is a great starting point for information on this: http://www.mxm-upgrade.com/Tech_13.html

Per that site, it is NOT possible to upgrade the GPU in a G73JW/JH, because it does nto use a true MXM form factor card. I'm not sure about the G74, and maybe someone else on here can provide constructive input if they've cracked theirs open...

[gilbert]

electric0ant wrote:
if the GPU is soldered onto the board you're not going to be able to upgrade it. resoldering individual chips on motherboards is possible but when the graphics card is integrated in, no upgrade is going to be possible for that.

the G75 series motherboard is not going to fit the G74 case.

general rule for notebooks, only the motherboard for that notebook will fit that notebook. anything that is integrated on the motherboard will never ever be upgrade-able.

you can upgrade the gpu like i said if u are willing to pay is not going to be easy and yes it will void your warranty , i remember when i first got my supercharged cobalt in 2005 people told me no you cant put a turbo on it and what do you know a year later i was using a big turbo on it , yes i had to change a lot of other parts but it was possible , im not saying it would b easy and you may need to modify the heat sinks and other parts but it is possible if u have the cash , it may not be cost effective but hey who am i to tell you what to do with your money it may be a lot cheaper just to get another lappy but hey everything is possible with money

[jonfl1]

Oops... Just saw a pic of the naked G74 mobo in another thread and it looks as though the G74 doesn't use an MXM slot. So basically, even if you could find a loose GPU chip for sale on the secondary market, you'd need a technician to remove the previous one and install the new one. And this would far from guarantee compatibility.

[gilbert]

jonfl1 wrote:
Oops... Just saw a pic of the naked G74 mobo in another thread and it looks as though the G74 doesn't use an MXM slot. So basically, even if you could find a loose GPU chip for sale on the secondary market, you'd need a technician to remove the previous one and install the new one. And this would far from guarantee compatibility.

oh yeah you can say good bye to your warranty for sure ,on any big upgrade to pretty much anything , in my case i would be trowing in a 2960 xm in mine and im aware that i would have no more warranty on it but its ok because i know a lot of shops here in az that are pretty cheap and if they want to charge a lot my nephew is a technician for a big company in mexico usually dealing with fixing everybody's laptops and pc's in the company im sure he can fix mine 2 .

[jonfl1]

The point though is that while you might be able to get the chip installed (assuming you can even get a loose chip in the first place), there is no way to guarantee compatibility or functionality once you do.

[gilbert]

jonfl1 wrote:
The point though is that while you might be able to get the chip installed (assuming you can even get a loose chip in the first place), there is no way to guarantee compatibility or functionality once you do.

theoretically it should work but you are right , we wont know until somebody try's it out , the only reason we know that a 2960xm will work on the g74sx is because somebody already did it , so in other words if u attempt to upgrade the gpu you will be the first one to ever tried it that we know .