jaydotz

If want cheapest pnp TB2 eGPU enclosure with : http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/8199-2013-13-macbook-pro-gtx980%4016gbps-tb2-netstor-na211tb-win8-1-osx10-10-%5Bgoalque.html#post111834

Otherwise please re-evaluate what "heavy modding" an AKiTio Thunder2 is. eg: bending a chassis to fit a video card, creating a barrel-to-molex adapter and using

an ATX PSU to drive it. It's suprisingly low US$189 base cost along with ease of adaptability being the reason why it's nearly had 130k hits here and a stack of implementations using it.

Eg:

http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/7598-2012-mac-mini-gtx770%4010gbps-tb1-akitio-thunder2-osx10-9-4-%5Bentzoe%5D.html#post104243

http://forum.techinferno.com/provisional-guides/8876-2012-15-macbook-pro-gtx970%4010gbps-tb1-akitio-thunder2-osx10-10-%5Bw4vz%5D.html

FYI: ViDock/PE4L expresscard solutions are best avoided: http://forum.techinferno.com/enclosures-adapters/7939-villagetronic-rip-off-alert-thunderbolt-vidock-crippled-tb-ec-4gbps-unit.html

Thank you for your advice and the warning @Tech Inferno Fan! Much appreciated. So, should I expect the same results with Windows (since you gave examples of Macs)?

Hello everyone,

Asking for some help to decide whether I'll buy a Dell Precision M3800 (Thunderbolt 2.0), depending on what the performance/cost figures are. I do not want to buy a MacBook, so I looked around for alternatives, and the M3800 seems like a pretty good candidate to me.

So, if I understand this correctly I have the following options:

Sonnet Echo Express III-D - Use almost any GPU I want, expensive, plug and play

Sonnet Echo Express SEL - Only slim GPUs, cheaper, plug and play

Akitio Thunder2 PCIe Expansion Chassis - Cheaper, heavy mods required

PE4L - Very cheap, heavy mods required

ViDock - Not so cheap, slower performance because of Express Card interface

Is this the complete picture? What I want is the simplest, plug and play solution available (or with minimal mods), without paying $1k for the III-D. Is this possible or am I dreaming?

Thanks in advance!