MXM 3.0b to PCI-E x16 cable???

[KR4G3N]

Before I get into my issue/idea, lets start with my system... Dell Alienware M18xR2

 

It was ordered in the UK in June 2012, and took I delivery in August 2012. Shortly after that, I moved to Canada.

 

 

Quote

Item No. Description

 

210-40056 Alienware M18x Base

203-21878 N08W8M01

213-15889 Processor : Intel Core i7 3820QM (8MB Cache, up to 3.7GHz w/ Turbo Boost 2.0)

230-12516 Display : 18.4" WideFHD (1920 x 1080) WLED LCD

319-10774 Camera : Integrated Skype HD Certified FullHD Camera with dual digital microphones

320-12432 LCD Back Cover : Cosmic Black - Anodized Aluminum

340-29243 Ship Accessory : Western Europe Docs (EN, FR, IT, GER, DUT)

340-29425 Resource DVD : Alienware M18x

340-29427 Placemats : Placemats (Eng, Fre, Ger, Swe)

370-22367 Memory : 16384MB (2x8GB) 1600MHz DDR3 Dual Channel

400-25418 Hard Drive : 256GB SSD + 1TB 5,400rpm SATA

429-16501 Optical Drive : BluRay Combo (Blu-ray read only, DVD, CD read & write)

450-13572 Power Cord : UK 250V

450-16750 Power Supply : Alienware 330W AC Adapter

451-11720 Battery : Primary 12-cell 97W/HR LI-ION

490-13752 Graphics : Dual 2GB GDDR5 Nvidia GTX 675M SLI

510-10453 Audio : Creative Sound Blaster Recon3Di with THX TruStudio Pro Software

545-10007 Gaming Software : Steam Gaming forum and download application

555-14432 Wireless : Killer Wireless-N 1103

583-15802 Keyboard : Internal UK/Irish Qwerty Keyboard

619-32223 Operating System : English Windows 7 SP1 Ultimate (64 BIT)

630-13354 Software : English Microsoft Office 2010 Professional (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, One Note, Publisher, Access)

640-12302 Software : Datasafe Local 2.0 Basic

640-12352 Software : Dell Support Center 3.0

644-10026 Avatar : Alienhead Glow

648-10027 Wallpaper : Alienware 3D Wallpaper

648-10028 Wallpaper : Alienware Glow Wallpaper

648-10035 Wallpaper : Alienware Logo Wallpaper

650-14174 Anti Virus : Not Included

654-10009 TimeZone : (GMT + 00.00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London

656-10016 AlienFX Colour : Mars Red

754-56825 Standard Service - 1 year of Next Business Day coverage included with your PC

754-56826 No Warranty Upgrade

755-10605 3 Years Accidental Damage Protection

799-18147 Alienware M18x Order

 

This laptop has been sitting on a Cooler Master Notepal U3 Plus its whole life.

 

The operating system was upgraded to Windows 10 Pro from Windows 7 Ultimate and is currently running Build 20H2. After upgrading I tried to keep all drivers as up to date as possible, including updating the BIOS to A14 which is the most recent option on Dell's website.

 

I added a Razer Blackwidow keyboard and Naga Mouse in 2013 and I increase the RAM to 32GB in 2017.

 

I have never repasted any of the processors since taking delivery of this machine.

 

So onto the problem...

 

Over the last year, when running on nVidia graphics. the laptop screen would randomly turn off (machine still running) did not matter if I was playing GTA 5 or browsing the web.

 

This week I finally had time to sit down and diagnose the issue. My primary GTX675m has failed. Initially I stripped down and repasted my CPU and GPUs and swapped the two GPUs around (they have been in there same slots for 8 years now). Fired up and system is stable with SLI disabled but crashes if I enable SLI so I know that my old Primary card is done.

 

However dropping to a single GTX675m on this system is a significant drop in performance which brings me to my question.

 

I have discovered the GDC Beast adapter comes in three variants Expresscard, Mini PCIe and NVMe M.2.      My M18xR2 has an Expresscard slot, I could also go mini PCIe if I remove my wifi adapter. These two solutions are only PCIe x1 though.      Unfortunately for me my M18xR2 does not have any NVMe M.2 ports HOWEVER one person here found an MXM to NVMe M.2 convert which they have used to add another SSD to their system. The GDC Beast NVMe M.2 connector allows for PCIe x4 not x1 which is a bonus. and users here have reported that this adapter does indeed work for eGPU although possibly not on some Clevo systems due to BIOS restrictions.

 

But that got me thinking, there are plenty of adapter cards to allow users to put an MXM 3.0b card into a desktop via PCIe x16, and retain the x16 speeds, so why can't it be done the other way around. After all, shouldn't it just be a case of pin mapping between the two connectors? And then I found this...

 

the sour ninja dual wield.

 

[MEDIA=youtube]0YzkpITCiUY[/MEDIA]

 

I know his kickstarter failed but I did some more searching...

 

And I found this product at taobao.com only problem is I don't read Chinese.  

 

 

 

What I would really like to know is:  who, if anyone has, managed to build a working MXM 3.0b - PCIe x16 eGPU solution on an M18xR2 and what is the most powerful card successfully used in it.

 

is the GTX1070 the limit as far as external cards go or could someone plug an RTX3080 into any of the known eGPU configurations and have it work?

 

On the M18xR2 there is an internal SLI cable. In theory if an MXM 3.0b - PCIe x16 were possible

 

 

IF these cables exist/work

 

And IF one were to fit 2 to their M18xR2

 

Would SLI be possible via the internal connector or would that need to be removed and use the desktop card"s SLI connections (if present)

 

Edited December 20, 2020 by KR4G3N