Upgrading my laptop's GPU. Worth it?

Hi everyone.

I currently own an Alienware M17x R4 laptop, with the AMD Radeon 7970m GPU in it. 2 years ago, this was a top of the line GPU and laptop. Now, it's getting a bit long in the tooth, so I'm thinking of upgrading to the 980m.

What do you guys think? It costs $1000 to upgrade to a 980m, and I should get at least 61% increase in power, since the 980m is approximately 10% faster than a 7970m crossfire setup, which is already 50% more powerful than a single 7970m.

Do you guys think this is a good value for an upgrade. $1000 seems expensive, but I suppose this GPU would get me another 2 years of ultra settings perhaps, and increase the performance of games I'm already playing. I play a bunch of old games most of the time, but I do play the occasional GPU-heavy games as well.

Thoughts, comments, ideas, notions, suggestions…all welcome. Thanks!

P.S. Perhaps I should sell my Alienware, maybe get $1500 for it, and spend $2500 total on a better desktop PC + GPU? Hmmm….

I wouldn't spend $1k just to upgrade the GPU but thats me.

Clevo/Sager has some new 17" laptops with a 980m for about $1500 as a starting price. If you already have a SSD to stick in then your golden. You can even go 4k on the screen if you want.

Check this page out: http://www.xoticpc.com/custom-gaming…95_51_162.html

I would sell the old one and buy a new one.

Originally Posted by Fluent
P.S. Perhaps I should sell my Alienware, maybe get $1500 for it, and spend $2500 total on a better desktop PC + GPU? Hmmm….

If you're happy with a desktop, I think this has to be the way to go. You'll do so much better on price/performance, and there'll be far more options for upgrading, too.

I guess it all depends on how much value you place on the convenience of a laptop. I wouldn't buy a gaming laptop myself - but if I spent a lot of time on the road, and wanted to game when bored in hotel rooms, I probably would.

Well, believe it or not, my laptop basically acts as a desktop anyway! I have another laptop that I use on the go, but the Alienware basically performs as a desktop.

Soooo, I'm thinking that I should sell this Alienware, put together a nice desktop for $2500 and see what I can do.

Are there any GPUs for desktops that can deliver 4k resolution gaming? If it's not too expensive, I'd like to look in this area, perhaps upgrading my monitor as well (which is currently a 32" 1080p screen).

Thanks for the answers thus far. My wheels are turning a bit.

I agree with you, if its basically a desktop only laptop then I'd go desktop for sure. Cheaper and more powerful that way.

I'm in the same boat as Toff in that I've also recently got a 980m laptop (Clevo too). I did consider an upgrade but the marginal cost of getting everything refreshed plus a new warranty was low enough to tempt me into a whole new machine. If you're going from a red to green it will usually mean a bit of work with pasting, cutting, possibly getting new heatsinks or at least thermal pads.

As to desktop - I generally tend to wait for content before getting hardware and there are so few good titles that go 4k (including on the horizon) that I preferred the portability of a laptop to raw graphics of a desktop at the moment.

I think I'm just going to get the 980m upgrade. That will at least keep me current for the next year or so, which is all I really need.

Thanks for the thoughts!