laptop - want to change from Quadro 3000 m to Gaming video card - please help

[davdav007]

Hi all,

Good to meet you guys here.

I have a big laptop with very powerful processor and lots or RAM, but with the quadro 3000m graphic card (useful for CAD, not for gaming) and i want to now use this machine for gaming. I attach here the snapshot of the rig characteristics. It's a great laptop (it's been bought in UK at pc specialist, so it is assembled, not an original equipment laptop or specific brand).

I kindly ask you help on the graphic card. As you can imagine, i do understand something about pc but i have never replaced an internal part of my pc. therefore could you please:
1) help me to understand what gaming graphic cards can i buy to replace the Quadro 3000m i currently have on my laptop (i bought it equipped with that because i was designing CAD back then... but now I have another machine so this laptop is used for gaming and surf)
2) clarify to me please the laptop graphic cards, are they bespoke for a single laptop model? or for a range of model?
3) basically i would like to know : if and what gaming graphic card i can install in my machine (my target is to play flight simulator 2020 and other games, possibly VR too) i would like to know 3 different price range (cheap, medium price and high price); what are the warning regarding this type of operation; any other information that you might consider important for my project.

Thank you very much for your help.

 

[DavidG]

The Quadro 3000m is mounted on an mxm module board. There are various other laptop graphics chips mounted on mxm modules . You would think therefore one mxm board would be compatible with another. A common misconception about MXM is that certain models of graphics cards (e.g. Nvidia GTX 980M) "is MXM 2.1", and therefore any notebook with a GTX 980M fully implements MXM 2.1. However, this is incorrect. While Nvidia defines a lot of MXM specifications, they do not manufacture or design MXM cards themselves, which mostly consist of a PCB with vRAM and an Nvidia or AMD GPU core. Therefore, any model of GPU can be manufactured in MXM, but a laptop released with any particular graphics card model may or may not implement MXM regardless. This is because it is the decision of the ODM whether or not to implement MXM, not Nvidia's or AMD's.
In short there is no guarantee that another mxm graphics module will be compatible. Your best bet is to contact PC specialist and ask their advice or go this forum which specialises in MXM module cards

Official MXM-Upgrade.com Forum

Kris' MXM realm. The one and only place to stop-by to get first-hand answers from the guru of MXM about upgrade options, prices, specs, tutorials etc.

forums.laptopvideo2go.com

 

[geek 0001]

Why do you want to change the GPU? The Quadro 3000m is a pretty powerful card, and although it won't be as good as a dedicated gaming GPU, it should perform just fine.