ATI for Dell laptops petition

Zardon

Im asking all our board members to pay attention to this post and to head over and fill in the petition detailed below, its a worthwhile cause. I posted it last week and it only got 400+ signatures, come on guys we can do better than that !

Laptops have always been about compromise, right back from when they were essentially a small tower case with a monitor bolted on, we have had to settle for less CPU speed, less hard drive space and lesser performing video options. And that was accepted by all as necessary because back then the technology could not do any better.

Now days this is no longer the case. Improvements in shrinking and adapting technology have for the first time allowed the release of laptops with performance comparable to desktop machines. (Sager being an example that springs to mind.) The question is, why are the big names not offering us the option to upgrade the video cards of our recent laptops? We can already upgrade the hard drive, the ram and in some cases the CPU, so why not the video card as well?

The Desktop upgrade revolution started because people decided that buying a new computer just to get the latest video card (or whatever) was silly and just getting the card itself should be enough. Is this any different then how those of us with laptops that around a year old feel?

To that end, we have started a petition to Dell Inc, that they consider offering upgraded video card options (like the m10 9600) for current and recent Dell laptops. (like the 8xxx and 5xxx series Inspirons). Dell already have a modular construction and the instructions for removing / replacing the video cards are already available on Dells site. so why not give us something to increase the value of our considerable investment?

The petition can be found at http://www.petitiononline.com/inspiron/petition.html and while this one is targeted specifically at Dell, you can be sure that if Dell start offering us upgrades, the other big names would surely follow or lose market share as a result.

So if you had/have/will have a laptop computer, and you'd like the option of extending its life beyond the brief period when its video card is the latest, then help us let the manufacturers know that we deserve the same consideration given to our desktop brothers.

ATI has paved the way by producing the Flexfit architecture whereby their current and recent mobility chipsets are pin compatable with each other, have basically the same voltage requirements and share the same driver. All that is remains, is to convince the big OEM/OEDs to actually make use of the technology.

Frank Hauptle.

tastyweat

All done!!!

Davidgt

i signed!

ToshiroOC

I have a Dell 5150 and an ATI card in it. Signed.

spark rain fire

edit.

Zardon

EDIT: ah glad to see you read it.

Rayder

My bro is thinking of getting a laptop.......signed.

toddsmack2k

Oh yeah signed!

patje

every time i try the link I get a page not found

Judas

workz good here still....... i'm 153 still!

Franki

You guys are great,

Thanks for your support..

Hopefully I'll be able to get this thing slashdotted at some stage.. I've submitted it to anandtech and some other news sites as well.

Even if they don't publish it, at least they are made aware of the issue which might come in handy at a later date.

Thanks again.

rgds

Franki

FuNsTeR

signed .... even though i'll never buy a laptop

kinetic

Signed!

craig588

TonyMonTana

While i agree they should offer laptop's that have replacable graphic card's i also know that some laptop builders, (Hi-Grade) for one, offer you the choice to return your laptop after a year and trade it in for the latest one.This to me seems a better idea, as not only do you get a better, and latest graphic card, but also the cpu, memory and Hd are all better spec than the one you trade in, this saves having to upgrade and risk warranty in most cases.If you have laptops in which people can replace the graphic cards it will mean you will have to take in to consideration warranty issues.With my old laptop if i wanted to install more ram i would void my warranty unless it was done by the maker of the laptop, surley this would be a issue with gpu units being replaced, if the company offered a free fitment service this i imagine would only be if you bought the upgrade using there hardware, which in my mind would be far greater price than if bought else were.If you want 256ddr for your dell laptop or anyother make of laptop you will pay at least 25% more buying it from the laptop makers than buying it your self, they do this and getaway with it because they know they are the only ones who can install the memory without voiding warranty, this is something they all do and should not be allowed to continue.

Tony.

Franki

Are you sure about that??? I do not know about your country, but in mine, changing the ram cannot void your warranty, nor the hardrive, even the CPU if its changable.. and none of it can void your warranty unless they can prove that your upgrade was the cause of the failure.

My Ex girlfriend took one of the companies to court because they claimed her taking the back of her machine voided its warranty.. she won.

The current Dell laptops have fairly non uniform vid card modules.. but its believed future models might have video cards more like PCMCIA cards in design, making it an easy job.

For now, Dell already supply the full instructions on how to remove/replace their video card modules on the site.

rgds

Franki