Skyfire II Graphics Card Upgrade?

[ReubinB]

Hi
Was wondering if anyone could help me,
I'm looking at the Skyfire II and the Vortex III and noticed the Skyfire did not have the options for having the Radeon HD 7970m or the GTX680m pre-installed. If i decided to go for the Skyfire with the GTX675m perhaps, would I be able to upgrade to either of the two graphics cards mentioned above in the future, or will they not be compatible regardless of the other components I choose.

My budget is around £1000, and my chosen specification for the Skyfire II without Windows is £934.

Other than the size of RAM which I would plan to upgrade in the future, and having no OS installed which I may buy elsewhere, does anyone see any flaws with the components below? Should I go for the GTX675m or buy the cheaper and upgrade to a better one in the future (if possible)?

I would really appreciate any comments and help.
Reubin.

This is the specification I would be looking at:


Chassis & Display
SkyFire:17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)

Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-3610QM (2.30GHz) 6MB

Memory (RAM)
4GB SAMSUNG 1333MHz SODIMM DDR3 MEMORY (1 x 4GB)

Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 675M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11

Memory - Hard Disk
750GB WD SCORPIO BLACK WD7500BPKT, SATA 3 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)

DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
8x SATA DVD±R/RW/Dual Layer (+ 24x CD-RW)

Memory Card Reader
Integrated 4 in 1 Card Reader (SDXC/MMC/MS/XD)

Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING

Sound Card
Intel 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack

Bluetooth & Wireless
GIGABIT LAN & INTEL WIRELESS 802.11N CARD INC. BLUETOOTH 3.0

USB Options
2 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 3 x USB 2.0 PORTS AS STANDARD

Battery
SkyFire Series 9 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

Power Lead & Adaptor
1 x UK Power Lead & 180W AC Adaptor

Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED

Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE

Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE

Keyboard Language
INTEGRATED UK KEYBOARD WITH NUMBER PAD

Notebook Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE

Webcam
INTEGRATED 720P 30 FPS HD WEBCAM

Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)

Insurance
1 Month Free Laptop Insurance inc. Accidental Damage & Theft

Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)

Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 8 to 10 working days [/I]

 

[PCS]

Welcome to our forums

The specification you have selected is well balanced, however I would consider upgrading to 8GB of RAM as this is only around £15 more expensive. At present there are no upgrades available to the HD 7970M or GTX 680M but we might be able to offer one of these in the future. However this is not a guarantee.

 

[ReubinB]

Hi again,
Thanks for your response,
Yes I may consider upgrading to 8gb of ram, thank you for the suggestion, but again with regards to the graphics card if you do not offer the upgrade to Skyfire, will it be possible for me to upgrade them myself, restrictions being either other hardware being incompatible, or inaccessibility?

Thanks again for the advice.
Reubin

 

[PCS]

Providing you can obatin the drivers and bios flash the upgrade is perfectly possible.

 

[ReubinB]

Oh ok,
Now I just need to decide whether to save up for the Vortex or stick with the lower performance graphics card on the Skyfire.
Thanks for your help

 

[dlatimer]

I'm in a similar position to you, with regards to choosing between the SkyFire or Vortex. I'm favouring the SkyFire as it's cheaper and has a bigger screen, but the Vortex possibly favours easier upgrades, better speakers and a backlit keyboard. The latter two don't bother me personally, so at the moment I cannot justify the extra money purchasing a Vortex. Sounds like you may have the same opinion?

 

[ReubinB]

Yes, our situations are pretty much identical, the only reason I would get the Vortex over the Skyfire is dependent on how hard it would be too upgrade the graphics card if the option is not available from PC Specialist.