OCuLink port on the case possible?

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum

Hi there,

if you're into eGPUs, you've probably heard of Oculink.
If not, feel free to have a look into this thread: OCuLink: What It Is, Why You Need It, and Where To Get It

In short, OCuLink allows for connecting an external GPU to your notebook and use at near bear-metal performance! This is a great alternative to Thunderbolt, which always has a performance penalty of roughly 20% (depends on app of course) and is also plagued by a variety of issues (dropping connections etc.)

Sadly, there are only a couple of device that offer a native OCuLink port. While the number is growing, it is not yet a wide-spread industry standard.

There's hope for anyone interested in this technology though: with the rise of PCIe 4.0, it is possible to use an adapter to connect an external GPU via a spare NVME slot:

This only is an option if your notebook has a spare NVME slot. Thankfully, Novacustoms new V54 (Intel-only model) offers two NVME slots:

V54 Series 14.0 inch coreboot laptop

While this hasn't been done yet - testing will commence this weekend, still waiting for some parts - it most certainly is possible. This would allow for a variety of new use-cases and also offer a tremendous boost to the computing power of this notebook!

If it does indeed work, would it be possible to incorporate a port into the chassis? This could either be done on the backside, as shown in this image ...

Makeshift OCuLink port on the backside of a notebook

... or on the sides. It could be done by modifying the chassis, maybe this could be offered as a send-in service?

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this!

novacustom

It's a cool idea.

That being said, I think that it is also a niche. But it might just work, we just have to wait for a community member who is willing to try this!

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum

novacustom It's a cool idea.

It's no longer a cool idea, it's a cool feature now:

This was done with an Osmeta M.2-to-OCuLink adapter, which so far isn't being sold on western markets. So you'd have to either use Superbuy or try a similar adapter on Aliexpress.

There are further ideas I may eventually give a try, like this adapter here:

Maybe this could be used to have a port on the side instead of the bottom?

There are also custom adapters made for certain laptops:

While most of these so far are made for various ThinkPads, I've also encountered some for Chinese laptops. Maybe we'll be lucky and see some for Clevo models in the future as well?

cortejo

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum

This is a pretty cool mod.
Have you explored the other idea that you had using the adapter? Would it perhaps fit the port on the side instead of having it sticking from the bottom?

Have you faced some signal losses? The Oculink without re-drive was pointed to be prone for signal interference.

It seems that there are several different types of adapters for Thinkbooks. Perhaps with a lot of lucky we may be able to use one of them.

novacustom

Cool modification, congratulations!

We cannot officially support it since such modification is required and affects the warranty we get from our side from our ODM provider. Feel free to use it though on your side.

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum

cortejo

Hi there, I haven't tried to modify the OCuLink setup any further since the current modification is working fine for me and there wasn't any interest in the community.
If you want to we can connect on Matrix and share our experiences, and maybe come up with an even better solution.

cortejo

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum Hi there, I haven't tried to modify the OCuLink setup any further since the current modification is working fine for me and there wasn't any interest in the community.

I guess what I'm probably most curious is if you faced some challenges regarding the performance.

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum If you want to we can connect on Matrix and share our experiences, and maybe come up with an even better solution.

That may not be a bad idea. It is funny that since we are in a NovaCustom forum we probably can expect that others are using the same tools such as Matrix.

In my research I found another report in the eGPU forum about the NovaCustom laptop with an Oculink port. Not sure if that was also you.

That same person reported some trouble using a non re-redrive M.2 Oculink adapter.

I wonder what specific parts (including GPU brands that we may avoid) we should grab to make this works flawless in Linux and potentially with a very convenient side port instead of cutting a hole on the bottom lid.

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum

cortejo

Well yes, that's me on the eGPU forum. Feel free to join the Dasharo Matrix Room. I'm present there by the same nick name as here in the forum.

Per-Astra-Ad-Deum

@cortejo: please re-check on Matrix if you haven't already. AMD GPUs are now usable.