For starters, lets define what the big rig is. The big rig is my Alienware Aurora ALX that I bought way back in 2009. It has been a great PC longer than any of my past PCs by far. The only problem is that I have never tried to upgrade until now.
After Harvey finally died down in Texas, I got started on trying to upgrade the graphics cards, hard drive, and add ram. I was able to add a hard drive easily, but the rest has been harder than expected with the cards being the real problem. That problem is that I made a bad mistake in 2009 when I bought a dual graphics card setup rather than a single powerful card. Besides never really working, it has only increased the complexity of upgrading the system.
Removing the two cards was not that hard other than removing a very small connector that was not listed in any diagram and having to get the bottom card around a cable without hurting either. The fun began when I went to get the GTX 1050 to install it in a slot. It is about the same size as the previous two cards combined. Therefore, it would not fit in the top or bottom slot.
This is what my system looks like now after the cards have been removed:
DSC03048
Now I am faced with a very important decision: Do I try to find a smaller card to fit one of the slots or do I move one of the platforms above so I can have room for the GTX 1050? If I removed the top platform, there is a cable labeled audio attached to it. Thus, I would have to either remove that cable or attach it to the bottom platform. With the top platform gone, the card should fit on the bottom platform as the reason the top platform does not work is the fan below the cooling system limits the height the card can be in that slot.
Of course, this does not even take into account the SLI feature of the system. Since the double cards never worked since day one, I believe the Dell tech just deactivated it and used the one GTS 240. I found the top card not connected to the system, but there was a SLI bridge attached to both cards.  Hoping this will not throw errors my way, so I am keeping all the parts just in case.
Hopefully, I can still use the single GTX 1050 because upgrading will be extremely limited if that is not the case. Without a doubt, I will never choose something overly fancy like a dual card setup again!

12 COMMENTS

  1. Whatever happens big rig sure have been your pal for a long time! I wasnt able to experience building my own desktop and have been with a laptop ever since. Never had a laptop survived that long as big rig. Tho we all know desktop parts are easier to replace but still, I believe you took good care of it.

    subeJ did not rate this post.
  2. Currently I play games on a laptop (i7 dual core) but I’m saving up to build my own PC from scratch one day, but right now I’m not sure if I have the time to maintain it and replace pieces.

    Rex did not rate this post.
    • Good choice right there! It’s better just to build your own PC rather than buy a new one considering you will be saving money, if you just build it yourself and you get parts with good prices. You don’t have to replace parts often, if you don’t play games that require a lot out of your PC and you don’t use it too intensively.

      Heromanguy12 did not rate this post.
  3. It looks very perplexing going through all of that circuitry and upgrading the graphics card, but I am sure the upgrade will make the Alienware a lot better. I usually never upgrade any of my computers, especially by myself since I have little clue of the internals of a computer.

    Snowy did not rate this post.
  4. Your commitment to have a computer for that long without upgrading for that long time is something else.
    I personally have a laptop but maybe in the future i will actually build myself my own computer part by part starting with a computer case and going forward with that.
    Considering the fact that my laptop is quite old and it will give up at some point and i don’t bother to replace parts of my laptop because it is going to be more difficulty and one mistake can break the whole thing, i know this from my personal experience.

    Heromanguy12 did not rate this post.
  5. Not gonna lie this looks confusing as heck, i’m not sure if i’d be able to build or maintain my own PC from scratch but with the internet these days it’s not hard to learn.

    Rex did not rate this post.

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