I remembered that Octane works with the external Cubix GPU-Xpander but 5k $ is quite a chunk for just an external GPU.
Is anybody aware of something different? Could this also work with Cycles?
If you check the site, they dropped their support for the Xpander. Seems nobody liked it and the results were lackluster.
you are probably better off getting a new computer. Then u can set up network rendering. Thats what i would do. I you want it to be fast in the viewport get a motherboard with 4 GPUs and then get a couple 680s
well the box they advertised at Octane is way to expensive but this idea is not really new. I like having a mobile PC but do not want to buy a desktop only for Blender with Cycles.
But maybe a mini PC with a decent CPU and a good GPU will do the trick and access it via a VNC client.
I never looked for those mini PC towers anybody has a good idea where to find those for reasonable prices?
I checked tigerdirect and their kits but those are to big for me (size wise)
If you have an Express Card or Thunderbolt socket on your Laptop there are adapters for external PCIe slots. Some of these are specific for external GPUs. As far as I heard, these work, but data transfers are a bit slower. Since for cycles there aren’t much data transfers during rendering, it shouldn’t have much impact on performance.
You might try Newegg. They have a good selection of mini computers (Shuttle shoebox size) HERE.
Side note: I’ve been buying from Newegg for years. They have so far been dependable and reliable.
Hi cekuhnen, there are many solutions for mobile/desktop systems.
http://www.villagetronic.com/
http://www.jmr.com/en/products/4/pcie-extender/
http://www.crypticglobe.com/pcie/item?id=1 (horror website :))
Some octane user use cubix expander and are very happy with it, but it is indeed very expensive.
Cheers, mib.
Hi cekuhnen,
check out Netstor NA250A-GPU, that is the cheapest product… i was doing a long research on this topic.
4 GPUs can be build-in. its around 1400 Euro. i found it still to expensive!
So i contacted a company, they producing pci-e backplates… i will check out, if the custom build product would be cheaper.
There was also a thread at octane render forum - one guy just brought recently the netstor product.
But i would wait a bit, the Netstor my release a newer version i think… maybe with PCI-E 3.0 or higher data transfer or thunderbolt, its not confirmed - this is my wild guess
uh I have no experience with building a PC on my own. So my question is if those shuttle desktops can also use a decent NVIDIA card.
All I honestly need is RAM an i7 CPU and a good gaming NVIDIA card as those are fine for me for 3D already. I do not need those monsta GPU render cards 
VIS4ARCH
those look pretty. I am actually curious if thunderbold would promote the usage of such external render cubes more because thunderbold moves the data so fast.
@rdo3 interesting read. Too bad that NVIDIA has the rule currently with CUDA. I would not mind using openCL or other systems in case their performance would be similar to CUDA - sadly they are not.
I am quite curious if INTEL will be successful with their CPU GPU combined chip design as they stated the time of dedicated GPUs is counted.
I have never used one of those cases before but graphics cards can be surprisingly long. So if it is possible that you can see both I would take some measurements before spending money. I have a mid size case and to fit my card in which is pretty ordinary I had to move my HDD out of the way.
A number of buyers list the components they used in their build under the Feedback tab on a case’s product page on Newegg. In addition, they often share details regarding any undocumented pitfalls regarding a build. I don’t build shoeboxes (Antec 1200 full towers for me!), but one of my friends does. Seems that with some shoebox cases the confined space dictates that you must install your components in a particular order lest one blocks you from installing another.
In case fans wouldn’t be so loud this would be quite a cool option - lol.
As I read this is supposed to be only used for assembly but it still looks nice.
Permanent dust exposure I think however might be an issue. And don’t spill your coffee over it
I took the leap and bought the ViDock 4 Plus from Village Tronic a few days ago and plan to put a GTX 680 or equivalent into it purely for Cycles CUDA rendering. I’ll try to post results when it comes together.
A friend of mine just built his first homebuilt PC and it went well with a little guidance from me (over IM, I’m an ocean away).
It is honestly not a big deal as long as you pay attention to detail and plan it out in advance before buying components.
As someone else said, graphics cards can be surprisingly long and some of those shuttle boxes come with a PSU already in them, which may or may not be able to feed the card enough power even if it fits. Make sure you know these things beforehand.
I am considering using the Lian Li Mini Series PC-V354 PC case for a new space-constricted build ((W) 245mm x (H) 320mm x (D) 420m.)
Can you get a PSU that can deliver more than 225W for this box? GTX-680 easily sucks 320W+ under load.
Also, when you get it, could you check to see if this works with Linux (as a compute device, not graphics) and PM me please? 
I checked tigerdirect and their kits but those are to big for me (size wise)
I just finished building my rig and I would stress that any graphics card that is worth a damn will be very frustrating to fit in a small case. If I had a dolar for every time I cursed trying to install parts in my old micro-atx, I’d be able to buy TWO new computers.
I thought I’d report back on adventures in external GPU products in case anyone else found it useful. In the end I bought the ViDock 4 Plus from Village Instruments (external GPU chassis) and a EVGAGeForce GTX 670 Superclocked+ 4GB (Part number 04G-P4-2673-KR). After much troubleshooting of why the unit could not maintain power to the card, I returned the ViDock 4 Plus and instead bought a NetStor NA211A-GPU(NB)Turbo Box (external GPU chassis). The NetStor device only had an PCIx8 but amazingly the GTX 670 works in it and I’m getting moderately quick Cycles renders from the configuration. All tests have been done on Windows 64 bit.
Hi FutureHack, how much is it?
Cheers, mib.