Patrick posted on Twitter about a man, Larry Gadea, who used a Thunderbolt-to-Express-Card adapter and an Express-to-PCI adapter to connect a GTX 570 to an 11" MacBook Air running Boot Camped Windows 7.

The video shows Borderlands 2 running at the 11" Air's maximum resolution, using the highest graphics and PhysX settings, maintaining 80-100 FPS.

While far from a practical setup, I find it pretty fascinating, particularly as the owner of a MBP with reasonable specs besides the Intel Integrated 3000.

MacRumors' Story: http://www.macrumors.com/2013/07/30/11-macbook-air-owner-connects-high-end-graphics-card-with-complex-thunderbolt-setup/

Larry Gadea's Post: http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/4271-2013-11-macbook-air-win7-sonnet-echo-expresscard-pe4l-internal-lcd-%5Bus%24250%5D.html

Hmm, I wonder how this compares to a direct PCIe connection. The test done is not very impressive, MBA's max resolution is tiny and Borderlands isn't that taxing of a game. Some benchmarks would better show the performance gains.

@rollingzeppelin: He benchmarked The Witcher 2 at its highest settings (again at only 1366x768) at 29 FPS. It's obviously nothing compared to a real gaming computer but at least I'd be able to play my so-far untouched Steam library.

Mine has decent specs for a few years ago (2.7 Core i7, 8 GB 1333 DDR3, 7200 RPM WD Blue) and it can't even handle Fallout 3 at its lowest settings without stuttering under Windows 7.

planning on getting and eGPU myself, when i realised i didn't have an express card adapter port I found a usb connector. When i eventually make mine i probably won't use an external power supply but that may change.

Nothing new, this sort of thing has been kicking around since thunderbolt bays launched (expensive as hell). That being said there is definitely a market out there for a self contained thunderbolt GPU should companies like Asus choose to jump on board.

Yeah, NVidia and AMD should start developing some external video cards. The lightning bolt connection and laptops with express cards could really see a performance boost, if my lappy had an express card I'd be all over this.