Laptop internal sd-card-reader.....possible upgrade/mod ?

Hi all,

I have an MSI GE65 RAIDER 9SF laptop

Amazing laptop with 1 x sata 3 + 2 x pcie 3 slots, but all that's letting it down in my opinion is the slow sd card reader. Of course i can use a bulky external sd card device which i have, but I'd rather not as it blocks use of other usb ports as they're very close together.

The laptops internal sd card reader is slow and MSI have confirmed its a usb 2.0 interface. I'm a newbie, but I have some knowledge of how things might work.

So basically.........2 x usb type A 3.2 gen 1 ports and an usb 2.0 sd card reader.......This is all on a small seperate circuit board attached to the mother board by cable. Please see attached images.

Is it possible to replace only the sd card reader part with a higher rated part and have this soldered onto the exsisting seperate board.......for e.g uhs-II sd card reader with faster speeds.

I'm definitely not going to attempt to mod my current board but maybe purchase a spare board and tinker if its even possible.......It's got to be, right ?

kind regards

I would say not likely you can upgrade it without changing the interface chips that drive the SD reader. If it uses a USB 2.0 chipset, that is all you can get. The mechanical reader part is irrelevant.

sagor1 said:

I would say not likely you can upgrade it without changing the interface chips that drive the SD reader. If it uses a USB 2.0 chipset, that is all you can get. The mechanical reader part is irrelevant.

Click to expand...

Would you say it's possible to change the usb 2.0 chipset that drives the sd card reader for something fasters ?
If so......then how and where is this chip located ?

I would say no, not possible. A different chip may have different pinouts and different signal levels and protocols. Your BIOS may not know how to handle any different "chip"

sagor1 said:

I would say no, not possible. A different chip may have different pinouts and different signal levels and protocols. Your BIOS may not know how to handle any different "chip"

Click to expand...

I had a feeling this might be the case :/ shame the bios might not be able to handle such a change either :/
oh well......I'll just have to make do with my external usb sd card reader.

Thanks for clarifying....much appreciated.