AMD Trinity (Mobile) performance analysis

[coderunknown]

nice review sam...keep it up given its price, this is a complete VFM product by HP till date. they also solved heating issues.

yup. heating issue is mostly sorted out in this lappy.

Hmm and what about the asus scene .Has any details came out about their trinity based config.

hope i can tell something about it. till now no info on anything

I seriously feel this machine doesnt deserve 33-34k price.At most 29k. But just waiting to see at what price samsung launches

given the free accessories and Windows, price is justified but should have launched same laptop with no accessories or Windows at sub 30k price. Or even without any discrete GPU as 7640 is somewhat capable.

 

[zacfx05]

hi sam i tested dirt 3 showdown in high performance mode this is what i have
i installed driver 12.6 from techpowerup link..... after installing frame rates increased a little biit from the default driver ( i don't know which version it was before) .
graphics settings ultra
crossfire mode 22.84/22.50
non crossfire mode 15.49/15.71

so crossfire helps in fps in directx 11 games.

i also had street fighter vs tekken but even running in the highest mode there was no change in fps both igpu / dgpu mode, but before i updated the driver the inbuilt benchmark system always showed 7640 as graphics adapter no matter which mode igpu/dgpu i choose, after updating driver it always showed 7640+7660m whatever mode i choose.

in dirt when we choose dual graphics mode there was a flickering effect over load images; and in game-play when we finish a race ie, in the slow-motion part.
there was no overheating issue when testing for the benchmarks.

i guess one more stable driver release 12.7 0r 12.8 and all the issues will be addressed. even though the fps is 22fps in ultra mode it dint show any lag in dirt, it was awesome to watch.....
other please try to update their experinces with other games.

but guys after driver updating my lappie dint start, for three times i had to hard shutdown by pressing power button, it freezes after the windows bootscreen. hope it will not happen again!!!

 

[coderunknown]

thanks for the numbers
i downloaded 12.6 from filehippo for my PC and tested the same driver in laptop but that caused laptop to show some strange colour pattern failing to enter windows. Also i checked for update from CCC and was said its latest version. maybe HP version is slightly different from official one.

Dirt 3 @ Ultra on a 32k laptop. WOW.

 

[dashing.sujay]

^I am going to download dirt 3

 

[coderunknown]

^I am going to download dirt 3

try Dirt: Showdown. Lot better if you try only SP.

i'll try running this @ ultra in my pc. but surely G6 can't. its lot more graphics heavy than 3.

 

[dashing.sujay]

try Dirt: Showdown. Lot better if you try only SP.

i'll try running this @ ultra in my pc. but surely G6 can't. its lot more graphics heavy than 3.

Ok will do, ty

 

[Piyush]

nice to see that there arent any heating issues
there were with A6 laptops

 

[ico]

Dirt 3 @ Ultra on a 32k laptop. WOW.

yup, that's why you should have tried it.

in dirt when we choose dual graphics mode there was a flickering effect over load images; and in game-play when we finish a race ie, in the slow-motion part.

Try installing the latest CAP and see if it gets fixed. (Catalyst Application Profile) These work in conjuction with your driver. And yes, 12.7 CAP3 will work with Catalyst 12.6.

*sites.amd.com/us/game/downloads/Pages/crossfirex-app-profiles.aspx

 

[zacfx05]

sam it was dirt showdown not dirt 3 , i thing both are different . i couldnt boot in with 12.6 driver (it crashed many times i think, it may be the laggy thing told by duke) i had to do a system restore in safe mod .

 

[duke123]

i tried arkham city which has a inbuilt benchmarking feature..the gaming performance has improved benchmarks when dual graphics enabled(almost 33% on average)...the game runs smooth with dual graphics enabled .....the game is unplayable(lot of lag) when dual graphics are disabled... also there is a AMD dual graphics logo overlapped with gameplay when dual graphics are enabled which is not seen when they are disabled...

i am unable to upload properly ...somebody edit the post properly if its useful....

 

[zacfx05]

duke which driver your on , 12.6.......? doesnt it crashes, if not your lucky man it increases fps but crashes mostly as i mentioned before, and try v-sync off it may increase fps.

 

[devil404]

I was planning to buy a new laptop mainly for playing games and java programming. How will this laptop fair when ibm Websphere server, ibm Websphere IDE or latest eclipse ide, oracle database 10/11 together.

 

[Shoaibq]

Very informative Sam..
Cleared many of my doubts..
Thanks..

 

[bhupati]

I bought G6 few days ago and happy with my purchase of a decently future proof product. Couple of driver revisions should get us good enough crossfireX performance.
My initial observation is that GTA4 or any game for that matter, doesn't recognize dGPU while running on battery even if you select: High performance power option -> disable crossfireX -> Setup the game to run in Performance mode under CCC.

Overall, with improving OpenCL application support (AMD's parallel compute feature) and possible doubling (ideal) of graphics performance in future makes this platform and G6 specifically a good buy for the price.

 

[coderunknown]

I bought G6 few days ago and happy with my purchase of a decently future proof product. Couple of driver revisions should get us good enough crossfireX performance.
My initial observation is that GTA4 or any game for that matter, doesn't recognize dGPU while running on battery even if you select: High performance power option -> disable crossfireX -> Setup the game to run in Performance mode under CCC.

Overall, with improving OpenCL application support (AMD's parallel compute feature) and possible doubling (ideal) of graphics performance in future makes this platform and G6 specifically a good buy for the price.

you tested GTA4? got playable framerates at default resolution?

 

[bhupati]

So far with latest v1.0.7.0 patch and dual mode disabled, I'm getting stuttering during gameplay (@native res+ medium details+ X2AA). The problem it seems is no matter what the combination of settings/parameters, I'm unable to activate JUST the dGPU because 7670 should be capable of smoother gameplay.

I'll post details with fraps and updated drivers.

 

[coderunknown]

yes you are right. AMD made a big mess of the dual GPU thing. should design dual GPU, fGPU and dGPU interface from grounds up in AMD CCC or just develop a new AMD CCC for laptops to avoid all sort of confusion.

 

[bhupati]

Okay, so I got some 'interesting' results.
GTA4 inbuilt benchmark reports 7640G (dual mode disabled) and 7640G+7670M but not 7670M in any case. Both these modes requires reboot to 'actually' show up in benchmarks.



Although when showing just 6740G, 7670M is actually being used!
AMD system monitor confirms this:

The red line is APU and maroon one is GPU.

Also when dual mode is enabled we see the same usage graph but the performance is somewhat improved. We're still talking stutters and ~28fps but it's 'feels' smoother.

Drivers are a mess for this platform with no official catalyst for trinity yet. See this forum -
*www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/troubleshooting/56296-shockingly-poor-performance-new-laptop-1.html

Crysis REFUSED TO LOAD and I was too weary to install others.

In the end I guess we will have to wait for official catalyst with trinity and switchable/dual graphics support. And since 7670M is actually being used and the gameplay is still choppy, we have to be realistic of our gaming expectations.

 

[duke123]

did you upgrade to AMD Mobility Catalyst 12.8...there will be improvement in performance....

 

[bhupati]

The auto detect feature on AMD site doesn't works on this platform, it installs a tool and nothing happens. I tried updating from the default vision control center, said my device was up to date.
Catalyst 12.8 doesn't has trinity/switchable graphics support.
*support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/AMDCatalystSoftwareSuiteVersion128ReleaseNotes.aspx