info Discussion : Laptop Graphics Card < PC counterparts?

[sam_738844]

Its been awhile i'm observing this, perhaps i had the note because i'm owning a laptop graphics card....but it seems, no it SHOWS that laptop graphics cards are somehow falling behind their PC counter-parts! See for example, a 7970M notebook card performs poorly in farcry3 ultra settings


AMD Radeon HD 7970M - NotebookCheck.net Tech

It exhibits below

21.8 FPS @ below resources

[X] GX60
AMD A-Series A10-4600M 2.3GHz
Radeon HD 7970M (850MHz), 2048MB (1200MHz) GDDR5, Catalyst 12.11
8192MB RAM
-----------------------------------------------

25.4 FPS @

[X] Schenker XMG P502 PRO
Intel Core i7 3610QM 2.3GHz
Radeon HD 7970M (850MHz), 2048MB (1200MHz) GDDR5, Catalyst 12.11
8192MB RAM
-----------------------------------------------

27.1 FPS @

[X] Schenker XMG P502
Intel Core i7 3610QM 2.3GHz
Radeon HD 7970M (850MHz), 2048MB (1200MHz) GDDR5, Catalyst 13.1
8192MB RAM

-------------------------------------------------
Average~ 25 fps barely playable and "7970" not nearly justifies this.



When the mighty HD7970 without that demoralising "M" behind, performs with flying colours...


View attachment 8842

Same goes true for Nvidia cards too and with latest drivers, i could post several similar instances where the same card-equivalent in PC performing way better. Any Specific reason? I need to know , so TDF ..kindly fill me up.

 

[Cilus]

Buddy, Laptop Graphics card Model number can't be compared with the Desktop Graphics card directly. Laptops can't use big, power hungry and big sized Graphics cards and therefore they use tailor made low power, low speed versions of the Graphics cards.
HD 7970M is basically comparable with Desktop HD 7870 as both have same number of SP and ROPs. But the Laptop version runs slower than the desktop HD 7870, both in Core Clock Speed and Memory speed, resulting performance just slightly ahead of HD 7850.

 

[sam_738844]

hmm..just as i thought, nomenclature got me confused, basically there is no need to spend money on a notebook graphics card even if it sounds high-end.... until mobility, and gaming while at it is abosolutely necessary. i faced it, facing even now, god knows when shall i be stationary and buy a proper desktop!

 

[d6bmg]

Both are different platform. Desktop cards are made for real gaming - there are no restrictions of any kind, while mobile graphics cards are made by restricting heat generation due to lack of cooling facility.
So, you can't compare those cards with one another.

 

[sam_738844]

So true, and guess i also have heard about CF and SLI in laptop too!!! Man, i dont want to believe it!

 

[Cilus]

yes, there are Laptops with Multi-GPU setup. But they are more of a desktop replacement than a portable computer. Those are not consumer Laptops and made specially with very high end components. Cleveo, Alienware are example of the makers.

 

[sam_738844]

yes, there are Laptops with Multi-GPU setup. But they are more of a desktop replacement than a portable computer. Those are not consumer Laptops and made specially with very high end components. Cleveo, Alienware are example of the makers.

Cilus, how do you mean "Desktop Replacement" than a "portable computer" ?, laptops are...how do i put it..a way to replace desktop for portabilty, isnt that, so if you meant, those machines are not mobile at all, at least in such sense? Also...very high end would mean very high cost and Alienware is famous for that, but speaking of which , i have only seen alienware providing "not-so-high-end" cards in their MnnX series against an exorbitantly high-price!! I see it more like a gimmik.... never seen any multi GPU setup from them though....and cleveo...i dont know about them. May be they are barely available in India?

 

[d6bmg]

Not all laptops are built keeping portability in mind. For example See any high end gaming laptop. (not Alienware)

 

[Cilus]

Mobility means you can carry the computer and should come with a reasonable weight for that purpose. Also battery life is another factor. The Desktop replacement one, on the other hand, are bulky, big and weight more than 3.2 KG, making the mobility is just an option. They are good for home usage or movement within your home. Also they don't offer good battery life due to their heavy configuration and not a good option for mobility.

 

[sam_738844]

Is there any option at all to upgrade your Laptop graphics card or to use external GPU or anything like that to meet the needs for a laptop, because since it will get old at a certain point of time, after that zero upgrade path speaks for loss.

 

[Cilus]

Yes there are but sadly not in India. If your Laptop has MXM (Mini PCI-Express Module) 2.x and 3.x certified ports then you can buy laptop GPU and add it into the laptop. But you need to very careful about the version as Mobile GPUs can have same name for different versions. Aslo each of the Laptop manufacturers tailor made their Mobility Graphics cards to suit their respective laptops. So choosing an Laptop GPU is very tricky business.

Back in 2008, AMD tried to solve this by launching External Graphics Box. This is a box with its own power supply and a Radeon HD 3870 512 MB GDDR3 Graphics card. This box can be connected with the Laptop with XGP (External Graphics Platform) link which can provide data rate up to PCI-E 1.1 standard. Fujitsu was the 1st company to implement External Graphics Box. But XGP, being a proprietary technology, never gained much popularity and most of the Laptop vendors didn't implement it in their Laptops. So the idea was left behind.

 

[d6bmg]

^^ And may be after Thunderbolt ports becomes a necessary part of every PC & laptop, we might see external graphics cards running via thunderbolt as it have enough bandwidth to accomodate PSI-E2.0/3.0 cards.
Just a theoretical aspect though.

 

[sam_738844]

Yes there are but sadly not in India. If your Laptop has MXM (Mini PCI-Express Module) 2.x and 3.x certified ports then you can buy laptop GPU and add it into the laptop. But you need to very careful about the version as Mobile GPUs can have same name for different versions. Aslo each of the Laptop manufacturers tailor made their Mobility Graphics cards to suit their respective laptops. So choosing an Laptop GPU is very tricky business.

So ur saying that even if i had the choice to upgrade laptop GPU, it would have a very specific and limited line of upgrade, i mean i just could not buy a GTX680M and fit it on those ports just like that? Then its also turns out to be complicated and encourages R&D before buying it ... after buying a GPU and realizing that its as good as a brick to my laptop..is humiliation! I was thinking about such an upgrade...but dissapointed. Will never spend on gaming laptop for sure...in future.

 

[topgear]

no matter what and how well made laptops are never meant for serious gaming with all eye blazing effects and blistering performance at the same time - just my observation - period.

 

[sam_738844]

off topic..but are processors for Laptop/Notebook ar tailor made just like GPU's and carry less or no resemblance with their PC counterparts?

 

[Cilus]

For most cases. they use the standard Mobile Processors, offered by Intel and AMD. But for most of the consumer Laptops, the Processor can't be changed as they are soldered to the Motherboard. Only the custom made Gaming Laptops as I mentioned eariler, sometimes do have a switchable CPU which can be replaced until the Power consumption is within the limit. But currenly Intel SB and IV based Processors do offer very good performance for most of the usgae, even for gaming.

 

[sam_738844]

Ok cilus...one more query, apart from the architectural advantage, if some laptop CPU is say, first Generation i7 740QM 1.73 Ghz(quad core), before this was first introduced....there were CPU's running at same frequency may be with less number of cores or with different architec...but yet at this exact same frequency...so how does this i7 is actually superior to that old one? and if i assume in future more advanced X-bridge CPU's will emerge and have superior cores and and differenct manufacturing process altogether....but if they happen to run at a particular frequency which many of the currect CPU's have, then how it justifies more power?

 

[Cilus]

No, the 1st Generation i7 is not as powerful as the 2nd gen or 3rd Gen i7, even it is running at slightly higher speed. But obviously a 1st Gen i7, which is a Quad Core CPU with HT enabled (4 Core, 8 Threads), is more powerful than most of the 2nd Gen and 3rd Gen i3 and i5 which are just Dual Core HT CPU (2 Core, 4 threads) in CPU intensive tasks. Gaming performance might be still better with the 2nd and 3rd Gen i5 running at higher clock speed as games are not yet optimally Multi-Threaded and depends upon performance of each of the Cores.