Intel Haswell integrated graphics are on par with GeForce GT 650M

Shawn Knight

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Intel’s Haswell chip made an appearance at this year’s CES although it wasn’t the star of the show. The chip maker wasn’t keen on playing show and tell with the CPU itself but we did get a pretty solid look at what the integrated graphics on Haswell (codenamed GT3) are capable of courtesy of a comparison video recently posted by the Tech Report.

In the video below, one system was running Intel’s Haswell CPU with integrated graphics while the other system was packing a Core i7 Ivy Bridge chip and a discrete Nvidia GeForce GT 650M graphics card. Dirt 3 was running at 1080p resolution with all of the details set to high and as you can see for yourself, it’s tough to determine which system is which.

We are reminded that the GeForce GT 650M is a midrange graphics card with 384 ALUs, a 128-bit path that dips into dedicated memory and clock speeds as high as 900MHz. The part is Nvidia’s fastest mobile GPU under the GT banner and is used in Apple’s 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display.

The publication also points out that drivers have been a sticking point with Intel graphics for some time but they are now releasing updates on a quarterly basis. The fact that Intel has released a new QuickSync SDK will help to ensure developers will have compatible software by the time the chip launches. At last check, Intel is planning to launch Haswell by the end of Q2 2013.

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So AMD has now got a true competitor in the APU market?

That's impressive though, I bet its more power efficient than an AMD equivalent as well, but we will not know until they officially release them.
 
If it can really be compared to a 650M then that is a fairly huge step forward for integrated graphics and will really be beneficial to consumers. Especially considering that most laptops with decent discrete graphics will easily be $200-300 more expensive than their integrated counterparts.
 
Not bad, in fact I was thinking of more like 640M sort of performance. I guess, when time comes to replace this DV6 (i7/HD6770) I'd probably won't have to bother with an discrete GPU, as I am a 'moderate' gamer nowadays.

Burty
Power numbers aren't bad at all. But, I am more interested in <10W parts, as I would like to buy a surface pro with Haswell CPU in it ;). This will also spell trouble for ARM, as its main advantage of power consumptions, will probably diminish in coming years.
 
So AMD has now got a true competitor in the APU market?

That's impressive though, I bet its more power efficient than an AMD equivalent as well, but we will not know until they officially release them.
Yea but also AMD Temash will be 20-40% faster then Trinity.
 
So AMD has now got a true competitor in the APU market?

That's impressive though, I bet its more power efficient than an AMD equivalent as well, but we will not know until they officially release them.
Yea but also AMD Temash will be 20-40% faster then Trinity.

When was the last time AMD's performance numbers actually matched up to the product?
Do you remember what they were saying about bulldozer over Phenom II's?

I personally wouldn't hold my breath for AMD, and even if it does outperform the Intel, It will more than likely use a considerable amount of power over the Intel counterpart.

If Intel make a breakthrough like this every 2 years, and AMD continue to lag behind, I feel AMD's Processor's are a dying breed of which, it's days are numbered.

To make Matters worse for AMD and Nvidia, when this processor hits, they now have to up their game to make their graphics cards viable.

However I take all of this as a good thing, now game developers can start to really push the graphics in their game engines as graphics hardware built into the processor is capable of running like the video above. Exciting times for games on PC.
 
So AMD has now got a true competitor in the APU market?

That's impressive though, I bet its more power efficient than an AMD equivalent as well, but we will not know until they officially release them.
Yea but also AMD Temash will be 20-40% faster then Trinity.

When was the last time AMD's performance numbers actually matched up to the product?
Do you remember what they were saying about bulldozer over Phenom II's?

I personally wouldn't hold my breath for AMD, and even if it does outperform the Intel, It will more than likely use a considerable amount of power over the Intel counterpart.

If Intel make a breakthrough like this every 2 years, and AMD continue to lag behind, I feel AMD's Processor's are a dying breed of which, it's days are numbered.

To make Matters worse for AMD and Nvidia, when this processor hits, they now have to up their game to make their graphics cards viable.

However I take all of this as a good thing, now game developers can start to really push the graphics in their game engines as graphics hardware built into the processor is capable of running like the video above. Exciting times for games on PC.

He's talking about the gpu performance though. AMD has nothing but a great track record for their APUs so far. It's about the only thing they've been good at. How could you doubt that?
 
Running games on low resolutions like 900p and 1080p @ mid-high settings doesn't take much power. The Intel HD Graphics 3000 and 4000 actually have respectable performance at 720p for what they are and Intel keeps upping the ante. AMD and Nvidia just keep renaming their product lines, you need to skip a generation to see a noticeable difference.
My GT550M (144 Cuda core/128bit/GF-116) is basically a GT630M, and games quite well actually at 900p.
 
If it can really be compared to a 650M then that is a fairly huge step forward for integrated graphics and will really be beneficial to consumers. Especially considering that most laptops with decent discrete graphics will easily be $200-300 more expensive than their integrated counterparts.

Probably good to keep in mind that there are quite a few details being left out for this demo. We do know it's the GT3 variant, which is the high-end GPU planned for Haswell (they will have GT1-3). This is probably the high end desktop Haswell chip, which means in the 80-100W TDP range. It may have graphics power comparable to a GT650M mobile graphics card, but that doesn't mean it's a mobile processor. While still a serious kick in the pants for desktops and higher end HTPC integrated graphics, I'll reserve judgement until we see how they directly compare in actual laptop/tablet configurations.
 
This is good for high resolution PCs as they become the norm. You wont need a gfx card to power the display.
 
If it can really be compared to a 650M then that is a fairly huge step forward for integrated graphics and will really be beneficial to consumers. Especially considering that most laptops with decent discrete graphics will easily be $200-300 more expensive than their integrated counterparts.

Probably good to keep in mind that there are quite a few details being left out for this demo. We do know it's the GT3 variant, which is the high-end GPU planned for Haswell (they will have GT1-3). This is probably the high end desktop Haswell chip, which means in the 80-100W TDP range. It may have graphics power comparable to a GT650M mobile graphics card, but that doesn't mean it's a mobile processor. While still a serious kick in the pants for desktops and higher end HTPC integrated graphics, I'll reserve judgement until we see how they directly compare in actual laptop/tablet configurations.

Ah, yeah good point. I had laptops on the mind for some reason. I'm very interested to see how the new chips play out in that field. Anyone have any links on how HD4000 compares across mobile to desktop processors for gaming?
 
This leads me to wonder, what year will be the year that 1366x768 max resolution lcd panels will die. All this graphics power and no display to properly use it.
they will die the same time that affordable laptops will. People that are checking their email and typing word documents and dont know anything more dont care about resolution.
 
Burty117,

"So AMD has now got a true competitor in the APU market?"

Not even close. GT3 won't even come close to Trinity APU and Richland will distance itself again. AMD's APUs compete with Core i3s on the desktop based on price. Intel has no plans to put GT3 into Core i3s either. So based on where things are going, on the desktop, Haswell's APU won't even tough Trinity, nevermind Richland.

http://www.kitguru.net/components/g...vs-haswell-gt3-graphics-performance-analysed/

So much hype for Haswell but people aren't realizing where HD4000 series is - it's a POS compared to Trinity. Richland is just an intermediate transition/stop-gap between Kaveri which should launch by Q1 2014. Since GT3 won't even approach Trinity APU, it has no chance whatsoever to even touch AMD's true next generation part - Kaveri.
 
Burty117,

"When was the last time AMD's performance numbers actually matched up to the product? Do you remember what they were saying about bulldozer over Phenom II's? I personally wouldn't hold my breath for AMD, and even if it does outperform the Intel, It will more than likely use a considerable amount of power over the Intel counterpart."

AMD publicly never said anything about Bulldozer vs. Phenom II. Let's not confuse JK-AMD's online drivel with AMD's public statements.

It looks like you made up your mind anyway. Recently AMD claimed that HD8000M parts would be 25-50% faster than HD7000M parts they replace at the same prices. HD8790M is actually 50-60% faster than the HD7690M part it replaced:

http://techreport.com/review/24086/a-first-look-at-amd-radeon-hd-8790m

In my post above I said Kaveri should launch by Q1 2014, but AMD actually expects it to be out by Q4 2013.

http://wccftech.com/amd-launching-28nm-kaveri-apu-steamroller-cores-2013/

Richland should provide 20-40% increase in GPU performance over Trinity APU and Kaveri is rumored to be another 40-50% faster than Richland APU in graphics performance. That means if Intel doubles its graphics speed with Haswell GT3, by Q4 2013, all those gains will be completely wiped out by Kaveri and AMD's APUs will once again be 70-80% faster in graphics vs. Intel's GT3.
 
Burty117,

"So AMD has now got a true competitor in the APU market?"

Not even close. GT3 won't even come close to Trinity APU and Richland will distance itself again. AMD's APUs compete with Core i3s on the desktop based on price. Intel has no plans to put GT3 into Core i3s either. So based on where things are going, on the desktop, Haswell's APU won't even tough Trinity, nevermind Richland.

http://www.kitguru.net/components/g...vs-haswell-gt3-graphics-performance-analysed/

So much hype for Haswell but people aren't realizing where HD4000 series is - it's a POS compared to Trinity. Richland is just an intermediate transition/stop-gap between Kaveri which should launch by Q1 2014. Since GT3 won't even approach Trinity APU, it has no chance whatsoever to even touch AMD's true next generation part - Kaveri.
this is true too. My Liano (before trinity) APU can beat my friend's 4000, played together in saints row 3 and battlefield bad company 2...
 
AMD showed off a tablet with their next gen x86 SoC (8w) playing Dirt Showdown in 1080p...so I wouldn't say Intel has quite caught up in terms of IGP.
 
I don't see discrete graphics going away anytime soon. Going to be a tough sell to PC gamers to buy into integrated anything.
 
It isn't all about the desktop space, rather, the important factor is, in mobile CPUs which GPU they pair up, and so far, GT3 will make a difference in this area (mind you not all mobile CPUs will be getting it).

How is that important? Well it will mean the midrange market will become very competitive, probably starting a trend where GPUs like 77xx or 650s will not be needed anymore, resulting in much lower power requirements, and much better battery life. So, unless AMD is able to put out a stronger + power efficient CPU to go with their reasonably performing mid-range GPUs I don't see it getting much traction.
 
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