MacBook integrated graphics?
Apples says the MacBook comes with a 64MB graphics card, but if you look carefully at the tech specs it says Memory available to Mac OS X may vary depending on graphics needs. Minimum graphics memory usage is 80MB
Does that mean 64MB is used for displaying and the other 16+MB is used for managing/caching?
I also seem to recall reading there is a maximum amount of RAM the graphics card would use, but I am not able to recall how much. Does anyone know if there is a way for us to change how much RAM the graphics card uses? Apple's use of the word 'minimum' suggests to me that it can, unless Apple has done something special to reserve RAM for other purposes (i.e. Quartz 2D Extreme?).
Does that mean 64MB is used for displaying and the other 16+MB is used for managing/caching?
I also seem to recall reading there is a maximum amount of RAM the graphics card would use, but I am not able to recall how much. Does anyone know if there is a way for us to change how much RAM the graphics card uses? Apple's use of the word 'minimum' suggests to me that it can, unless Apple has done something special to reserve RAM for other purposes (i.e. Quartz 2D Extreme?).
Comments
Originally posted by hmurchison
Integrated Graphics are sexy. Imagine only needing what your current apps need for video. Far more effective use of resources.
i dunno, reading this using Lynx (text based old school web browser) in a virtual Ubuntu instance on my Macbook is lame. Most likely needs a better video card? lol.
Intel is announcing the new Media Accelerator 3000 based off of the 965 chipset. It contains many advantages over today's GMA950 like
Hardware Transform & Lighting, Clipping and rotation.
It does 16 sample anisotropic filtering now.
You get 32-bit Floating Point precision
It accelerates VC-1(WMV) and AVC(h.264)
It has an improved video scaler and adds de-interlacing
Add in OpenGL 2.0 support and up to DirectX 10 Shader Model 4 support
...your ideas about integrated graphics should change quite rapidly. If you're a gamer then of course you're looking for discrete graphics for more grunt but then again you'd be looking at a beefier computer anyways.
for web browsing, standard tasks...integrated graphics in a laptop is fine. anyone that buys even the SLI laptops for gaming is losing out since they don't have the speed of full size systems.
of course in the next few years this will change.
for now a laptop is just that.
Cripes. This isn't rocket science.
I've got Blue Gene/L down the hall. Should I say that anything less is worthless for anyone?
If it meets the needs, then it is an *appropriate* solution. Not everyone needs to be a specwhore to compensate.
Originally posted by Aurora
Interesting how the cheapist,slowest,least capable graphics have been spun into gold by the fan boys. If Apple put cat poo in a bag and put a Apple label on it you guys would telling everyone its steak and its better then steak.
naw, it ain't gold and a good GPU would be waaaaay nicer but it IS sufficient in this thing for what it is used for (by me).
I'm also the guy that bought the lowest end Macbook and upgraded it myself. Didn't need black, or 2.0ghz or Apple Ram...all that is "Just Not Worth It".
The basic Macbook IS a decent deal.
And on a related note, the Macbook bootcamped with XP defaults to 128mb of ram and goes up to 244mb or thereabouts. Sure its shared but with 2gb ram that ain't shabby. Of course Apple crippled it in OS X but I'm sure that'll be overcome sooner than later.
Lower priced machines are going to have lower priced components and be aimed at less intensive tasks. That's just the way it is. Thinking otherwise is just delusional.
Integrated graphics truly did used to stink to high heaven, and weren't capable of handing much more than a Terminal window. The 950 is... decent. Pretty good for most tasks, actually. Shared RAM isn't a great solution for intensive tasks, but this isn't *aimed* at those. The 965 looks like it'll raise the bar quite a bit more, and hit performance levels that three or four years ago would have been on a mid-to-high dedicated card.
GPUs have progressed quite a bit faster than CPUs in the past few years. Assumptions based on evaluations made in 2000 have very little relevance any more.
Originally posted by Aurora
Lots of Spin here again from the fan club, we have a $5.00 semi GPU being used and the fan club just loves it, then ignores a $100 upgrade and spins PC users getting new cards every month. What a load of crap. All macbook needs is a $50 or $100 option for a real gpu, not the we give em away free if you buy our CPU. Integrated graphics are the cheapist you can get, you just cant get less expensive because they own the bottom. Integrated graphics are the cheapist you can buy but hey throw a apple logo on it and all of sudden the P.O.S. becomes.........let me guess 99% of the world doesnt need anything better I wonder who has bought all those real GPU's if no one needs them
Hmmmm funny that said fan club is almost universally against your statements or at the very least we realize that one solution doesn't fit all. Perhaps you should tell me why my mother needs a whizzband GPU if all she does is use the web and Office?
You're simply not going to win this argument. Just agree to disagree is likely your best option. It has nothing to do with being a fanboy and everything to do with common sense and matching your tools with an actual need.
Who bought all the high end GPUs?
1) Gamers. They 'need' them.
2) Graphics rendering professionals. They actually need them.
3) Suckers.
Unfortunately, advice like Aurora's is what grows market segment #3.
(And please, use a spell checker. It's cheapest with an e, not cheapist.)
Originally posted by Kickaha
Exactly.
Who bought all the high end GPUs?
1) Gamers. They 'need' them.
2) Graphics rendering professionals. They actually need them.
I'm actually slightly unsure over agreeing with 2). For rendering, GPUs are usually only used for preview purposes (due to their performance benefits), not for the final results (due to their quality/precision disadvantages). As such, arguably, the GMA950 might be more than good enough even for their needs. The main weakness of the GMA950 is not the actual chip's capabilities, but the inherent low-bandwidth design due to shared memory; bandwidth, however, doesn't matter such much during live previews (like in rendering) as it does while continuously rendering new images in real-time (like in games).