Open Air test bench for mobile GPU

[Fleetside58]

Hey there,

I know most of us have seen the open air kits you can build for testing multiple components that get plugged into and out of the system board. My team would like the ability to do the same, only with mobile systems, specifically, to test mobile GPUs. Is there anything on the market that would fit the bill, allowing us to easily and rapidly swap out mobile GPUs for stress-testing?

Thanks a ton!!

 

[xSauronx]

Hey there,

allowing us to easily and rapidly swap out mobile GPUs for stress-testing?

just out of curiosity....mind giving us some details on what youre doing that requires this ability? seems like itd be interesting

 

[Fleetside58]

I work for a video game company. :biggrin:

Basically, they do the stress-testing on most available video cards for desktop PCs, really push the hell out of them and then tweak the graphics on level 9 to make sure it can run ok on "old and busted", and is slicker than snail snot when it's running on "the new hotness".

Thanks for any input!.

 

[Fleetside58]

Anything? Anyone?

 

[TheStu]

For mobile cards, there is the MXM standard, but I have no idea if anyone is still using it. Open air would eliminate some but not all of the cooling issues,namely the fact that the card is designed to have a heatsink attached a certain way and I don't know how easy it would be to attach a non-'designated' heatsink to it.

Plus I don't think there are any boards with MXM, aside from laptops.

I think your best bet would be to use notebookcheck.com to get clock speeds and shader counts and then modify desktop cards to get a fair approximation. Take a desktop 280 and downclock it for example, that would give you an idea of how an 260m would perform.

 

[coolVariable]

For mobile cards, there is the MXM standard, but I have no idea if anyone is still using it. Open air would eliminate some but not all of the cooling issues,namely the fact that the card is designed to have a heatsink attached a certain way and I don't know how easy it would be to attach a non-'designated' heatsink to it.

Plus I don't think there are any boards with MXM, aside from laptops.

I think your best bet would be to use notebookcheck.com to get clock speeds and shader counts and then modify desktop cards to get a fair approximation. Take a desktop 280 and downclock it for example, that would give you an idea of how an 260m would perform.

notebooks should be tested with IGP anyhow since so few notebooks have dedicated graphics.
Just get some run of the mill intel and AMD laptops (e.g. intel 855, intel 950, ...)

 

[TheStu]

notebooks should be tested with IGP anyhow since so few notebooks have dedicated graphics.
Just get some run of the mill intel and AMD laptops (e.g. intel 855, intel 950, ...)

Well, definitely get low end ones, but I do think that they should be able to change the clocks and shaders on a desktop card (especially if they already have a wide selection of them to work with) to emulate a mobile discrete card.

 

[coolVariable]

Well, definitely get low end ones, but I do think that they should be able to change the clocks and shaders on a desktop card (especially if they already have a wide selection of them to work with) to emulate a mobile discrete card.

True but still doesn't address my point: probably less than 10% of notebooks have discrete graphics with 90%+ having IGPs (that are all pretty crappy).
Rule of thumb can probably be: if it runs on an intel 855 or 955 chipset, it will probably run in the majority of notebooks currently in use. If it needs more than that ... there is really no point in testing for notebooks since you are only addressing a small subset of all the notebooks out there, ie just say it doesn't run on notebooks and if it does that person should be happy.

 

[TheStu]

True but still doesn't address my point: probably less than 10% of notebooks have discrete graphics with 90%+ having IGPs (that are all pretty crappy).
Rule of thumb can probably be: if it runs on an intel 855 or 955 chipset, it will probably run in the majority of notebooks currently in use. If it needs more than that ... there is really no point in testing for notebooks since you are only addressing a small subset of all the notebooks out there, ie just say it doesn't run on notebooks and if it does that person should be happy.

Your point is valid, they should definitely get IGPed laptops and test them, because if they want to hit the majority of the laptop using market then they need to make sure that it runs well on those.

Not all games are cut out to be run on all systems, take Crysis for example. So if this company feels that it is in their best interests to not cater to a certain level...

 

[Fleetside58]

Thanks guys. That's a big help.

 

[coolVariable]

One last comment - while not every game needs to run on every system, most PCs sold today are notebooks. So if you are targeting the PC market, I find it ridiculous if notebooks/IGP PCs get ignored.
Just a thought ...