Radeon HD3200 Bandwidth reported as 3.2GB/s - why so low?

[TheDarkKnight]

I am trying to figure out why this article on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...s#Radeon_R600_.28HD_2xxx.2C_HD_3xxx.29_Series


reports a bandwidth of 20.8GB/sec for the Radeon HD 3200 series chipsets and GPU-Z is reporting a very low 3.2GB/sec of bandwidth on my actual system which is a Gateway GT5692.

Is the bandwidth of an iGPU mostly dependent on the speed of the system memory itself? Is that why GPU-Z is reporting such a low number?

Trying to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. Thanks for reading.

Images of statistics about my system below:

 

[Vesku]

Yes, the bandwidth an iGP receives is from system memory. Some 760/780/790G chipsets have sideport memory that is usually dedicated DDR3.

 

[TheDarkKnight]

Yes, the bandwidth an iGPU receives is from system memory. Some 760/780/790G chipsets have sideport memory that is usually dedicated DDR3.

Does the sideport memory bypass my system memory? I mean there is only 256MB of memory on the iGPU(northbridge) itself. Do the videocard graphics display straight to the monitor at 20.8GB/sec?

I still don't understand why GPU-Z reports 3.2GB/sec for the graphics memory bandwidth. It's ridiculously low.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Does the sideport memory bypass my system memory? I mean there is only 256MB of memory on the iGPU(northbridge) itself. Do the videocard graphics display straight to the monitor at 20.8GB/sec?

I still don't understand why GPU-Z reports 3.2GB/sec for the graphics memory bandwidth. It's ridiculously low.

The Hypertransport used cant handle 20.8GB/sec either.

The iGPU on the chipset only got access to 3.2GB/sec from the main memory. And can be supplemented by a sideport cache.

 

[Arkadrel]

reports a bandwidth of 20.8GB/sec for the Radeon HD 3200 series chipsets and GPU-Z is reporting a very low 3.2GB/sec of bandwidth on my actual system which is a Gateway GT5692.

This is what DDR3-1333 does:

(64x1.333 / 8) x 2 = 21,328 GB/s


Why yours is that much slower im not sure of though, but part of it is the DDR2 and its ram speed.

 

[TheDarkKnight]

This is what DDR3-1333 does:

(64x1.333 / 8) x 2 = 21,328 GB/s

Your not running DDR3 memory with your motherboard, or in dual channel mode.
So you system memory is much much slower than even some older motherboards could do.

But I think my computer is capable of running in dual channel mode. It's a GT5692 from Gateway. I will see if I can configure it to go into dual channel mode. Unless some intelligent individual can tell me how first. Which might be quicker than I could figure it out. If it's possible...that is.

Are you reading the CPU-Z program right...are you sure its not running dual-channel mode? CPU-Z only reports the memorys actual running speed at not the "effective" memory speed.

 

[ShintaiDK]

40SPs at 500Mhz is not exactly memory demanding. And the sideport for the HD3200 gave essentially nothing.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2640/4

 

[TheDarkKnight]

40SPs at 500Mhz is not exactly memory demanding. And the sideport for the HD3200 gave essentially nothing.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2640/4

I think it's time for me to find some pidgeon and try to offload this system for a couple of G's. Hehehehe, just kidding. I wonder if I can even give it away or if I have to pay someone to haul it away? I know what I can do. I'll just hold onto it for another 10 years and sell it as a huge premium as an antique.

 

[Arkadrel]

Are you reading the CPU-Z program right...are you sure its not running dual-channel mode?

Nope I miss spoke there, I just assumed so.
If you run CPU-Z and look under the memory tab (instead of SPD) you should be able to see if its running dual channel mode.

I'll just hold onto it for another 10 years and sell it as a huge premium as an antique.

No kidding, I thought that PC is ooooold, when I read the first post.

However the Wiki page says that HD 3200 chipset is "only" from 2008.

Sometimes forget how fast things move when it comes improvements with PCs.

 

[TheDarkKnight]

Nope I miss spoke there, I just assumed so.
If you run CPU-Z and look under the memory tab (instead of SPD) you should be able to see if its running dual channel mode.

I checked. It's running in dual-channel mode. If I could ever understand how to put all these pieces together I think I could probably sue AMD for millions. But it's so complex that won't happen.

Wikipedia says HD3200 Graphics are capable of 20.8GB/sec and all this computer has been getting for the past 6 years is 3.2 GB/sec. Looks like Im the pidgeon.

 

[Arkadrel]

I dont think theirs anything wrong with your system.
Its just that wiki page's reporting of the system memory + side port speed.

For all you and I, know its running at the speed its supposed to.
Or GPU-z isnt showing it all, or just showing the side port memory speed.

Or its something silly like you have a bias setting set to not give system memory to the IGP or something.
(and youve had it that way for the past 6 years)


Reguardless I doubt it makes much of any differnce unless your actually gameing on it.

 

[SPBHM]

Hyper Transport is a bottleneck, no way this IGP have 20GB/s access to memory, 3.2GB/s sounds a lot more realistic.

simple test, overclock the HT and test 1000, 1800, 2600 or something and you will see a nice gain, even with the same memory clock.

but, this IGP is extremely slow anyway (40sps!), even sideport was just 32bit dedicated memory

 

[TheDarkKnight]

I dont think theirs anything wrong with your system.
Its just that wiki page's reporting of the system memory + side port speed.

For all you and I, know its running at the speed its supposed to.
Or GPU-z isnt showing it all, or just showing the side port memory speed.

Or its something silly like you have a bias setting set to not give system memory to the IGP or something.
(and youve had it that way for the past 6 years)


Reguardless I doubt it makes much of any differnce unless your actually gameing on it.

Your probably right. I think the bigger sin was probably pairing the HD 3200 Graphics iGPU with DDR2-PC5300 memory since the iGPU is supposed to be using that.

Ah well, I think I should just stick to the ole saying, "newer is better and faster" and I won't have to try and figure all this out. LOL. But it's kinda fun trying so I continue to punish myself.

 

[ShintaiDK]

I checked. It's running in dual-channel mode. If I could ever understand how to put all these pieces together I think I could probably sue AMD for millions. But it's so complex that won't happen.

Wikipedia says HD3200 Graphics are capable of 20.8GB/sec and all this computer has been getting for the past 6 years is 3.2 GB/sec. Looks like Im the pidgeon.

Wiki is a terrible place for information. But again, the wiki in your case list the memory bandwidth by the CPU, not the IGP. The IGP is connected via HT to the CPU. A HT also shared with PCIe, SATA, USB etc.

 

[TheDarkKnight]

Wiki is a terrible place for information. But again, the wiki in your case list the memory bandwidth by the CPU, not the IGP. The IGP is connected via HT to the CPU. A HT also shared with PCIe, SATA, USB etc.

A quote from Wikipedia: "HyperTransport supports an autonegotiated bit width, ranging from 2 to 32 bits per link; there are two unidirectional links per HyperTransport bus. With the advent of version 3.1, using full 32-bit links and utilizing the full HyperTransport 3.1 specification's operating frequency, the theoretical transfer rate is 25.6 GB/s (3.2 GHz × 2 transfers per clock cycle × 32 bits per link) per direction, or 51.2 GB/s aggregated throughput, making it faster than most existing bus standard for PC workstations and servers as well as making it faster than most bus standards for high-performance computing and networking." With a theoretical maximum bandwidth of 51.2 GB/second it doesnt sound like "sharing" would be a problem.

Interesting stuff. Yeah 32-bit as reported by GPU-Z for the iGPU is very small. I have purchased videocards with 256-bit bus widths before. I think my first 256-bit bus width videocard was the ATI Radeon X800XL or something like that.

I also own 4 GeForce 9800GT's that are 256-bit bus-width. Now that's the kinda bandwidth Im talking 'bout!!!! 128-bit bus width is "acceptable if" it uses GDDR5 memory on the videocard.