What's the best IGP for laptops today?

[Blue_Max]

I can't justify the cost of fancy laptops with enhanced graphics so I'm wondering what the best IGP's are these days? I know the Intel desktop HD 4600 graphics aren't all that bad, sometimes even besting AMD's offerings...

...but I'd love to hear your input on an affordable machine ($500 or less?) with still-decent graphics and decent battery life. (IGP means less power use, right?)

Thanks!

 

[dave_the_nerd]

On a sub $500 machine, you're probably looking at an AMD APU.

If cost were no object, the best on-chip IGP would probably be the Iris Pro (HD5200) though. I think AMD might have a product or two that will compete on the IGP side, but the CPU won't be nearly as good.

IGP doesn't necessarily mean less power use... it depends on the chips involved and what the typical load % is during operation. "Gaming" laptops in your price range will tend to have corners cut though, and one of those corners will probably be battery life. You might need/want to pay extra for a high capacity battery.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

The HP Pavilion 17-e112dx here looks like it might fit the bill

https://www.laptopninja.org/finding-the-best-gaming-laptops-under-500-dollars/

 

[Blue_Max]

That Lenovo looks great!

...and I wouldn't touch an HP consumer-class laptop for any money... absolute garbage!

 

[TeknoBug]

As of right now, an A10 5750/5757M has the best IGPU, funny that the newer A10 7300 has a lower performing IGPU than the previous, there's also the 5745M that runs off the IGP+GPU but still doesn't perform as well as the 5750M's 8650G.

...and I wouldn't touch an HP consumer-class laptop for any money... absolute garbage!

Yeah my wife has a HP with a Pentium N3530 and it performs well but man if I want to replace the HDD or RAM, I'd have to take the whole thing apart, HP's has never been good for upgrading.

 

[Fox5]

There's a handful of laptops with discrete cards for just a bit over your price range, and a few within it (under $500) as well!

If you step up a bit in cost, 840m laptops start at $630.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-535-_-Product

For $450, you can get a laptop with AMD's R5 M240 and an AMD cpu. Not sure if it can use Crossfire or not.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834314561

You can get a laptop with the Geforce 820M for $500:
http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-E5...&keywords=820m


And a pretty nice (1080p screen!) A10 crossfire capable laptop with an 8670M for $580:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834231521

Or a less nice core i5 with R7 R265 for $600:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834314383


For laptops with integrated graphics only:
This one has an AMD A10 for $460
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834313719

 

[hoorah]

I'm looking in the same range - sort of ho hum gaming performance for $400-500. I know I'm not going to get a 'gaming' notebook for that price, but want something that happens to be on the better end of the IGPU offerings.

What seems to be killer for me is the 1366x768 screens. I'd glady put a few more dollars into getting a 1920x1080 screen, but now that game that ran at 30-35 fps on integrated graphics at 768P now runs at 20-25 fps at 1080P, and now isnt really appealing as a budget gaming notebook. Now it has to be stepped up to a discrete card.

I realize the example I posted is not backed up with actual data and can vary much depending on the game, but it seems to be, anecdotally, what I am finding.

At this point, I have my sights set on the A10 Kaveri or the A10-5750 with the 8650G and just skimming the deal websites for a killer sale. If I can jump on one of those for $350-400 I'll probably get a year or two use out of a cheap laptop then re-evaluate when there are good Iris Pro/Kaveri + discrete competitive offerings.

 

[hoorah]

There's a handful of laptops with discrete cards for just a bit over your price range, and a few within it (under $500) as well!

If you step up a bit in cost, 840m laptops start at $630.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-535-_-Product

For $450, you can get a laptop with AMD's R5 M240 and an AMD cpu. Not sure if it can use Crossfire or not.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834314561

You can get a laptop with the Geforce 820M for $500:
http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-E5...&keywords=820m


And a pretty nice (1080p screen!) A10 crossfire capable laptop with an 8670M for $580:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834231521

Or a less nice core i5 with R7 R265 for $600:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834314383


For laptops with integrated graphics only:
This one has an AMD A10 for $460
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834313719

These are all really nice options. Thank you.

 

[TeknoBug]

I'm looking in the same range - sort of ho hum gaming performance for $400-500. I know I'm not going to get a 'gaming' notebook for that price, but want something that happens to be on the better end of the IGPU offerings.

What seems to be killer for me is the 1366x768 screens. I'd glady put a few more dollars into getting a 1920x1080 screen, but now that game that ran at 30-35 fps on integrated graphics at 768P now runs at 20-25 fps at 1080P, and now isnt really appealing as a budget gaming notebook. Now it has to be stepped up to a discrete card.

I realize the example I posted is not backed up with actual data and can vary much depending on the game, but it seems to be, anecdotally, what I am finding.

At this point, I have my sights set on the A10 Kaveri or the A10-5750 with the 8650G and just skimming the deal websites for a killer sale. If I can jump on one of those for $350-400 I'll probably get a year or two use out of a cheap laptop then re-evaluate when there are good Iris Pro/Kaveri + discrete competitive offerings.

I got an Acer V5-552-X832, fits the description and it has a A10 5757M and pretty fast 8650G which will play plenty of games on low and some on medium, but yeah it'll be limited to 720p/768, good APU anyways. But if you can't find those, go for the A10-7300,somewhat lesser performance but nearly as good.

 

[Fox5]

The Asus sounds like it meets your needs the most and it has a discrete GPU.
http://redirect.anandtech.com/r?url...duct.aspx?Item=N82E16834231521&user=u00000687

 

[hoorah]

The Asus sounds like it meets your needs the most and it has a discrete GPU.
http://redirect.anandtech.com/r?url...duct.aspx?Item=N82E16834231521&user=u00000687

I hadn't really planned on spending $600 on my next laptop, but the more I look at it the more I'm talking myself into it. That does look like a nice balance of specs, and thank you for the suggestion.

Do you happen to know how AMD is implementing the onboard + discrete GPU? My old laptop, an HP DM3 had onboard ATI 4200 and a discrete 5430M. The only drivers I could ever get to work for it were the ones that came with the PC, the Catalyst 12.6 driver package. If I upgraded the CCC it would break the functionality.

Anyway, you would open the CCC and select if you wanted the low performance GPU (battery saving) or the high performance GPU. When you selected one or the other, the screen would flicker and then restore. I don't know if it was picking between one or the other, or if it was using some sort of hybrid crossfire and getting a boost from the onboard GPU. Either way it was a little cludgy, but it worked (except that I could never update the GPU drivers).

I've heard from some people that the discrete GPUs on these AMD notebooks are about the same performance as the onboard GPU, and the only way you see a benefit is if the game supports hybrid crossfire. Not sure if that makes sense to me considering the discrete GPU has discrete memory.

 

[Fox5]

Oh wow the laptop went up by $100 since I posted it. Its less of a deal now, but maybe other places have something similar in the price range.

I'm not sure about the answer to your questions either.

 

[Fox5]

At the higher price point, I'd go forhttp://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834231960&cm_re=840m-_-34-231-960-_-Product for $700 or look at one of the other models I posted.

HP and dell also have some competitive models in this price range.

 

[hoorah]

Yes, I noticed it was priced significantly less at newegg (yesterday) than amazon or anywhere else. It was a solid offer at 579 (instead of 679). I will keep an eye on it.

 

[hoorah]

Can anyone else confirm that the ASUS R510D is showing at $679? I noticed that when I went back to look at the G505s, it showed at the bottom "similar items". It had the R510D listed at 579. When I click on it, it goes up to 679.

I've heard reports in the past of neweggs pricing bumping up after you've been looking at an item for awhile. I guess they try to make you think you better buy it soon. Is it the same price for everyone?

 

[Roland00Address]

Can anyone else confirm that the ASUS R510D is showing at $679? I noticed that when I went back to look at the G505s, it showed at the bottom "similar items". It had the R510D listed at 579. When I click on it, it goes up to 679.

I've heard reports in the past of neweggs pricing bumping up after you've been looking at an item for awhile. I guess they try to make you think you better buy it soon. Is it the same price for everyone?

Showing 679 for me at newegg, newegg business, b&h and 700 at frys.com

 

[Blue_Max]

Great options all! Thanks for the lively discussion and good ideas.

Am I right, though, that an IGP solution is going to use a lot less power than a dedicated solution? Lower power use = longer battery, after all!

...and I should go back to the 13-14" size... this 15.4" just feels so klunky now! I feel foolish having traded away my old 13.3" rock-solid Travelmate, even though its graphics were worthless for games.

Even 768 res looks half-decent when it's only 13.3" in size... but more is always more gooder-er.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Great options all! Thanks for the lively discussion and good ideas.

Am I right, though, that an IGP solution is going to use a lot less power than a dedicated solution? Lower power use = longer battery, after all!

No, you're not correct. It's more complicated than that.

Massive Oversimplification Follows:

Look up the specs of the machine and compare the combined TDPs of the CPU+GPU vs. the CPU/IGP. That's not 100% right, but it will give you an idea of the absolute skull-fucking maximum power draw. (In typical use, power draw will be much, much lower.)

Then you compare that to the watt-hours or milliamp-hours of the battery (battery capacity.)

Example 1: My laptop has an i7-4750HQ CPU/IGP, with a maximum TDP of 47w, and an 8700mAh 12v battery (about 100 watt hours). That will power the CPU at full load for 2 hours. (More like 90 minutes with the monitor and everything else, but we're going to ignore that going forward.)

Example 2: The Toshiba C55D-A5108 has an A6-5200 CPU/IGP. That will burn 25w maximum. However, the battery capacity is 48 watt-hours, so the battery life at 100%, full-on-worst-case-screw-you load is around the same.

Example 3: The Acer Aspire V3-572G-54S6 linked previously has an i5-4210U (15W TDP) and a GeForce 840m (33w) which, at 48w combined, is pretty close to Example 1. However, the battery is only 5000mAh, so the battery life would be <2/3rds as good. But it's because of the battery size, not because of the discrete GPU.

 

[Fox5]

Great options all! Thanks for the lively discussion and good ideas.

Am I right, though, that an IGP solution is going to use a lot less power than a dedicated solution? Lower power use = longer battery, after all!

...and I should go back to the 13-14" size... this 15.4" just feels so klunky now! I feel foolish having traded away my old 13.3" rock-solid Travelmate, even though its graphics were worthless for games.

Even 768 res looks half-decent when it's only 13.3" in size... but more is always more gooder-er.

An IGP solution only has a small advantage over a non-IGP solution in power usage. On a laptop with a discrete gpu, the IGP is mostly idle and drawing very little power. On many nvidia and AMD laptops, they can also shut off the discrete gpu entirely and use the IGP.
Then there's also the issue that nvidia's maxwell chips are massively more power efficient than any of the IGPs currently available.