9400M comparable to what?

[cloakster]

I was looking into one of the Dell 14" studio laptops with a 9400M video card. Right now i have a very old PC with a 7600GT so would the 9400M be better or worse than the 7600GT? Also, what current gen card do you think its comparable to?

Thanks

 

[WildW]

Take a look here - http://www.notebookcheck.net/N...e-9400M-G.11949.0.html

Great site for notebook GPU comparisons with some benchmark scores.

 

[Parasitic]

The 9400M is more or less the same as a 9300M GS, which is roughly comparable with a 8400M GS. Since the 8400M GS is a bit slower than the 8600M GT, which is probably marginally faster than your 7600GT, I would say that the 9400M ~ 8400M GS ~ 7600GT.

Edit: ok, maybe I was a little off...the 9400M should be 30-40% slower the a 7600GT in synthetic comparisons according to this chart:

Text

But keep in mind that you'll be running this on a laptop which probably has a lower resolution than your desktop LCD, so you might not see much difference. Plus the new card supports DX10 while your 7600GT doesn't.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: Parasitic
The 9400M is more or less the same as a 9300M GS, which is roughly comparable with a 8400M GS. Since the 8400M GS is a bit slower than the 8600M GT, which is probably marginally faster than your 7600GT, I would say that the 9400M ~ 8400M GS ~ 7600GT.

Edit: ok, maybe I was a little off...the 9400M should be 30-40% slower the a 7600GT in synthetic comparisons according to this chart:

Text

But keep in mind that you'll be running this on a laptop which probably has a lower resolution than your desktop LCD, so you might not see much difference. Plus the new card supports DX10 while your 7600GT doesn't.

I have a Studio 14z enroute, with a scheduled delivery date of 31 Jul. I'd be happy to run some benchmarks and post them for AT.

 

[Bateluer]

Got mine in yesterday, reformated it and reinstalling Vista 64 right now. Puts out a good amount of heat on the left side, course that may have something to do with my 83* ambient temperature.

 

[Parasitic]

My 9300M GS in Vostro 1320 also gets a little hot in 3D apps. I think it's hotter than my old 8400M GS.

 

[Bateluer]

Some quick synthetic tests.

My 14z has a C2D T6500 with 3GB of DDR3 with its 9400M G, by the way.

3DMark 2006 - 2086
3DMark 2005 - 3664
3DMark 2003 - Crashes, not sure why.

I have PCMark 2004 and 2005 as well, but they don't seem to play very nicely with Vista 64. I will run some actual tests later to get a better picture of how it performs in the real world.

 

[Hacp]

9400M is roughly around the 6800gt in performance.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: Hacp
9400M is roughly around the 6800gt in performance.

Err, not by a long shot. The 6800GT will walk all over the 9400M and any other integrated chip.

 

[R3MF]

the 6800GT gets around 2600 at 3dmark 2006, that is comparable to the 9400M which gets 2,100.

the 9400M also has a similar number of GPU transistors and bandwidth, as well as a core clock that 50% higher than the 6800GT.

the performance should be similar.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: R3MF
the 6800GT gets around 2600 at 3dmark 2006, that is comparable to the 9400M which gets 2,100.

the 9400M also has a similar number of GPU transistors and bandwidth, as well as a core clock that 50% higher than the 6800GT.

the performance should be similar.

As someone who had a 6800GT, I can tell you that this is not the case. Driver optimizations and increases in CPU power can account for their similar 3DMark scores, but the 6800GT will crush the 9400M IGP under its boot heel. My 6800GT could play a plethora of games at high details that my Studio 14z will never be able to play, despite having a much more powerful C2D CPU than the P4C I had back then.

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: Bateluer

Originally posted by: R3MF
the 6800GT gets around 2600 at 3dmark 2006, that is comparable to the 9400M which gets 2,100.

the 9400M also has a similar number of GPU transistors and bandwidth, as well as a core clock that 50% higher than the 6800GT.

the performance should be similar.

As someone who had a 6800GT, I can tell you that this is not the case. Driver optimizations and increases in CPU power can account for their similar 3DMark scores, but the 6800GT will crush the 9400M IGP under its boot heel. My 6800GT could play a plethora of games at high details that my Studio 14z will never be able to play, despite having a much more powerful C2D CPU than the P4C I had back then.

Unless you have one on you right now to compare the two and bench, the 3dmark benchmarks are the best bet. I had a 6800GT too btw. The pipelines, and core/shader clocks all are pretty close to the 6800GT in spec. Only big difference is memory clock.

Its probably closer to a regular 6800 card, but one of those overclocked could give you 6800GT numbers, much like you can overclock the 9400m to give you the same numbers.

 

[Bateluer]

I'm installing several titles that I have with Steam right now, but I just don't see the IGP 9400M being anywhere near as powerful as the 6800GT.

 

[IlllI]

the desktop variants are different from the laptop ones. generally ones in laptops are lower clocked b/c of heat issues

 

[Bateluer]

Some thing I've noticed with the Studio 14z though. The drivers on Nvidia's site don't seem to work with the 9400M on the Studio, only those on Dell's site. And those are out of date by a few months.

 

[tvih]

I haven't collected all the possible data to support this, but sometimes it seems people underestimate these "modern" IGPs. A Zotac 9300-ITX review had a Crysis benchmark in it (http://www.tweaktown.com/revie...therboard/index9.html), and it was playable at low settings. The reported framerates were almost as good as what I used to get with my 7800GT (though I admit to having had a weaker GPU back then)! At any rate it is comparable to a 6800 GT based on what I've read.

It'll be a couple of weeks probably before I get my 9300-ITX, but when I do, I can test it (and a 7800GT if I decide to) for myself.

 

[hans007]

9300/9400 M if you have ddr3 is different than ddr2. that said, its 16 pipes, and with ddr3 and a full dual channel bus, it would probably be faster than a 8400GS which is 64-bit bus with the same 16 shaders. I am not sure if they renamed the 8400GS the 9300GS (i think its a die shrink) but it should be similar.

A ddr3 9400 based laptop would actaully notbe horribly slow i'd think. a macbook pro 13" i guess would be one example.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: hans007
9300/9400 M if you have ddr3 is different than ddr2. that said, its 16 pipes, and with ddr3 and a full dual channel bus, it would probably be faster than a 8400GS which is 64-bit bus with the same 16 shaders. I am not sure if they renamed the 8400GS the 9300GS (i think its a die shrink) but it should be similar.

A ddr3 9400 based laptop would actaully notbe horribly slow i'd think. a macbook pro 13" i guess would be one example.

In Vista, its very snappy. I just haven't had a lot of time to actually do any testing in actual games. Its been a busy few weeks.

Nvidia's done so much rebranding and renaming though that I'm not sure they know what they're selling any more.

 

[mjrpes3]

This page is all you'll ever need:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/W...ics-cards.18488.0.html

EDIT: Be nice if there was an equivalent table for desktops!

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: mjrpes3
This page is all you'll ever need:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/W...ics-cards.18488.0.html

EDIT: Be nice if there was an equivalent table for desktops!

Useful, but needs more variety of games and from different generations.