HD 2300 or 8400M GS for laptop?

[Frank]

What is the better GPU: a HD 2300, or an 8400M GS, both with 256 MB dedicated video RAM?

I couldn't find any benchmark whatsoever, only the basic specs. It seems an 8400M is worst, but I don't know what the difference would be between the 8400M GS and the HD 2300.

 

[Zaphod]

You should be able to find benchmarks for the Mobility X2300/X1400 which should be basically the same thing as the HD 2300 sans UVD. I'd expect the HD 2300 to be slightly faster in older stuff and the 8400M better at the more recent titles. The HD 2300 does probably have better video decoding abilities while the 8400M is DX10. In the end, I'd probably take the latter unless the former is much cheaper.

 

[ShaidarHaran]

The HD2300 has a 128-bit memory interface whereas the 8400M GS is 64-bit. That alone should answer your question.

 

[Zaphod]

But lower clocked memory. I wouldn't expect memory bandwidth to be the limiting factor in typical usage scenarios for these chips anyway. I believe the added shader power of the 8400M GS (note: not 8400M G) should win out most of the time.

 

[ShaidarHaran]

But lower clocked memory. I wouldn't expect memory bandwidth to be the limiting factor in typical usage scenarios for these chips anyway. I believe the added shader power of the 8400M GS (note: not 8400M G) should win out most of the time.

It's all speculation at this point, since no one cares to test mobile GPUs as thoroughly as their desktop brethren.

Here's the specs I was able to find for each GPU after lots of searching:

HD 2300:
API support: DX9c, OGL2.0
GPU clock: 480MHz
pipeline configuration: 2 vs 4 ps 4 rop 4 tmu
Pixel fillrate: 1.92GP/s
Texture fillrate: 1.92GT/s
Mem clock: 550(1100)MHz
memory interface: 128-bit
Memory bandwidth: 17.6GB/s

8400M GS:
API support: DX10, OGL2.1
GPU clock: 400MHz
shader clock: 800MHz
pipeline configuration: 16 scalar alus 4 rop 8 tmu
Pixel fillrate: 1.6GP/s
Texture fillrate: 3.2GT/s
Mem clock: 600(1200)MHz
memory interface: 64-bit
memory bandwidth: 9.6GB/s

So HD 2300 has a slight pixel fillrate advantage and a massive memory bandwidth advantage whereas 8400M GS has large shader throughput and texture fillrate advantages. Also, 8400M GS is DX10 whereas HD 2300 is "only" DX9c. HD 2300 has UVD support and 8400M GS has Purevideo2 support.

Looks like performance would vary wildly between the two depending on the bottleneck of the game being played. Too bad there's absolutely no performance numbers out there for either...

 

[Zaphod]

Thanks for digging! I thought the memory clock would be like the X1400 (440MHz, IIRC), so yeah: that bandwidth advantage is notable.

Looks like performance would vary wildly between the two depending on the bottleneck of the game being played.

To quote digitalwanderer:

 

[Frank]

It ended up being a HD 2300. (My 2.5 year old laptop broke down, wasn't repairable, and the best laptop they had available has a HD 2300.)

I'll let you know if it is useable for games on medium-low detail.

 

[Blazkowicz]

shading power isn't exactly a high point of 8400/8500, you have 16 scalar units to do all the work, pixel and vertex, whereas on the X1300 you have two vector VS units and four times two vector PS units giving the equivalent of 40 vs 16 scalar ALU in a apple-to-orange comparison.

I view bandwith as a highly significant metric on low end parts. TNT M64, geforce 2MX 200, 9200SE and FX5200 64bit were terrible next to their 128bit counterparts
you'll probably find it better anyway to run games at a lowish, non native resolution with 2x AA.

 

[Albuquerque]

The 128mb 7300GS on my Dell Inspiron does pretty well for most games, albeit at 1280x800 resolution. Obviously I'm not doing any HDR or AA with acceptable performance, but even Oblivion and STALKER work alright with some combination of low and medium details.

The Core 2 Duo 2ghz and 4GB of ram behind it also helps

 

[Frank]

Well, the performance test of Company of Heroes gives an average fps of 34.5 with shader detail on low, and 11 fps on high. The other settings (even AA) don't seem to make much of a difference. It still looks pretty nice on low, except that there are no shadows. Strangely enough, with AA it looks worse than without.

All older games I tried work great, of course.

So, much better than expected on average, but it isn't a shading monster (as expected).

Other specs: Core 2 Duo 1.7 GHz, 2 GB RAM, resolution 1280 * 800.


Btw, the new CCC is worse than ever, as the only thing it allows me to do is select a different resolution. And I cannot find any other display settings anywhere. Is there something better that does allow me to configure stuff in Vista?

 

[Albuquerque]

Maybe it's a function of the drivers provided to you by your vendor? My Thinkpad T60 uses an ATI x1400 and the CCC gives me options for rez, LCD expansion, monitor orientation, all the AA/AF/filtering optimize/etc controls, color adjustment and the like.

Basically I can access everything I'd expect compared to the XP version... I still like NV's application profiler thing a lot better.

 

[Frank]

Yes, I like the nVidia drivers and control panel a lot better as well, although I didn't have the Vista troubles.

My CCC also has some settings for rotation and such, but everything else is missing. Where do you find those options?

I'm installing STALKER now, see how that goes. After that, I think I'm going to look for newer and better drivers with a functional control panel.

 

[Albuquerque]

My CCC also has some settings for rotation and such, but everything else is missing. Where do you find those options?

Sounds like your laptop vendor gutted the available video driver options. Those settings should be exactly where you would expect them to be on any other CCC window. If they're not there, the video driver itself isn't exposing them for some reason or another.

I had that problem with really really early beta ATI Vista drivers, but that has been long-since fixed. Maybe try force-installing the default ATI drivers from their website? Or using another laptop vendor's ATI drivers on your machine?

Or ATI Tray Tool

 

[Frank]

Good idea. I'll try both.

STALKER turns out to be very playable with static lighting, no issues whatsoever. Although I reduced shadows, grass density and viewing distance by default. I might increase those to see the difference, but there is no need.

Strangely enough, it is reasonably playable with full dynamic lighting (albeit slow mouse response in menus), but totally unplayable with only dynamic object lighting! That's totally weird!

I have no fps statistics, as I cannot get the console to open (pressing ~ doesn't work). What could that be?

 

[Frank]

Hm, where exactly can I find decent drivers? I'm now (very slowly) downloading the drivers for an Asus with an X2300, but is that the best I can do? Omega doesn't have any, let alone AMD.

I really think that the support from nVidia and AMD for notebook GPUs is severely lacking. While they claim it might not work, I have yet to encounter one that doesn't, unless it also includes other vendor specific crap. Which makes support directly from the manufacturers all the more desirable.

 

[Zaphod]

Hm, where exactly can I find decent drivers? I'm now (very slowly) downloading the drivers for an Asus with an X2300, but is that the best I can do? Omega doesn't have any, let alone AMD.

Sadly, as with most notebook manufacturers, Asus' driver/download support isn't the greatest one in the world. I'd try out the 'ordinary' Catalysts after putting them through the DH Mobility Modder.

 

[Frank]

Sadly, as with most notebook manufacturers, Asus' driver/download support isn't the greatest one in the world. I'd try out the 'ordinary' Catalysts after putting them through the DH Mobility Modder.

Thanks! I'm on it.

 

[Frank]

Well, that worked pretty nice.

One question: can I see the amount of dedicated memory anywhere in the full CCC, or do I need ATI Tray Tool for that?

 

[Albuquerque]

Actually, Windows will now tell you the proper memory settings. Go to display settings and Advanced, and you'll see Dedicated Video Memory in there. Another nice new feature that should have always existed