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ATi X1600 (dedicated) vs NVIDIA 9400M (integrated)

C

Cottonsworth

macrumors regular
Original poster
May 11, 2008
132
0
I'm trying to do some research for a friend and I'm a bit baffled at what I am finding. Is it possible that a mid-2009 Unibody MBP has worse performance than a late-2006 MBP?

Specifically, I'm looking at the video cards. The 2.33ghz C2D MBP has a dedicated ATi X1600 Card with 256mb of vram, while the 2.53ghz C2D Unibody MBP has an integrated Nvidia 9400M with 256mb of shared vram.

Looking at Notebookcheck's benchmark site (http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html) it would seem that the ATi X1600 ranks higher at position #145 than the Nvidia 9400M at position # 161. Am I missing something here? How can Apple put a worst video card in a machine that is three years newer?

I would appreciate if anyone could elaborate this. Thanks.
 
It was because Apple refreshed their line to remove the "Macbook" title to their aluminum unibodies while keeping the internal specs the same and slapping on a MBP title. Those MBP (the low end 15" and all the 13") had the same integrated graphics card, the Nvidia GeForce 9400M, that the Macbooks had. The previous prices were hold over (and so when they got rid of the integrated graphics for the 15", there was also a small price hike). This is AFAIK and I may be wrong, but hopefully this could start discussion or something.
 
No1nfoProvided said:
It was because Apple refreshed their line to remove the "Macbook" title to their aluminum unibodies while keeping the internal specs the same and slapping on a MBP title. Those MBP (the low end 15" and all the 13") had the same integrated graphics card, the Nvidia GeForce 9400M, that the Macbooks had. The previous prices were hold over (and so when they got rid of the integrated graphics for the 15", there was also a small price hike). This is AFAIK and I may be wrong, but hopefully this could start discussion or something.
Click to expand...

I think it is really awful. I'm having a discussion with some other people and it seems that the Pro line is really becoming or has become a consumer line.

According to this link,

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-460-radeon-hd-5570-gaming,2697-7.html

There is almost no GPU performance increase from the late-2006 MBP to the lower-end mid-2009 Unibody MBP.

During late-2006, the GPU on the MBP was either a X1600 with 128mb or 256mb, imagine if Apple offered the lower end MBP with the same GPU as the MB's integrated Intel GPU. I do understand you can get a better GPU in the mid-2009 MBP but I think to put the 9400M back then in a MBP was just ridiculous. They should have just called it MacBook XL. I don't see how now in 2009, Apple could have put the same GPU in the MB, MB Air, lower-end MBP.
 
Cottonsworth said:
I think it is really awful. I'm having a discussion with some other people and it seems that the Pro line is really becoming or has become a consumer line.

According to this link,

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-460-radeon-hd-5570-gaming,2697-7.html

There is almost no GPU performance increase from the late-2006 MBP to the lower-end mid-2009 Unibody MBP.

During late-2006, the GPU on the MBP was either a X1600 with 128mb or 256mb, imagine if Apple offered the lower end MBP with the same GPU as the MB's integrated Intel GPU. I do understand you can get a better GPU in the mid-2009 MBP but I think to put the 9400M back then in a MBP was just ridiculous. They should have just called it MacBook XL. I don't see how now in 2009, Apple could have put the same GPU in the MB, MB Air, lower-end MBP.
Click to expand...

I totally agree with you here. When first I saw what Apple did with their marketing, it made me really upset. I saw them starting to advertise that their MBP line had a new lower price, but I looked closer at the specs and saw it was the same price and specs as the old uMBs back in the day. As I read more articles on it though, most people did not notice, or they simply didn't care. The only positives from that were that the people who owned the previous gen MBP were selling their MBPs so cheap so they could still be competitive with Apple's "lower price." I didn't end up getting one of those used MBPs, but since I'm still using my mid-2006 MBP, I wish I had.
 
No1nfoProvided said:
I totally agree with you here. When first I saw what Apple did with their marketing, it made me really upset. I saw them starting to advertise that their MBP line had a new lower price, but I looked closer at the specs and saw it was the same price and specs as the old uMBs back in the day. As I read more articles on it though, most people did not notice, or they simply didn't care. The only positives from that were that the people who owned the previous gen MBP were selling their MBPs so cheap so they could still be competitive with Apple's "lower price." I didn't end up getting one of those used MBPs, but since I'm still using my mid-2006 MBP, I wish I had.
Click to expand...

well you do know what the specs are. if you dont like it or doesnt fit your needs, what do you think you should do?
 
Cottonsworth said:
... I don't see how now in 2009, Apple could have put the same GPU in the MB, MB Air, lower-end MBP...
Click to expand...

In case you haven't noticed, this is 2010. We have powerful NVidia 330M graphics in 15" MBPs and 17" MBP's. The 13" MBP has capable NVidia 320M graphics. By no means are these any worse that your ATI GPU.
 
AlphaDogg said:
In case you haven't noticed, this is 2010. We have high performance NVidia 330M graphics in 15" MBPs and 17" MBP's. The 13" MBP has high performance NVidia 320M graphics. By no means are these any worse that your ATI GPU.
Click to expand...

330m High Performance? Hahah!
 
I don't see how now in 2009.....
Click to expand...

So don't buy one if you don't like it. Bellyaching on a forum gets you nothing. Vote with your money.

BTW, it's 2010 now. Has been for a while.
 
wywern209 said:
might not be HIGH performance but we do want to stay away from the outlets a bit you know.. it is a fairly capable card. and both the 320m and 330m outclass the 9400m and the X1600.
Click to expand...

I would certainly hope that four years later Apple would have GPUs that outclass the X1600. I'm shopping for a friend that is looking at a mid-2009 machine and I'm trying to research for her if the upgrade is worthwhile over her late-2006 machine. She does a lot of Final Cut and Photoshop and I was thinking a mid-2009 machine would be a fairly significant upgrade but to my disappointment it doesn't seem that way.

My whole point is how Apple seems to going away from their Professional/Prosumer line tradition in the PowerBook/MacBook Pro line and everything seems to be going consumer.
 
It's pretty simple – you're comparing the mid-range of one generation to the low-end of another. Not a precise comparison.
 
Forgive me, but I'm still a little lost. I, too, am trying to find out how the Radeon X1600 compares to the 9400M as I'm looking to replace my Early 2006 iMac with a Late 2009 Mac mini Server which has, you guessed it, the 9400M. I configured my iMac to have 256MB of VRAM when I originally ordered it. Given that, I know that the two GPUs are close in terms of performance. Given that, is the 9400M in the 2009 mini Server slightly faster, slightly slower, or on par with the X1600 that I have in my iMac?
 
Yebubbleman said:
Forgive me, but I'm still a little lost. I, too, am trying to find out how the Radeon X1600 compares to the 9400M as I'm looking to replace my Early 2006 iMac with a Late 2009 Mac mini Server which has, you guessed it, the 9400M. I configured my iMac to have 256MB of VRAM when I originally ordered it. Given that, I know that the two GPUs are close in terms of performance. Given that, is the 9400M in the 2009 mini Server slightly faster, slightly slower, or on par with the X1600 that I have in my iMac?
Click to expand...

It's slightly on par.

I found the 9400M in the 2nd generation MacBook Air to be extremely similar to the X1600 in my first generation Core Duo MacBook Pro, 17". However, the X1600 seemed to be slightly faster (like 5% at best) then the 9400M in SOME games. However, the 9400M is newer and with current software, would be better then the X1600. But if you're not doing anything 3D or if current 3D performance is fine, then you shouldn't have any issues.
 
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