hey sorry if this thread has been repeated. i dont know. but i was wondering if this is possible since amd gpus are lower wattage etc. (according to nb check) compared to the gt 330m and are significantly faster (mobility 5670) though these could be used in the next imac, is it possible?
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Ati Mobility Radeon Macbook Pro?!
- Thread starter peakchua
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
In MBP, no unless ATI develops something similar to Optimus (auto-switching). Apple has also been using NVidia in MBPs for several years now.
In iMac, yes. All but the low-end iMac have ATI GPUs thus it's very likely that it'll remain the same.
Everything is possible. Oh, BTW, there is no mobility 5670, only 5650.
In iMac, yes. All but the low-end iMac have ATI GPUs thus it's very likely that it'll remain the same.
Everything is possible. Oh, BTW, there is no mobility 5670, only 5650.
That is nonsense as Apple uses a multiplexing method in the current MBP and this works with the current ATI GPUs as well.
The think the reasons Apple didn't switch are political and the better drivers of Nvidia expecially in Open GL/CL. Also it probably was too much working having a 320M in the 13" and ATI in the bigger MBP.
It depends on what Apple really wants to do in the future. If they want to go even more into the mainstream they will switch to ATI because their hardware clearly offers better Power/Performance than Nvidia for Gaming but if the focus more on GPGPU they will stick with Nvidia which has the better Architecture for this purpose.
NVidia drivers have always been crap. Apple writes them (AFAIK), not NVidia. ATI, on the other hand, writes the OS X drivers. For example ATI 4870 crushes NVidia 280 in OpenGL performance even though GTX 280 is a lot faster in terms of raw performance. That should tell something about the drivers. I don't know how good drivers other GPUs have but this is at least the case for Mac Pro. NVidia is still stuck with ancient mobile GPUs while ATI has already released DirectX 11 GPUs ages ago. When NVidia can finally release some mobile Fermis, ATI is already releasing Southern Islands.
I hope Apple would switch for ATI and dump NVidia, even a whole switch to AMD would be cool as "Fusion" CPUs look VERY capable.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Llano GPU was close to the HD 5650 in performance. Even Ontario's GPU might not be far from HD 5430/5450 performance.
That would be cool. Depending on the clock speeds but it can actually beat mobility 5770 as it has 400 stream CPUs while Llano has 480 (if I read correctly
). Runs circles around GT 330M at least. Let alone quad core with +3GHz with Turbo with TDP less than 35W.ATI cards can switch between the Intel GPU and dedicated GPU. Not automatic, but manual.
And to be honest, I like manual switching more then automatic because I know when I want the extra power or more battery.
It's an extremely powerfull GPU that can game games on maximum details based on some demonstrations.
Not sure if the laptop's IGP will be that strong too, but it's a serious GPU that makes dedicated GPU's obsolete, unless you're a gamer and need a HD5870.
480 seems to be the most common rumored number. Clock speeds are the big unknown and it'll have a lot to do with TDP. It's possible that Llano's GPU can Turbo like CPU cores.Depending on the clock speeds but it can actually beat mobility 5770 as it has 400 stream CPUs while Llano has 480 (if I read correctly
Stream CPUs you can't add, clock speed you can
Someone will anyway code a nice little OCing tool which will unleash the real power of it
Trust me Apple writes no GPU drivers. All CPU drivers kind of suck but at least on Windows ATI drivers have for a long time been worse than Nvidia. Writing a GPU driver is according to the people who do it about as much work and complex as writing a whole operating system. Nvidia writes them all Apple does is maybe ask for some features or customize power management settings and stuff. Apple doesn't write GPU drivers. As for that Open GL on ATI is faster that is new to me. The whole GPGPU stuff is definitely better suited for the nvidia architecture but it is also much less important to most people.