Interesting concept for MBP

[Aranince]

http://arstechnica.com/journals/har...m=main_ars_account&utm_campaign=microblogging

What allows the N10 to play Call of Duty 4 is NVIDIA GeForce 9300M GS graphics. When the user wants to get the best battery life from the netbook a reboot will change the system back to the more miserly integrated graphics.

Possibility of this going into the Macbooks to help save power? But a reboot seems a bit on the annoying side.

 

[ayeying]

Its been done before on a Sony Laptop. You can switch to a more powerful nVidia card or switch to a weaker integrated card to save battery life. Its not something new though.

 

[e12a]

how is the video card selected? through a physical switch on the computer? I dont think apple will sacrifice looks for a switch.

a nice concept though. I wouldn't mind having more battery life during class.

 

[rekhyt]

how is the video card selected? through a physical switch on the computer? I dont think apple will sacrifice looks for a switch.

a nice concept though. I wouldn't mind having more battery life during class.

Lol. I don't think so too.

 

[squeeks]

im sure apple could intagrate it into a keystroke at bootup if they went that direction

 

[eXan]

Seems like a waste of space inside the notebook. Knowing Apple, they will use every millimiter to the maximum efficiency.

 

[Vanarak19]

all that for what, 30min of battery?

no thanks.


id rather have my 8600 downclock as much as possible while on battery, by then, the difference is probably even less

 

[Yixian]

All new ATI cards from the 9650M GT and up come with a built in integrated G 9100 that the computer can switch back and forth using.

 

[richard.mac]

the graphics in notebooks are just chips right? although you guys probably already know this and just denote dedicated graphics as "cards". so it wouldnt add that much extra space.

 

[bolen]

All new ATI cards from the 9650M GT and up come with a built in integrated G 9100 that the computer can switch back and forth using.

9650M GT and 9100M are both nVidia GPU's.. maybe you ment nVidia and not ATi? 😎

 

[DaveTheGrey]

never heard of such a concept. Interesting. Is a dedicated video card such a power hog compared to integrated graphics card?

 

[ayeying]

how is the video card selected? through a physical switch on the computer? I dont think apple will sacrifice looks for a switch.

a nice concept though. I wouldn't mind having more battery life during class.

As funny as it sounds, it is a physical switch. Lemme find that notebook for you.

Edit: Here's an article from 2006 about this feature on a Sony SZ laptop.

http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2006/02/02/sony_readies_vaio_sz_series/

It contains a GeForce 7400 and Integrated 950GMA.

Here's a notebookreview.com, Review.

http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=2862

I knew I wasn't dreaming when I saw this. lol