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MBP Graphics card comparison

F

ftbps

macrumors member
Original poster
Mar 5, 2008
69
0
Hello All,

I have a first gen unibody mBP (2.53 GHz) with 9600 M GT graphics card.
My wife is buying a lenovo w500 laptop with ATI Mobility FireGL V5700 graphics card.

Can someone please tell me how these two cards compare? Which one outperforms? and some explanation?

I would appreciate your input.
thanks,
Bipin
 
You are comparing apples to oranges. As each card will be running a different OS, there is no direct comparison.

The price of the Lenovo laptop is a giveaway as to the strength of the graphics card. You won't get any kind of good graphics card under $800 (unless other features of the machine are neutered).
 
I think I need to stress this again.

G.T. said:
Also one is mobile gaming and one mobile workstation
Click to expand...

"ATI Mobility FireGL V5200 is based on ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 for notebooks as probably the same chip was used. Only the Bios is different and allows the use of professional drivers (for CAD and 3D applications optimized). The standard Catalyst drivers can only be installed in a modded version. Therefore the V5200 becomes a X1600 (with the same performance). The professional drivers show a clearly reduced performance in games."

from http://www.notebookcheck.net/ATI-Mobility-FireGL-V5200.2164.0.html

even if u planned to change the drivers so it was for gaming and not workstation the 9600m GT would far out perform the ATi card. However, if u were doing CAD work etc I'm not sure which would perform better most likely the ATi.
 
Are you doing anything that would require a graphics card? Most laptop users do not.

If not, you might be spending more then you should be.
 
G.T. said:
I think I need to stress this again.



"ATI Mobility FireGL V5200 is based on ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 for notebooks as probably the same chip was used. Only the Bios is different and allows the use of professional drivers (for CAD and 3D applications optimized). The standard Catalyst drivers can only be installed in a modded version. Therefore the V5200 becomes a X1600 (with the same performance). The professional drivers show a clearly reduced performance in games."

from http://www.notebookcheck.net/ATI-Mobility-FireGL-V5200.2164.0.html

even if u planned to change the drivers so it was for gaming and not workstation the 9600m GT would far out perform the ATi card. However, if u were doing CAD work etc I'm not sure which would perform better most likely the ATi.
Click to expand...

The OP said FireGL V5700, not V5200.
 
the 9600gt is roughly 75% faster, but that is in windows. Windows tends to bench faster than OSX in most apps, but the 9600GT is the better card. So..I'd say the 9600gt still has the upper hand, but maybe by 30% in osx instead of 75% in windows.
 
vanc said:
The OP said FireGL V5700, not V5200.
Click to expand...

either way your still comparing a mobile workstation to a mobile gaming card. It depends what they what from performance. The 9600m GT is much better for gaming but the FireGL V5700 I would say is better in CAD work etc.

"The FireGL V5700 graphics card is in fact a Mobility Radeon HD3650 with optimized drivers"

in 3dmark 06 the Leno scores around 3851 and the MBP gets around 6000, so you can kind of tell the differences.
 
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