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Ati 5870 vs Nvidia 650M

F

Freida

Suspended
Original poster
Oct 22, 2010
4,077
5,874
Hello guys,

just out of curiosity how much faster/slower is the new 650M compared to the 5870? I know that its desktop card vs notebook one but what difference do you think I could expect? I have MP that I run on 30" ACD 2560x1600 and the card works fine even for occasional gaming but I want to know how it is going to run when the new retina MBP has 20% more pixels than my 30" ACD. Would you say that 650M is 20% faster than desktop 5870 and therefore I can expect the same performance or would you say something different?

I'm debating what to do with my MP as I can still sell it for reasonable price and now just got a job in a company that will provide a workstation so I'm kinda leaning towards just getting a laptop and then get MP next year if I start freelancing again.

Thank you very much
 
the nvidia is weaker.

you have to expect lower performance because of two things, the fact that the card is weaker, and the fact that the resolution is higher (that is, if you choose to game in native res).
 
Freida said:
Hello guys,

just out of curiosity how much faster/slower is the new 650M compared to the 5870? I know that its desktop card vs notebook one but what difference do you think I could expect? I have MP that I run on 30" ACD 2560x1600 and the card works fine even for occasional gaming but I want to know how it is going to run when the new retina MBP has 20% more pixels than my 30" ACD. Would you say that 650M is 20% faster than desktop 5870 and therefore I can expect the same performance or would you say something different?

I'm debating what to do with my MP as I can still sell it for reasonable price and now just got a job in a company that will provide a workstation so I'm kinda leaning towards just getting a laptop and then get MP next year if I start freelancing again.

Thank you very much
Click to expand...

The mobile GPU is going to be slower. Not sure by how much though. Maybe somebody with more knowledge on the subject can link to some benchmarks for a better comparison.

But also remember if you need to, you can always take your MBP back down to non retina resolution for better performance if necessary.
 
Really? I thought that 2 generations old desktop card would easily be matched with latest card even if its a laptop one.
Hmm, I was hoping for a more positive answer (that its the same or 650M slightly faster) but I guess I overlooked something.

Shame Tom's hardware doesn't compare notebook cards with desktop ones :(
Lets hope bare feats will have benchmarks soon then
 
what you are overlooking is thinking that 650m is top end.

the 670m is already around 20% faster then the 650m. the 680m is said to run BF3 at Ultra at medium resolution, so it seems to be at par or faster then the desktop 5870.
 
Freida said:
Really? I thought that 2 generations old desktop card would easily be matched with latest card even if its a laptop one.
Hmm, I was hoping for a more positive answer (that its the same or 650M slightly faster) but I guess I overlooked something.

Shame Tom's hardware doesn't compare notebook cards with desktop ones :(
Lets hope bare feats will have benchmarks soon then
Click to expand...

Not sure if this helps:
http://community.futuremark.com/hardware/gpu/NVIDIA+GeForce+GT+650M/review

3D Mark GPU score for 650M is 2150 and 3D Mark GPU score for 5870 is 4410. I think mobile GPUs are less powerful than you had hoped. But with a desktop GPU, there is A LOT more room for power.
 
my logic was this.
3 years old desktop mainstream card
vs
3 months old mainstream notebook card

My assumption was that the technology improved and they would be on the same performance. Well, it looks like I was clearly wrong :(

Thanks for the headsup - it now makes it a bit harder to decide whether or not to get the retina mbp after i sell the MP or not. Lets hope we will see some benchmarks soon :)))
 
strausd said:
Not sure if this helps:
http://community.futuremark.com/hardware/gpu/NVIDIA+GeForce+GT+650M/review

3D Mark GPU score for 650M is 2150 and 3D Mark GPU score for 5870 is 4410. I think mobile GPUs are less powerful than you had hoped. But with a desktop GPU, there is A LOT more room for power.
Click to expand...

Battlefield 3 (2011) 1920x1080 ultra 4x MSAA 16xAF

AMD Radeon HD 6870 28
ATI Radeon HD 5850 24
NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M* 14
AMD Radeon HD 6770M -

The GT650M sucks for gaming! http://www.notebookcheck.net
 
bottleneck said:
Battlefield 3 (2011) 1920x1080 ultra 4x MSAA 16xAF

AMD Radeon HD 6870 28
ATI Radeon HD 5850 24
NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M* 14
AMD Radeon HD 6770M -

The GT650M sucks for gaming! http://www.notebookcheck.net
Click to expand...

No, laptop GPUs are simply less powerful than desktop ones. I'd hardly call the 5870 a mainstream card, that was a high-end card when it was released and still has a lot of horsepower by today's standards. The 650M is a great GPU that works within Apple's strict power/thermal constraints.
 
Freida said:
my logic was this.
3 years old desktop mainstream card
vs
3 months old mainstream notebook card

My assumption was that the technology improved and they would be on the same performance. Well, it looks like I was clearly wrong :(

Thanks for the headsup - it now makes it a bit harder to decide whether or not to get the retina mbp after i sell the MP or not. Lets hope we will see some benchmarks soon :)))
Click to expand...

You can safely assume the rMBP will suck for gaming at native resolution and probably even 1920x1200 unless the game is more than a couple years old. The memory bandwidth of the 650m is pitiful compared to the HD5870. By today's standards HD5870 is still considered a mid-high end desktop gpu (bit slower than a HD7850) vs a mainstream mobile gpu in the 650m.
 
The Mac Pro can support 225W cards. The MBP is probably down in the 20-30W range, so the Mac Pro literally has an order of magnitude more power to work with. It'll take a few generations to overcome that deficit.

Naturally, this is why I have a Mac Pro for gaming, since it'll always be able to support the fastest GPUs (especially now that off-the-shelf PC cards basically work).
 
Exactly, there just isn't enough power pumping into that little MBP. The MP can divert a hefty amount all around.

Is the MBP 650 GDDR3? or have they achieved GDDR5?
 
I see. Well that is a shame and I'm not sure why Apple marketed so much but lets hope I can get decent performance on medium settings in that native resolution.
Anyway, I don't play that much but being spoiled by MP its hard to go down :))))
Thank you guys for clarification, much appreciated
 
650M is a little slower than the 5770, so the 5870 is in theory about twice as fast.

Apple marketed it a lot because it's still a substantial step up from the last Macbook Pro.
 
goMac said:
650M is a little slower than the 5770, so the 5870 is in theory about twice as fast.

Apple marketed it a lot because it's still a substantial step up from the last Macbook Pro.
Click to expand...

Exactly, I think I saw a 60% improvement over the previous MBP quoted somewhere. However, it's still a mobile GPU, and desktop GPUs will always be in a class of their own. The discrete mobile GPU will also be significantly faster than an integrated GPU, even the HD 4000.
 
Asgorath said:
Exactly, I think I saw a 60% improvement over the previous MBP quoted somewhere. However, it's still a mobile GPU, and desktop GPUs will always be in a class of their own. The discrete mobile GPU will also be significantly faster than an integrated GPU, even the HD 4000.
Click to expand...

You are correct. 650M is 60% faster than GPU in last MacBook Pro. They also said that Intel HD 4000 is 60% faster than HD 3000. So in both the discrete and integrated graphics, 60% increase in performance. Yet 4X as many pixels...
 
strausd said:
You are correct. 650M is 60% faster than GPU in last MacBook Pro. They also said that Intel HD 4000 is 60% faster than HD 3000. So in both the discrete and integrated graphics, 60% increase in performance. Yet 4X as many pixels...
Click to expand...

Kind of like the HD iPad. More GPU needed for more pixels. No better interaction or responsiveness.
 
goMac said:
650M is a little slower than the 5770, so the 5870 is in theory about twice as fast.

Apple marketed it a lot because it's still a substantial step up from the last Macbook Pro.
Click to expand...

If it was 10% faster, Apple would still market it as the fastest macbook pro gpu EVVAAAAAARRRR!:p

Okay I'm almost embarrassed to have typed such a thing, but they are hyping this in a profoundly silly way. The 5870 may not be twice as fast under OSX. It depends on how well the drivers are optimized.
 
thekev said:
If it was 10% faster, Apple would still market it as the fastest macbook pro gpu EVVAAAAAARRRR!:p

Okay I'm almost embarrassed to have typed such a thing, but they are hyping this in a profoundly silly way. The 5870 may not be twice as fast under OSX. It depends on how well the drivers are optimized.
Click to expand...

Given that the NVidia drivers are optimized worse than the ATI drivers usually, especially when they are new, that only means worse things for the NVidia card. :)
 
goMac said:
Given that the NVidia drivers are optimized worse than the ATI drivers usually, especially when they are new, that only means worse things for the NVidia card. :)
Click to expand...

When was the last time you used an NVIDIA GPU? This has not been my experience at all.
 
Asgorath said:
When was the last time you used an NVIDIA GPU? This has not been my experience at all.
Click to expand...

From time to time I write OpenGL code. So not only have I used NVidia GPUs (My Mac Pro used to have an 8800, my Macbook Pro is NVidia), but I get to file bugs too!

Tons of fun.

I also hear the same from other developers.
 
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