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How much graphical performance does the new MBP have over the old one?

So here's a question for you gurus out there. I have a MBP 2.33 with the x1600 graphics card. My question is, is it going to be possible to upgrade my MBP with the new 8600M at some point if I wanted to? Or am I pretty much stuck with what I have now? Not that that's such a bad thing, I was just wondering about my future upgrade possibilities if there are any.

Thanks!
 
denverjay said:
So here's a question for you gurus out there. I have a MBP 2.33 with the x1600 graphics card. My question is, is it going to be possible to upgrade my MBP with the new 8600M at some point if I wanted to? Or am I pretty much stuck with what I have now? Not that that's such a bad thing, I was just wondering about my future upgrade possibilities if there are any.

Thanks!
Click to expand...
There are no upgrade options for your laptop short of buying a new one.
 
Thanks for the quick response. I thought that probably would be the case. Oh well, no worries.
 
Wolfpup said:
I'm not sure there's any laptop out at the moment that will last you four years of gaming with medium to high settings. The best card available right now is a Geforce 7950GTX, which is obviously a far cry from an 8800GTX. The 8600GT is a big step back from the 7950GTX, so... just be aware that some games will only be able to run on low settings within a few years.

OS X is pretty awesome for it's Unix-ness. After using it for a while, Windows feels kind of limited in some ways, just since I've found so much open source software you can compile on multiple OSes like OS X and Linux, but not Windows.
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I would not be looking for 4 years of gaming, just 4 years of good use throughout college for a select few blizzard games, music, spreadsheets, powerpoint, and a few other uses such as dvd making.
 
Sulky Smooth said:
I would not be looking for 4 years of gaming, just 4 years of good use throughout college for a select few blizzard games, music, spreadsheets, powerpoint, and a few other uses such as dvd making.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'd think it would do just fine for that, and I'm sure it'll run Starcraft 2 very solidly, at worst. For general purpose stuff I think there's no question it would last four years easy, as it's all pretty new hardware (great CPU, very modern GPU, etc.)
 
All I can say is I want to upgrade to the new mpb SO BADLY for the graphics! the 8600M GT is a pretty big improvement, and maybe I'll try and sell my decked-out 2.33 MBP and get a refurbished 2.4 when they start selling. and for the record, I easily oc-ed my x1600 to 482/483 and my 3dMark06 score went from 1800 to 2438, which is pretty good, but the new 8600 goes in to the 4000s
 
I looked thru this thread, apologize if someone addressed this but I couldn't find it so:

If you configure the 2.2 ghz 15 in Macbook Pro with the 160 gig hard drive, it's several hundred cheaper than the 2.4 ghz model. The difference in cpu speed is 10%, not huge. The question is:

does the 256 vs 128 mb of video card memory make any real difference. I am not using high end graphics programs, mainly some scientific programs and the usual mail word processing etc. And maybe a couple of games. Seems to me, if the extra video memory would only be used in specialized circumstances, the middle version is the better buy.

Note the barefeats test above didn't compare the middle and high end new Macbooks Pro, just the high end compared to older models.
 
It looks like my wait for Santa Rosa paid off.
seems powerful enough for me. Can't wait to get it delivered. Still not shipped though, even though I ordered five hours after they were released :)
 
Eidorian said:
Maybe if it was the desktop version. Even so the 8600 GTS does get schooled by a X1900 and 7950.
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Yeah, I guess I am being overly optemistic.

It seems like achitectually the 8 series had been near 100% faster than the cards it replaced (8800GTX pretty much owning the GX2 in too many situations to not consider it near 100% faster than the 7900GTX it replaces). For the "mainstream" parts to be released and not have such a commanding lead over the replacements is kinda interesting. More than likely there is some speed to be had in the scheduler and memory controller (as usual). Or nvidia is prepping for a 87xx card (refresh FTW).
 
matznentosh said:
does the 256 vs 128 mb of video card memory make any real difference. I am not using high end graphics programs, mainly some scientific programs and the usual mail word processing etc. And maybe a couple of games. Seems to me, if the extra video memory would only be used in specialized circumstances, the middle version is the better buy.
Click to expand...

If you're going to use it for games, I'd go for the extra video RAM. The 8600GT is powerful enough to actually make good use of it, and 128MB is pretty stingy.
It may also help if you regularly use dual monitors, from what I've read (probably depending on what resolution the second screen is).

I do hate how you basically have to pay $500 for such a tiny upgrade though. I wish Apple had either dropped the price, or at least thrown in a single 2GB DIMM rather than 2x1GB. That would justify the price difference probably.
 
diamond.g said:
Yeah, I guess I am being overly optemistic.

It seems like achitectually the 8 series had been near 100% faster than the cards it replaced (8800GTX pretty much owning the GX2 in too many situations to not consider it near 100% faster than the 7900GTX it replaces). For the "mainstream" parts to be released and not have such a commanding lead over the replacements is kinda interesting. More than likely there is some speed to be had in the scheduler and memory controller (as usual). Or nvidia is prepping for a 87xx card (refresh FTW).
Click to expand...
Proof?
 
Does The NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT Support Rotation On Dells

Does anyone have one to confirm they can see the rotation options we saw with ATI mobile cards up until now in the Displays preferences when hooked to a Dell 20, 24 or 30 monitor? Thanks. :confused:
 
Eidorian said:
Proof?
Click to expand...

Well I had this long post with links to tomshardware's gpu chart. Safari crashed on me... So I will just say go there. The G80 against the G71 at high settings is nearly 100% faster. But it isn't like that in every test. But enough to be shocking. It is too bad G84 isn't like that
 
diamond.g said:
Yeah, kinda confirmed the leetness of G80. Man the G84's performance is sadly lacking.
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It's just too chopped down, and is completely pointless when you can get an 8800GTS for slightly more. I don't think the 8600 is a complete failure though, as it does at least completely beaet out the 7600 it's officially replacing, and adds DX10. It's not too different in performance from a 7900GS, really.

Though I do wonder if it will even be that useful for DX 10 games, since it seems like the 8800 and Crysis are made for each other.
 
No matter what, it still beats the heck out of the Radoen 9600 I had on the PowerMac I'm replacing with this MBP. And I used that for Motion and Cinema 4D without hiccups, at a higher resolution :)
 
Wolfpup said:
It's just too chopped down, and is completely pointless when you can get an 8800GTS for slightly more. I don't think the 8600 is a complete failure though, as it does at least completely beaet out the 7600 it's officially replacing, and adds DX10. It's not too different in performance from a 7900GS, really.

Though I do wonder if it will even be that useful for DX 10 games, since it seems like the 8800 and Crysis are made for each other.
Click to expand...
It's the ROP's man. It's the ROP's. I bet if you overclock the bejesus out to the G84M it would freaking scream.

chrleon said:
No matter what, it still beats the heck out of the Radoen 9600 I had on the PowerMac I'm replacing with this MBP. And I used that for Motion and Cinema 4D without hiccups, at a higher resolution :)
Click to expand...
True, true.
 
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