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MacBook Graphics

guitarmaster18

guitarmaster18

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 27, 2007
158
0
Do you think that the macbook graphics card will be upgraded soon? As in, is apple going to release a patch where you can choose how much memory the GMA uses out of your system memory? I know that it is capable of 224 MB, and that would be a fairly fast graphics processor, if you have enough ram (I have 2gb). So, if apple does not have a patch, then wouldent it be easy to run a command in single user mode or in terminal to set the ram limit that the macbook uses?

Thanks
 
Could somene explain to me where I would notice the difference by increasing the video memory from 64 megs on a 13" MacBook?

I presume it would give me more colours. Would it increase the resolution? Would I need to connect an external monitor to see the difference? Would its benefit be primarily for gaming?

Thanks.
 
skunk said:
Could you explain how you intend to do this? :confused:
Click to expand...

Exactly, that is my question. How would you do it? And, if you did do it somehow, then it would make games run faster, and be able to load it's memory with more photos, etc. Just better overall performance.

But, I am desperate. How would you make it recognize more RAM???
 
guitarmaster18 said:
Exactly, that is my question. How would you do it? And, if you did do it somehow, then it would make games run faster, and be able to load it's memory with more photos, etc. Just better overall performance.

But, I am desperate. How would you make it recognize more RAM???
Click to expand...

use windows. seriously. its a driver issue afaik for OS X. its dynamically allocated under Windows though.
 
Apple would probably keep it capped so there's no crossover with the MBP as far as graphics memory. Just a guess though.

Does the 64mb limit mean that Apple is "crippling" the integrated graphics?
 
skunk said:
Could you explain how you intend to do this? :confused:
Click to expand...

I'm simply responding to guitarmaster18's original post which asks when Apple will remove the limit of 64 megs on the GMA 950. There have been many such posts on this forum.

I'm simply asking what actual benefits I would see if Apple chose to do this before weighing in on the discussion of "when will this happen?" or why hasn't Apple done this already?"

I hope that provides some clarification.
 
guitarmaster18 said:
Would it really make a difference if the GPU had more memory?
Click to expand...
Yes. The GMA950, while not a beast, isn't nearly as bad as many of these forums would have you believe. There would be a noticeable improvement doubling the memory to 128MB, and further gains when increased even more.
 
There is no point in putting a better GPU in a MacBook. The MacBook is an "entry level" notebook. It is a consumer Mac not a Pro machine. If they put a better GPU in the MacBook people would just by the MBP instead. They want to make money off of all their products not just the one. And might i add that the MacBook took over for the iBook which was also a consumer Mac. And the PowerBook was also considered a "pro" machine.
 
aaron.lee2006 said:
There is no point in putting a better GPU in a MacBook. The MacBook is an "entry level" notebook. It is a consumer Mac not a Pro machine. If they put a better GPU in the MacBook people would just by the MBP instead. They want to make money off of all their products not just the one. And might i add that the MacBook took over for the iBook which was also a consumer Mac. And the PowerBook was also considered a "pro" machine.
Click to expand...
No one said anything about upgrading the GPU. The thread is in regards to the artificial cap on the amount of memory the GMA950 can allocate to itself.
 
guitarmaster18 said:
Do you think that the macbook graphics card will be upgraded soon? As in, is apple going to release a patch where you can choose how much memory the GMA uses out of your system memory? I know that it is capable of 224 MB, and that would be a fairly fast graphics processor, if you have enough ram (I have 2gb). So, if apple does not have a patch, then wouldent it be easy to run a command in single user mode or in terminal to set the ram limit that the macbook uses?
Click to expand...

Not that one again. :eek:
 
guitarmaster18 said:
Would it really make a difference if the GPU had more memory?
Click to expand...

The integrated graphics in the MacBook doesn't have any memory. It uses the same memory that the CPU uses. 64 MB of that memory is reserved for graphics, but the OS can use more memory for it any time it wishes. Reserving more memory for graphics doesn't give any improvement.

That is different from a dedicated graphics card that usually has some extremely fast memory on the card with ridiculous amounts of bandwidth; having 256 MB of ridiculously fast extra memory instead of 64 MB surely helps. Reserving more of good old RAM for graphics doesn't help. Not at all.
 
If you're into games/heavily visual stuff like image/video editing, and that's what you intend on primarily using it for, it's a no-no. It'll handle Core Animation, and for those of us that don't care about gaming or heavy video editing, it's fab.
 
Bill Gates said:
No one said anything about upgrading the GPU. The thread is in regards to the artificial cap on the amount of memory the GMA950 can allocate to itself.
Click to expand...

All I saw was "Will the MacBook GPU be upgraded" I didn't read the rest, I thought it was another one of those threads that we've heard over and over again :p
 
gma950

will intel gma950 will work fine with leopard ?

and all the new things?

[not like vista who had to change almost all of my hardware///]
 
I'm Praying that apple will take the artificial cap off the GMA and put in a feature where you get to choose how much graphics memory the MacBook is using... Ps. I use my macbook for like photoshop and aperture, and those run really fast (I have a blackbook with 2 GB of ram), and even when I try to play halo on my 23" cinema it plays pretty well (I have to turn the resolution down). Do you think that the artificial cap will be lifted when leopard comes out? That's what I think...
 
aaron.lee2006 said:
There is no point in putting a better GPU in a MacBook. The MacBook is an "entry level" notebook. It is a consumer Mac not a Pro machine. If they put a better GPU in the MacBook people would just by the MBP instead. They want to make money off of all their products not just the one. And might i add that the MacBook took over for the iBook which was also a consumer Mac. And the PowerBook was also considered a "pro" machine.
Click to expand...

A) If the Macbook is an "entry-level" notebook then why does it have 1.8/2Ghz C2Ds? These aren't needed by the average consumer and are overkill for surfing the net, listening to music, typing an email etc.

If it was an entry level notebook it would have Mini specs. Unless you consider the Mini less than entry level.

B) Having a GPU does not make a laptop a "pro" machine.

C) The iBook had a dedicated GPU.
 
Manic Mouse said:
A) If the Macbook is an "entry-level" notebook then why does it have 1.8/2Ghz C2Ds? These aren't needed by the average consumer and are overkill for surfing the net, listening to music, typing an email etc.

If it was an entry level notebook it would have Mini specs. Unless you consider the Mini less than entry level.

B) Having a GPU does not make a laptop a "pro" machine.

C) The iBook had a dedicated GPU.
Click to expand...

Agreed, although the iBook had a GPU that was not as fast as the GMA in the macbook...
 
lenso said:
will intel gma950 will work fine with leopard ?

and all the new things?

[not like vista who had to change almost all of my hardware///]
Click to expand...
Can you imagine the bad press Apple would receive if it didn't? They've openly stated that OS X works on machines they made seven years ago - don't think it'd look all that good if their latest and greatest couldn't sit comfortably on hardware they're shipping a mere six months from the proposed launch.
 
guitarmaster18 said:
Agreed, although the iBook had a GPU that was not as fast as the GMA in the macbook...
Click to expand...

But it was far better than the integrated graphics at the time. Apple even lambasted the use of integrated graphics, saying they steal CPU cycles and system RAM.
 
macjay said:
Apple would probably keep it capped so there's no crossover with the MBP as far as graphics memory. Just a guess though.

Does the 64mb limit mean that Apple is "crippling" the integrated graphics?
Click to expand...

"Crippling"? I believe Intel took care of that when they made the 950. It's simply not a workhorse GPU. To try to coax high performance out of it is unrealistic. As I see it, the issue is not a memory one, but a horsepower one. Try loading up the windows version of Age of Empires III and you will see what I am talking about. Even with the dynamic memory allocation it will grind to a halt as soon as you start a sea battle because it cannot handle rendering the smoke and the water at the same time. This is with 1.25 GB of RAM on a blackbook. The real killer is that Asus put out a product called the XG Station that specifically addresses this issue. It's an external graphics card that connects via an ExpressCard. This immediately excludes the Macbook users who are interested in higher performance. The bottom line is that Apple needs to put out a sub-15" pro model with a serious graphics chipset. That would fill the gap nicely for people who want size and performance.

fr0
 
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