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Why is HD4000 not good enough on 2012 mini?

barkmonster said:
The tax of having to use Windows is too much for some people to get a PC instead. They literally don't hate themselves enough to do it :D
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There is that, though I think that "tax" was more apparent pre-Windows 7. I've had a cheap W7 PC laptop for 2 years, so far without major issue. OTOH, I'll still do most of my serious work in Mac OS X, with VG reason. ;)

If I find that I'm not using the new gaming PC as much as I thought I would, well, when I've more time on my hands I can always try turning it into a Hackintosh. :) We'll see.
 
GPUFreak said:
8800 GT is faster than integrated graphics
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That was not the question I was answering nor did I say that HD 4000 is faster than 8800 GT.

"
Originally Posted by propower
A little slower filter application in photoshop?


Is that the case? I have a Mac Pro 1,1 with the GeForce 8800 GT...would the new Mini be faster or slower than what I already have?"
 
FCPx - Radeon is faster :(

OK some FCPx test comparing my mini with the hd 6630m card, 2.7 Ghz to my MBA, hd4000 card with FCPx.

Mini is using a SSD too main drive, but footage on a thunderbolt drive but not super fast 130Mbps.

In a lot of tests with color effects the mini is 100% quicker - a 1min render ob Air takes 30s on Mini. Some it is the same so weird, depends on the effect but most times the mini is quicker. Ok so the processor is about 50% faster on the mini but I think the card is being used more by FCPx than with FCPx and the HD4000. Informal tests and my MBA is no slouch, i& 2GHz and the SSD on the Air is about 3x the speed of my Thunderblot HD.

Disappointing as I was hoping to get a quad core I7 mini with HD4000 someday.

Of course just doing everything in Proxy will help speed up both machines and just switch back to full quality at the end of the edit.
 
Magrathea said:
Disappointing as I was hoping to get a quad core I7 mini with HD4000 someday.
Click to expand...
By the way you put it, it might seem as if the i7 mini with HD4000 was the only available thing for a loooong time to come.

You should wait for the new one with the HD5000 and then we check benchmarks first to see if at least it overpasses the 6630m.
 
gregorsamsa said:
Considering the Mini with HD 6630M was released in 2011, I think it'd be a major disappointment for many people if the next Mini's graphics couldn't at least beat the 6630M by some margin. :rolleyes:
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I'm pretty sure it will, but it needs to be understood that it has been a long way for an integrated graphics solution (in-the-CPU-die one) to become relevant somehow.. (years ago, an integrated graphics solution was only meant to get the OS running hahah let alone trying to play anything "intensive").
 
Do you guys recommend upgrading to haswell when the next mini comes out ?

I have the latest base model with 16gb ram & apple care

If I do upgrade it will be to the base model of haswell

So I would have to sell this mini first , how big of an upgrade will haswell be over hd4000 ? In terms of the cheapest base model
 
Che Castro said:
Do you guys recommend upgrading to haswell when the next mini comes out ?

I have the latest base model with 16gb ram & apple care

If I do upgrade it will be to the base model of haswell

So I would have to sell this mini first , how big of an upgrade will haswell be over hd4000 ? In terms of the cheapest base model
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If Haswell lives up to the hype then, yes, I'd also upgrade. But that remains to be seen. :rolleyes: This article claims Haswell to be on par with the GT 650M. For integrated graphics, that's impressive:

http://www.techspot.com/news/51307-...graphics-are-on-par-with-geforce-gt-650m.html

For a better perspective, the GT 650M scores a decent 1,307 on the high-end videocard benchmarks:

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html
 
mac mini

I bough a mac mini i7 version with 4000 graphics. replacing 2009 macbook pro core 2 duo etc. been playing X3 TC on both. graphics works fine on mac mini at highest default setting even with loads of pirates on screen and lots of fogging in sector etc. so no probs. the macbook wouldn't display at all in highest video setting and only stuttered alone at 1024*840 with a load of prates on screen. so no competition there I think. I am well please with the difference. even with a higher resolution display.
 
At this time in my working domain (video), the major issue with such integrated GPU is not so a matter of performance but already a simple support. DaVinci Resolve, Smoke or any CUDA/OpenCL application are not even simply supported, both in Windows (as I know) or OS X.

Intel release HD4000 Driver (april 2013) that theoricaly enable OpenCL support, but for now it could be frustrating to just cannot simply open a software because of this, as a 2010 Mini can do it !

BTW, I do the entire editing and grading of a 2K 10bit movie (1h30 of fiction)... on a MBP13 with an HD3000, in FCPX and Premiere Pro, with external display/mouse/keyboard/storage all wired on the closed laptop.

It works like a charms ! Beside encoding/compositing performance, the only difference I see with a dedicated GPU is on OS X windows management (not exactly laggy, but not so fluid and soft when you go on fullscreen, alt+tab etc).
 
Last edited:
Every time I see this topic floating the top recent Mini topic list, I want to edit the title:
Why is HD4000 good enough on 2012 mini?
 
propower said:
For me,

Some light photo and video editing, a ton of pro audio work and general web stuff -- maybe a movie

So for the last 10 years, every graphics card I have used (mostly lowly) have been 100% up to the task. HD4000 seems perfectly capable of delivering again... plus triple monitor support if I need it (I I always have at least two mirrored ones)

So... help me understand... I see SO much complaining about this... What is the negative impact to "YOU" of HD4000 graphics. What exactly will be the cost? A little slower screen redraws? A little slower filter application in photoshop? ... Some monitors not work at all? Is it just all about games??
Click to expand...

my HD4000 has been completely up to my tasks, I've even been doing Portal 2 on 1 monitor and Netlfix on the other, and sometimes I do a little bit of FC X/7 (I have both) while watching movies on the other, it's actually pretty decent. For integrated Graphics, it actually has really good performance, which I can see the problem of not being upgradeable, People underestimate it. I get between 55 and 60 FPS on Minecraft on Fancy Graphics and Far render distance without optifine, which is saying something because MC is optimized like ****. Even recording, the Mac mini is a mini beast!
 
Sorry to bring up an old thread but I have a mid 2011 i5 2.5 with the 6630m. I'm a web developer and run 2 27" apple displays from it. Sometimes it struggles to cope if I have Plex or VLC running playing a video and am doing other things such as surfing the web etc. I'm hoping that the 2012 i7 Server I just ordered will cope better or would I be sorely mistaken? It'll have an SSD and 16GB RAM.

Apple being Apple I'd bet the drivers for the HD4000 have been updated more?
 
SamPotts said:
Sorry to bring up an old thread but I have a mid 2011 i5 2.5 with the 6630m. I'm a web developer and run 2 27" apple displays from it. Sometimes it struggles to cope if I have Plex or VLC running playing a video and am doing other things such as surfing the web etc. I'm hoping that the 2012 i7 Server I just ordered will cope better or would I be sorely mistaken? It'll have an SSD and 16GB RAM.

Apple being Apple I'd bet the drivers for the HD4000 have been updated more?
Click to expand...

I have the 2.3 ghz i7 Server with 16GB of RAM with HD4000 and it plays HD videos just fine with other apps open. I boot off a Samsung 830 SSD, but my movies play just fine running off the HD that came with it.
 
Should be ok. Folk forget the card uses your memory so 16Gb you should get the card to have 1Gb of ram, this will help. FCPx wise my editing rig is a dual not quad core i7 Mini with 16gb of ram and SSD. I have the now removed option of the 6640 AMD card and it works fine even with a 1000 clip project! I did notice that with FCPx my card was better than a new mini, quad core with the HD4000.
 
Cool, thanks for the replies.

I've just got it setup and it does feel quicker. I noticed that the HD4000 has 1GB of VRAM which must help somewhat. It certainly lags much less than the 2011 i5 2.5/6630 it replaced and should last a bit longer. Voided the warranty already and fitted an SSD.
 
SSD and 16 gigs of ram are the way to go on the mini. Tunderbolt HD or USB3 an you'll be able to edit large projects in FCPx 10.1.1.

Not sure that TB is worth the investment though so get USB3 drivers for video. You gotta add the $100 per enclosure and then the cable per drive! OUCH! But on my mini I have USb2 so this is a reason to go with the new mini and they'll be announcing a new mini end of feb the crystal ball gazers tell us! Oh well.

Unless you want to edit 4K video or do big renders and special effects the mini should be just fine.
 
For an entry-level Mac I think the HD 4000 graphics is fine, as for browsing and office type apps it's more than enough, and can handle light gaming just fine. Yes it may be a step down from discrete graphics, but for a Mac Mini eliminating an extra chip and thus extra source of power consumption, heat and cost, is the better proposition as while the performance may be less, it's certainly good enough.

Iris graphics should be a big step up though, in fact I'm expecting it'll give my GeForce 8800 GT a run for its money, at which point the Mac Mini will be a perfect replacement for 2008 Mac Pro in that it should still be an upgrade in many respects, even if it doesn't offer tons more raw power; after all what I have now is about enough for my needs, so smaller, quieter and more energy efficient are huge bonuses, plus faster I/O and memory can't go amiss either.

Iris Pro would be even better, and Broadwell graphics could be an even bigger leap. But as far as intended users the HD4000 is already plenty, it's just that more is usually better, especially with more and more 3d graphics coming to the web, higher resolution screens on the way, and more apps looking to take advantage of OpenCL. In fact the latter is especially cool as it makes the Mac Mini potentially a very solid "dual processor" machine!
 
propower said:
For me,

Some light photo and video editing, a ton of pro audio work and general web stuff -- maybe a movie

So for the last 10 years, every graphics card I have used (mostly lowly) have been 100% up to the task. HD4000 seems perfectly capable of delivering again... plus triple monitor support if I need it (I I always have at least two mirrored ones)

So... help me understand... I see SO much complaining about this... What is the negative impact to "YOU" of HD4000 graphics. What exactly will be the cost? A little slower screen redraws? A little slower filter application in photoshop? ... Some monitors not work at all? Is it just all about games??
Click to expand...

In a word, games. I have a 2012 mini and I use it as my main desktop doing everything from Photoshop to VMware and it's very good. It's a very good machine for Photoshop and all my other daily tasks. I wouldn't use it for games however, I use a separate PC for that.

Look at the benchmark results for the HD4000 and a recent high-end graphics card GTX 780 and you'll see what I mean. It's also worth comparing these to the GTX 780M (don't for get the M part) as this is the GPU used in the current high-end iMac. The HD4000 is pretty slow for gaming.
 
Poki said:
It would be possible, but it would make the Mini at least 200 bucks more expensive (100 more for a 35W quad-core CPU like the i7-3632qm and 100 for the graphics card).
Click to expand...

It would be nice to have the choice though at the minute there are no GPU options for the mini.
 
2 x 27'' external display with Matrox display extender. Possible?

Hi there,

Anybody here who can provide some experience with this setup a friend of me would like to build very soon:

Mini 2012 + 2 x 27'' external monitor (DVI, 1920 x 1080, 60hz)
+ Matrox dual display extender
http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/products/gxm/dh2go/digital_me/

Monitor: 2 x LG 27EA33V or similar

Use: 1 large extended display for music software e.g. Logic, Cubase, ...
(No games, No movies, No internet, No flashing fastmoving visual stuff)

Intel HD Graphics 4000 can handle this without issues or burning up?

Intel & Matrox website say it should be possible, but we're no computer experts so we trust more on comments and experience from other users rather than commercial talking ;-)

Thanks in advance,
Regards,
Ivez
 
Ivez said:
Hi there,

Anybody here who can provide some experience with this setup a friend of me would like to build very soon:

Mini 2012 + 2 x 27'' external monitor (DVI, 1920 x 1080, 60hz)
+ Matrox dual display extender
http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/products/gxm/dh2go/digital_me/

Monitor: 2 x LG 27EA33V or similar

Use: 1 large extended display for music software e.g. Logic, Cubase, ...
(No games, No movies, No internet, No flashing fastmoving visual stuff)

Intel HD Graphics 4000 can handle this without issues or burning up?

Intel & Matrox website say it should be possible, but we're no computer experts so we trust more on comments and experience from other users rather than commercial talking ;-)

Thanks in advance,
Regards,
Ivez
Click to expand...

If you're only running two displays why do you need the Matrox? The Mini can support two monitors at those resolutions natively....you'll just need an HDMI to DVI adapter and a mini-Displayport to DVI adapter - one of which is included with the mini (can't recall which at the moment and I'm not home to check)
 
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