Intel's Sandy Bridge architecture to feature up to 2 GPUs on 1 monolithic die

[Clairvoyant129]

lolz
GMA 4500 x 2?
oh..it is going to be VERY powerful
can play CoD at 1024*768 at med setting???

You guys are pathetic arguing about IGP performance. Are you so proud of your beloved dear company? That must be the only good thing about your AMD PC huh? Your IGP.

You guys are really pathetic, I thought this was Xtremesystems.

Anyways back on topic, I think it's a bit strange for Intel to make this move. For office and general use, a single IGP from any company is fine.

[OutSider]

what you expect to discuss in that topic global warming?

[MrMojoZ]

That's why you're not making Billions of dollars and Intel IS. May be they just studied slightly harder and barely edged ahead of you and figured it out. Let's wait and see.

If this was true why haven't they already done so? Intel doesn't need to make good graphic hardware in order to sell their IGPs, so they don't. They aren't going to beat Nvidia or ATI in multi gpu scaling with their current mindset.

[god_43]

You guys are pathetic arguing about IGP performance. Are you so proud of your beloved dear company? That must be the only good thing about your AMD PC huh? Your IGP.

You guys are really pathetic, I thought this was Xtreme systems.

Anyways back on topic, I think it's a bit strange for Intel to make this move. For office and general use, a single IGP from any company is fine.

you are right, this is extreme systems, and we are discussing intel's "xtreme graphics"......lol, and do you really think that current intel igp's will be able to handle web 3.0+?

but the main thing is fanboys are arguing....any chance they can get to bash the other guy; they will take it. akuna-mattata man, circle of life!

[Otis11]

If this was true why haven't they already done so? Intel doesn't need to make good graphic hardware in order to sell their IGPs, so they don't. They aren't going to beat Nvidia or ATI in multi gpu scaling with their current mindset.

Be careful there, just cuz they haven't yet doesn't mean they aren't working on it...

Larrabee may be dead for the moment, but i suspectyou'll be seeing some decent graphics from Intel yet...

[Chumbucket843]

Anyways back on topic, I think it's a bit strange for Intel to make this move. For office and general use, a single IGP from any company is fine.

what i find stranger that no one here has noticed is that a quadcore will have an igp. this sounds like a bottleneck to me. the goal of igp's are to display windows and save money but it doesnt belong on a high end chip.

my speculation is that they have two gpu's on die so at idle they can turn one off for better idle power.

[verndewd]

i think that it is probably 2 reasons for this:

1. to better compete with llano, i do not think that anyone here can argue that intel is better at graphics than ati.

2. these two gpus have some sort of special function.

Maybe it takes 2 to deliver what one amd can deliver. I am up for it , id love to see it. but its not sli its not xfire could we come up with a pet name for Intels uber 2gfx setup?
how about bridged video graphics Beegee's for short

[verndewd]

Be careful there, just cuz they haven't yet doesn't mean they aren't working on it...

Larrabee may be dead for the moment, but i suspectyou'll be seeing some decent graphics from Intel yet...

Larrabee was only dead ended in discrete segments , and we know not why. Intel made massive investments in gfx and after the AMD/sec/ftc fallout was able to look at ATI patents. Could be that they have an ondie solution but how much of the slower sys ram is it going to eat?

[Salvador]

I can't, for the love of god, see why anyone wants to argue on IGP's. Who cares if an IGP manages 10 more FPS when it still can't reach playable framerates

As long as an IGP works in browsing, playing HD stuff then that is enough!! You wont game on it Perhaps in the future, but not now when you get 30 fps in 800x600 at very low settings. Thats just wrong.

Looking very much forward to Sandy Bridge, tho

[bfar]

Wild speculation:

One GPU will be an Intel GMA GPU, the other an Nvida GPU. Optimus switching technology will determine which gpu will be in use - providing both CPU and GPU performance and powersaving in one single package. Intel and Nvidia will laugh all the way to the bank.

[zalbard]

Wild speculation:

One GPU will be an Intel GMA GPU, the other an Nvida GPU. Optimus switching technology will determine which gpu will be in use - providing both CPU and GPU performance and powersaving in one single package. Intel and Nvidia will laugh all the way to the bank.

LOL, what?

[I_no]

Wild speculation:

One GPU will be an Intel GMA GPU, the other an Nvida GPU. Optimus switching technology will determine which gpu will be in use - providing both CPU and GPU performance and powersaving in one single package. Intel and Nvidia will laugh all the way to the bank.

[terrace215]

Anyways back on topic, I think it's a bit strange for Intel to make this move. For office and general use, a single IGP from any company is fine.

"2 graphics cores" != 2 IGPs.

In the same way that a dual-core CPU is not "2 CPUs", but even more so, given the parallel nature of virtually all GPU workloads.

Fuad got a little piece of information, and then got confused.

There is one IGP. It can have 1 or 2 cores, depending on the model. That's like saying... 16 or 32 shaders, for example.

Addressing another poster, this is not the "high end part". QC is the mainstream part. IIRC, there's an 8-core part with no IGP for the high-end.

[Monkeywoman]

all new socket too, suckes they are ditching lga1156 so soon.

side note, bulldozer is supposed to compete with sandy riight?

[generics_user]

all new socket too, suckes they are ditching lga1156 so soon.

side note, bulldozer is supposed to compete with sandy riight?

llano will compete with IGP sandy bridge models in the low-mid range and bulldozer will take the high-end

IMO Llano will be the first IGP REALLY capable of playing Games as it's supposed to have more shader cored than HD 56xx

[Monkeywoman]

IMO Llano will be the first IGP REALLY capable of playing Games as it's supposed to have more shader cored than HD 56xx

Thats what im talking about, im waiting for via nano3000 for my first netbook, llano will be nice for my first lappy

[ajaidev]

This is what i wrote some weeks ago:

Amm Intel did delay Sandy bridge and they did it to try and implement something which SB does not have and BD does. Tough the implementation is very hard to accomplish i have been told 3-4 teams are working on it right now, one may call it the v1.1 the v1.0 of SB is all ready for the fight....

If the v1.1 works out it will get relesed in stead of the v1.0 otherwise v1.0 will be used, in tis case IB will come sooner than later.

What FUD says is very partially true either they did not understand or they are diluting the info.

[Hornet331]

llano will compete with IGP sandy bridge models in the low-mid range and bulldozer will take the high-end

IMO Llano will be the first IGP REALLY capable of playing Games as it's supposed to have more shader cored than HD 56xx

Shaders is the least i care for, its the memory, especial the available bandwidth that concerns me.

A HD5670 has x2,5 more bandwidth available and even a HD5570 has more bandwidth than DDR3-1600 allowes. Plus all those GPU bandwidths are not shared with the CPU.

[zalbard]

SB will be still pretty far behind GPU wise IMO, unless Inte's really doing a huge breakthrough there.

[SocketMan]

Dual GMA 4500.

in "FUDFIRE"

[informal]

Fud "reports" intel told select few partners that top bin SB dual core model should end up around 20% faster than today's top bin Arrandale/Clarkdale dual core chip.We know that Arrandales do have subpar memory perfromance when compared to even 45nm Nehalem's(Bloom and Lynfields,due to the way IMC is redesigned and moved over to other die) and we know intel will additionally tweak the Turbo boost on SB cores,presumably one or two more speed bins over Westmere generation. All in all,not that impressive,but it is not that bad either. I would like to know exactly how much of these 20% is IPC and how much his the difference in clock(due to different Turbo modes supported by SB cores).

[saaya]

significantly improved performance? huh? in what?
i guess this refers to avx? or the igp?

Wild speculation:

One GPU will be an Intel GMA GPU, the other an Nvida GPU. Optimus switching technology will determine which gpu will be in use - providing both CPU and GPU performance and powersaving in one single package. Intel and Nvidia will laugh all the way to the bank.

interesting idea, but i dont think so...
its probably an imagination technology igp plus a gma igp...
the imagination technology thing will be 2d, and gma will do video and games... i guess...

that one makes the most sense at least, cause intel has been using imagination technology ip for a while, and they seem to have completely given up on getting their gma stuff to low power, instead they rely on imagination for low power and focus on performance with gma

[ajaidev]

Fud cracks me up, the low down is that SB has some enhancements and a better voltage control sub system this allows better and cooler* operation for the cores and reduces the heat generated due to lower energy consumption "This is partly due to a better 32nm process".

This allows the speed to be increased within the same power envelope, thus for the same consumption you get better performance. Ohh ya you all remember the word "Dual Turbo"

[zalbard]

significantly improved performance? huh? in what?
i guess this refers to avx? or the igp?

Doubt that's IGP.
Probably compared to Lynnfield. Should be faster at least due to much higher clocks.

[Vozer]

SNB still haven't appeared on Intel's latest roadmap yet.