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Nvidia is telling the world plus dog that its Optimus graphics switching technology has the potential to transform the mobile graphics market and several vendors seem to agree.
The idea is quite simple, Optimus notebooks can seamlessly switch between integrated graphics and discrete Nvidia graphics, thus allowing for major energy savings in apps that don't require much in terms of graphics.
Laptopmag checked out 13 Optimus notebooks at Nvidia's Computex booth and it appears that quite a few more models were shown off by individual vendors at the show. What's more, notebook makers chose to implement Optimus in a wide variety of designs, ranging from 10-inch netbooks with ION 2 graphics to 15.6-inch models with powerful 3xxM series mobile GPUs and proper gaming credentials. Acer and Asus lead the way, but MSI, Lenovo, Clevo, Gateway and Packar Bell have also unveiled a few Optimus models.
Nvidia's Director of ION/Geforce marketing David Ragones said that several additional vendors will show off Optimus notebooks during the show and it appears that Nvidia has a rather attractive technology on its hands. However, Nvidia still lacks mobile DirectX 11 parts. AMD is currently shipping several DX11 chips, but their introduction has been rather slow.
Of course, few people actually need DirectX 11 support on their notebooks, but the really big advantage doesn't lie in the API, but rather the manufacturing process. DirectX 11 parts are 40nm, while most older DirectX 10 parts still stick to 55nm. Sadly, most mobile discrete parts sold today are still 55nm, which doesn't sound too impressive considering that CPUs have gone 32nm months ago.
More here.
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Graphics
Vendors start to embrace Optimus
Several designs shown off at Computex
Nvidia is telling the world plus dog that its Optimus graphics switching technology has the potential to transform the mobile graphics market and several vendors seem to agree.
The idea is quite simple, Optimus notebooks can seamlessly switch between integrated graphics and discrete Nvidia graphics, thus allowing for major energy savings in apps that don't require much in terms of graphics.
Laptopmag checked out 13 Optimus notebooks at Nvidia's Computex booth and it appears that quite a few more models were shown off by individual vendors at the show. What's more, notebook makers chose to implement Optimus in a wide variety of designs, ranging from 10-inch netbooks with ION 2 graphics to 15.6-inch models with powerful 3xxM series mobile GPUs and proper gaming credentials. Acer and Asus lead the way, but MSI, Lenovo, Clevo, Gateway and Packar Bell have also unveiled a few Optimus models.
Nvidia's Director of ION/Geforce marketing David Ragones said that several additional vendors will show off Optimus notebooks during the show and it appears that Nvidia has a rather attractive technology on its hands. However, Nvidia still lacks mobile DirectX 11 parts. AMD is currently shipping several DX11 chips, but their introduction has been rather slow.
Of course, few people actually need DirectX 11 support on their notebooks, but the really big advantage doesn't lie in the API, but rather the manufacturing process. DirectX 11 parts are 40nm, while most older DirectX 10 parts still stick to 55nm. Sadly, most mobile discrete parts sold today are still 55nm, which doesn't sound too impressive considering that CPUs have gone 32nm months ago.
More here.