How good (or bad) is integrated/onboard video?

[jcarle]

I don't know how many dozens of computer's I've seen have such problems running even the most basic of flash animations with on-board video. I've upgraded so many of my client's computers from on-board video and every single one of them have noticed the improvements. Generally, it translates to a smoother windows experiences. Smoother scrolling in webpages, no jittering in flash and generally making the computer feel "lighter".

I never said anything about buying a 8800 GTX instead of on-board, I usually sell them an nVidia FX5200 for no more then $40 CAD.

[bonestonne]

i use a geforce fx5200

i got it because i realized eventually i would need a form of graphics acceleration. and since its DVI, i'll have the ability to continue using it for a while longer. i would still rather have onboard for troubleshooting hardware problems. its just a personal preference, no one really has to agree.

[puntoMX]

The onboard nVidia 6100/6150 chipsets I use blow away any 5200, clear and simple.

M2NPV-VM and M2NPV-MX are nice motherboards.

In 128bit mode they have 2.1GB/s RAM throughput with 667MHz DDR2, almost 2.6GB/s with 800MHz DDR2. This is why they don’t perform that bad with games. NFSU2 will run fairly well at 1024*768 with almost all settings on high, F.E.A.R will only run at 640*480 medium setting but no one will be surprised about that .

[awergh]

onboard is okish sometimes. for example an intel onboard with 64MB RAM is better than an Nvidia TNT2 M64 32MB at playing ut2004

[jcarle]

onboard is okish sometimes. for example an intel onboard with 64MB RAM is better than an Nvidia TNT2 M64 32MB at playing ut2004

You're comparing modern day technology with technology from ages ago. Of course it's the case. If I compare a Celeron D to a PII of couse the Celeron wins.

Even the god awful ATI Radeon X300 beats out the Intel GMA 900 by a landslide: http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1617355,00.asp

[CoffeeFiend]

You're comparing modern day technology with technology from ages ago.

I believe this is what you're doing too. Comparing yesterday's embedded video to today's video cards. If someone had some ancient and poorly performing onboard video and used 64Mb out of the 128MB system memory for the video card, on a lowly P3 system running XP and all kinds of spyware, and using a bad version of the drivers, then yeah, performance would suck like you claim, and putting a dedicated video card would indeed give a noticeable boost in performance.

But modern video chipsets - just like the intel one you diss - are actually overkill for most non-gaming use, and perform very, very well for their intended use (and just fine for some older games). Most of the time a pre-radeon PCI video card would suffice (like a Rage XL 8MB), and all embedded chipsets are definitely faster than that.

I've seen hundreds of PCs and laptops running such embedded video chipsets, and NONE of them had the kind of problems you've mentioned - not even once. Performance is the same as most video cards installed in most of the other PCs (like GeForce 4 MX440's). Web pages with flash, movies, powerpoint, you name it, runs perfectly fine. Dedicated video cards wouldn't really affect the performance much if at all, but it would certainly cost money.

[E-66]

It seems the opinions are divided right down the middle here. I'll just keep reading as more replies get posted. I think if the motherboard I decide to get happens to have onboard video I'll just opt for that initially and see how it goes rather than getting an additional card right from the get-go.

[jcarle]

It can be hard to judge how little is good enough since a lot is subjective to personal tastes. It's like the speed of the internet. I'm on 10Mbit cable, for me anything slower is abysmal, yet some people have are quite happy with 600Kbps cable, or uncomprehensibly, with dial-up 56Kbps.

I guess in the end it all comes down to what minimum is good for you.

[CoffeeFiend]

I think if the motherboard I decide to get happens to have onboard video I'll just opt for that initially and see how it goes rather than getting an additional card right from the get-go.

I might have argued that embedded video performance is good enough for most uses, but I certainly didn't recommend getting one either.

There are many reasons to buy a dedicated video card, even if onboard video performs good enough for most office work and such: you may one day want to run Vista w/ Aero Glass (you may not want or need Vista right now, but you might change your mind eventually). Or use nice apps which uses WPF (that's the main reason for me to buy a card). Or you might want to play the occasional new-ish game. And even if it's not the case, if you're going to tie a significant part of your RAM for video memory (not necessarily the case though), then a dedicated video card just might be cheaper. Having your video card use 256MB of a 1GB DDR2 kit that costs like 200$ with tax is not a very good idea, when a basic card with 256MB of RAM can be had for around 50$ anyways, leaving more memory to your system, and having better 3D performance to boot. It's about future-proofing your system to some extent.

[puntoMX]

This is why I gave an example of 2 motherboards with good onboard VGA and the option to use a PCI-E 16x slot. It will run Vistas Aero Glass fine although I wonder how much people use the Aero Glass feature when they know it will use more RAM and CPU performance as well. Even in Windows XP most people have disabled, if they know how, the theme service as well.

If you want a better video card then a 6150, then don’t look at the 6200/6500 but you have to jump to a 7300GT/GS or better even go directly for a 7600GT and up, and then I’m talking indeed about the direct X 9c games.

[jcarle]

Even in Windows XP most people have disabled, if they know how, the theme service as well.

That's a bit of a bold statement. I personally have never disabled themes, and I have never known anyone else who did. I think the percentage of people that disable themes is very low, hence the popularity of such things as the Royale theme or other custom visual themes.

[puntoMX]

Okay, I wasn’t 100% clear on that.

I was talking about the serious users that know how to and the die-hard performance tweakers over here .

"and I have never known anyone else who did." -- Now you know one, and look around on the forums, tons of people who do it (keep out of the nLite/vLite section (joking)).

[E-66]

I don't know if I have themes "disabled," but I use the Classic Desktop and Start Menu. I use "show windows contents while dragging," but other than that I have everything else shut off, like the menu shadow/sliding/fading. I just find all of that stuff annoying. No screen saver either, just "Blank" after however many minutes I have it set to.

[bonestonne]

onboard vs. card is just preferance, it always will be. i like having a graphics card, because i can take it out when i have a problem with it, and i can put it in without much trouble when i want to use it. just today i got two pairs of little ram heatsinks for about $1 a piece, and i put one on the card, not because i think it gets hot, but because i want it to last me. i don't need high end cards, in some respects, i don't see why anyone really does, but there are gamers who say so, and im not going to argue it. i don't play many games...what i have suits me, in some respects, it goes the same with everyone, what you have suits you. its just what you want, not whats exactly better in any way.

[newsposter]

Ok guys.....

Onboard video chips have direct access to the cpu data lines, memory, and all that. That data transfer runs at the full, native speed of the chipsets. Additionally, the video chipsets are often integrated directly into the north/south bridge chips taking the GPU that much closer, logically and electrically, to the CPU and OS.

Even the fastest PCIe/PCIx video cards will be getting their data through buffered motherboard connections/card slots. These are at least two, and more often three electrical jumps from the north/southbridge chips through which the CPU and OS communicate. Lots of potential for wait-state there.

So assuming that the integrated video chipsets are capable of competetive rendering and frame rates, and the most recent ones are, there is no reason to aussume that on-board video will be slower than add-on cards. There is a lot of potential there for on-board video to be faster than add-on cards.