Maxwell and Kepler and…Fermi?

NVIDIA is launching a complete new line of mobility GPUs, some based on Maxwell, some on Kepler, with a new feature called Battery Boost.

Covering the landscape of mobile GPUs can be a harrowing experience.  Brands, specifications, performance, features and architectures can all vary from product to product, even inside the same family.  Rebranding is rampant from both AMD and NVIDIA and, in general, we are met with one of the most confusing segments of the PC hardware market.  

Today, with the release of the GeForce GTX 800M series from NVIDIA, we are getting all of the above in one form or another. We will also see performance improvements and the introduction of the new Maxwell architecture (in a few parts at least).  Along with the GeForce GTX 800M parts, you will also find the GeForce 840M, 830M and 820M offerings at lower performance, wattage and price levels.

 

With some new hardware comes a collection of new software for mobile users, including the innovative Battery Boost that can increase unplugged gaming time by using frame rate limiting and other "magic" bits that NVIDIA isn't talking about yet.  ShadowPlay and GameStream also find their way to mobile GeForce users as well.

Let's take a quick look at the new hardware specifications.

  GTX 880M GTX 780M GTX 870M GTX 770M
GPU Code name Kepler Kepler Kepler Kepler
GPU Cores 1536 1536 1344 960
Rated Clock 954 MHz 823 MHz 941 MHz 811 MHz
Memory Up to 4GB Up to 4GB Up to 3GB Up to 3GB
Memory Clock 5000 MHz 5000 MHz 5000 MHz 4000 MHz
Memory Interface 256-bit 256-bit 192-bit 192-bit
Features Battery Boost
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE
Battery Boost
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE

Both the GTX 880M and the GTX 870M are based on Kepler, keeping the same basic feature set and hardware specifications of their brethren in the GTX 700M line.  However, while the GTX 880M has the same CUDA core count as the 780M, the same cannot be said of the GTX 870M.  Moving from the GTX 770M to the 870M sees a significant 40% increase in core count as well as a jump in clock speed from 811 MHz (plus Boost) to 941 MHz.  

  GTX 860M GTX 760M GTX 850M GTX 750M
GPU Code name Kepler or Maxwell Kepler Maxwell Kepler
GPU Cores 1152 or 640 768 640 384
Rated Clock 797 or 1029 MHz 768 MHz 876 MHz 967 MHz
Memory Up to 2GB Up to 2GB Up to 2GB Up to 2GB
Memory Clock 5000 MHz 4000 MHz 5000 MHz 5000 MHz
Memory Interface 128-bit 128-bit 128-bit 128-bit
Features Battery Boost
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE
Battery Boost
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE
GameStream
ShadowPlay
GFE

Things get a bit more interesting on the GTX 860M and GTX 850M, both of which are based on Maxwell - or at least partially.  What?  The GTX 860M will have options available in both Kepler and Maxwell architectures, resulting in a variable in the marketplace that I think is really unnecessary.  NVIDIA's reasoning for the duplication of products is that "mobile GPUs are marketed on performance" - which is fine, but so are desktop GPUs and we don't really have exact model numbers on the shelf based on two distinct designs.  Performance on the 860M should be close the same with both ASICs but obviously the Maxwell SKU will offer better power efficiency, and thus battery life.  How (and if) notebook vendors differentiate this variation will be very interesting.

Also launching today are the GeForce 840M and GeForce 830M, both based on Maxwell - though no shader counts were given in the press deck....  These are added to the GeForce 820M that continues to be based on Fermi.  Yes, Fermi, the same GPU architecture that was released in September of 2009!  None of these GPUs will support ShadowPlay, GameStream or even Battery Boost, which is a bit of a let down really.

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