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ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2

Because of the high amount of shaders (2x800) the gaming performance of the Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2 is very good and allows the gaming of all DirectX 9 games in high resolutions and details. Even demanding DirectX 10 games of 2008 (i.e., Crysis Warhead and Far Cry 2) can be played with high details. The GPU supports fast GDDR5 graphics RAM, but all laptops as of this writing are built with slower GDDR3 graphics memory (Alienware M17x, Asus).

The 4870 X2 also suffers from micro stuttering most noticeable around 30 fps, similar to all SLI and Crossfire setups. This occurs if both cards are in Alternate Frame Rendering (AFR) Mode since the time delay to display each sequential frame becomes irregular. See our dedicated micro stuttering article here for more information.

The Mobility HD 4870 x2 is based on two RV770 chips and features 2x800 stream processors (2x160 5-dimensional shader cores). These cores do the graphics work of the shader and pixel pipelines of older GPUs. The stream processors are also called ALUs and are grouped in five-way VLIW units. Each of the five instructions of a VLIW bundle has to be independent from the others and the performance therefore depends on the optimization of the driver.

The Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2 includes Avivo HD, an onboard soundchip for 7.1 sound output over HDMI or DisplayPort and the 2nd generation UVD (Unified Video Decoder). UVD 2 supports full bitstream decoding of H.264/MPEG-4 AVC and VC-1 streams, dual video stream decoding and Picture-in Picture mode which makes the UVD full BD-Live compliant. To put simply, the Avivo HD technology handles all video tasks and enables the GPU to decode HD videos.

AMD published a power consumption of about 2x65 Watt for the HD 4870 X2. Still, it is unclear if this value represents the chip alone or the whole MXM board including the memory, which we estimate would add about 2x5 Watts.

Compared to the desktop ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2, the mobile 4870 X2 features a slower core clock and should therefore perform a bit slower than even the desktop HD 4850 X2.

Mobility Radeon HD 4000 Series

Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2 1600 @ 0.55 GHz256 Bit @ 888 MHz
Mobility Radeon HD 4870 compare 800 @ 0.55 GHz256 Bit @ 888 MHz
CodenameM98-XT
ArchitectureTerascale 1
Pipelines1600 - unified
Core Speed550 MHz
Memory Speed888 MHz
Memory Bus Width256 Bit
Memory TypeGDDR3, GDDR5
Max. Amount of Memory2048 MB
Shared Memoryno
APIDirectX 10.1, Shader 4.1
Transistor Count1.9 Billion
technology55 nm
FeaturesOpenGL 2.0, PCI-E 2.0 x16, Powerplay, DisplayPort support up to 2560x1600, HDMI support up to 1920x1080 (both with 7.1 AC3 Audio), 1x Dual-Link/Single-Link DVI, 1x Single-Link DVI Support (all display ports have to be supported by the laptop manufacturer)
Notebook Sizelarge
Date of Announcement09.01.2009
Link to Manufacturer Pageati.amd.com

Benchmarks

3DMark Vantage
3DM Vant. Perf. total +
3DM Vant. Perf. GPU no PhysX +
3DMark 06 3DMark 06 - Standard 1280x1024 +
3DMark 06
min: 12328     avg: 14496     median: 14120 (19%)     max: 17380 Points
Cinebench R10 Cinebench R10 Shading (32bit) +
- Range of benchmark values for this graphics card
- Average benchmark values for this graphics card
* Smaller numbers mean a higher performance

Game Benchmarks

The following benchmarks stem from our benchmarks of review laptops. The performance depends on the used graphics memory, clock rate, processor, system settings, drivers, and operating systems. So the results don't have to be representative for all laptops with this GPU. For detailed information on the benchmark results, click on the fps number.

med. 1024x768
84.2  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
59.6  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings ultra.
Risen

Risen

2009
med. 1024x768
60.2  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
31.6  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings med..
Need for Speed Shift

Need for Speed Shift

2009
med. 1024x768
52  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
25  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings med..
Colin McRae: DIRT 2

Colin McRae: DIRT 2

2009
med. 1024x768
69.7  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
50.4  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings ultra.
Anno 1404

Anno 1404

2009
ultra 1280x1024
89.8  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings ultra.
Sims 3

Sims 3

2009
low 800x600
251.7  fps    + Compare
med. 1024x768
118.6  fps    + Compare
high 1280x1024
77.4  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
F.E.A.R. 2

F.E.A.R. 2

2009
high 1280x1024
105.3  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
92.5  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings ultra.
GTA IV - Grand Theft Auto

GTA IV - Grand Theft Auto

2008
low 800x600
48.6  fps    + Compare
med. 1024x768
32.3  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings low.
Far Cry 2

Far Cry 2

2008
low 640x480
88.7  fps    + Compare
high 1024x768
40.5  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
Racedriver: GRID

Racedriver: GRID

2008
low 800x600
84.6  fps    + Compare
med. 1024x768
56.3  fps    + Compare
high 1280x1024
51.3  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
Call of Duty 4 - Modern Warfare

Call of Duty 4 - Modern Warfare

2007
low 800x600
156.5  fps    + Compare
med. 1024x768
106.2  fps    + Compare
high 1280x1024
99.8  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
Supreme Commander - FA Bench

Supreme Commander - FA Bench

2007
med. 1024x768
52.5  fps    + Compare
high 1024x768
51.4  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
Crysis - GPU Benchmark

Crysis - GPU Benchmark

2007
high 1024x768
52.4  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
26.7  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
Crysis - CPU Benchmark

Crysis - CPU Benchmark

2007
high 1024x768
52.2  fps    + Compare
ultra 1920x1080
25.5  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
lowmed.highultraQHD4K
CoD Modern Warfare 284.259.6
Risen60.231.6
Need for Speed Shift5225
Colin McRae: DIRT 269.750.4
Anno 140489.8
Sims 3251.7118.677.4
F.E.A.R. 2105.392.5
GTA IV - Grand Theft Auto48.5732.27
Far Cry 288.740.5
Racedriver: GRID84.656.351.3
Call of Duty 4 - Modern Warfare156.5106.299.8
Supreme Commander - FA Bench52.551.4
Crysis - GPU Benchmark52.426.7
Crysis - CPU Benchmark52.225.5
< 30 fps
< 60 fps
< 120 fps
≥ 120 fps

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For more games that might be playable and a list of all games and graphics cards visit our Gaming List

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Gaming Benchmarks

The Czech website pctuning.cz have already published an extensive review of the  Asus W90 with a Intel C2D T9600 and 6 GB RAM. The following gaming benchmarks stem from their review.

Test Drive Unlimited: 1920x1080, high: 47-72 fps -> fluently playable
Bioshock: 1920x1080, high: 67-207 (avg. 131) fps -> fluently playable
Call of Duty 5: 1920x1080, extra: 29-92 (avg. 53) fps -> fluently playable
Crysis Warhead: 1920x1080, Mainstream: 13-45 (avg. 32) fps -> fluently playable (single stutters)
Far Cry 2: 1920x1080, ultra: 21-55 (avg. 33) fps -> fluently playable
Flatout Ultimate Carnage: 1920x1080, high: 36-48 (avg. 43) fps -> fluently playable
Race Driver Grid: 1920x1080, high: 34-56 (avg. 43) fps -> fluently playable
Stalker Clear Sky: 1920x1080, Maximum: 16-39 (avg. 28) fps -> playable
Unreal Tournament 3: 1920x1080, max: 32-63 (avg. 51) fps -> fluently playable
World in Conflict: 1920x1080, high: 19-103 (avg 30) -> playable

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Class 3

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> Expert Reviews and News on Laptops, Smartphones and Tech Innovations > Benchmarks / Tech > Comparison of Laptop Graphics Cards > AMD ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2 (Crossfire)
Klaus Hinum (Update: 2017-09- 5)