Qualcomm Adreno 510 vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Ti (Desktop) vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Max-Q

Qualcomm Adreno 510

The Qualcomm Adreno 510 is a mobile graphics card for mid-range smartphones and tablets (mostly Android based). It is included in the Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 and 652 SoCs and based on the Adreno 500 architecture (like the Adreno 520 in the S820, which should be fully compatible in software).

The GPU supports modern standards like Vulkan 1.0 (according to Wikipedia), OpenGL ES 3.1 + AE (3.2 in other sources), OpenCL 2.0 and DirectX 12 (FL 12.1 according to Wikipedia, 11.1 according to Qualcomm). Furthermore, the GPU supports Universal Bandwidth Compression (UBWC) to save memory bandwidth.

Compared the the faster Adreno 530, the 510 is currently produced in the older 28nm process (650 and 652) and should offer less ALUs. The clock speed is not disclosed.

Early benchmarks and performance ratings from Qualcomm position the GPU on a level with the old Adreno 330 (former high end GPU) in the Snapdragon 810. Therefore, it should be able to handle most Android games up to Full HD fluently.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Ti (Desktop)

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 Ti is the second fastest Pascal based graphics card in November 2017. It is a high-end desktop graphics card based on a cut down GP104 chip as the GTX 1080 and manufactured in 16 nm FinFET at TSMC. Compared to the GTX 1080, it uses the more available GDDR5 graphics memory, and compared to the GTX 1070 it offers more shaders (2432 versus 1920). More details on the Pascal architecture including all features and comparisons to Maxwell, can be found here.

The performance of the GTX 1070 Ti was in our tests right between the GTX 1070 and GTX 1080. However, the powerefficiency was worse than the GTX 1070 and near the GTX 1080. Nvidia also specifies the 1070 Ti and 1080 at 180W.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Max-Q

The Nvidia GTX 1050 Ti with Max-Q design is a power efficient mainstream GPU for laptops based on the Pascal architecture and was announced in January 2017. Contrary to the faster models, the GTX 1050 uses the GP107 chip, which is manufactured in a 14 nm process at Samsung.

The clock is not the only difference compared to the regular GTX 1050 Ti though. The drivers for the Max-Q version were optimized for efficiency (and not performance; only for Max-Q models), there are optimized voltage converters for 1V operation, high-end cooling methods, and a 40 dB limit for the fan noise (with clock adjustments to ensure this at all times).

Features

The GP107 chip is manufactured in a 14 nm FinFET process at Samsung and offers a number of new features, including support for DisplayPort 1.4 (ready), HDMI 2.0b, HDR, Simultaneous Multi-Projection (SMP) as well as improved H.265 video de- and encoding (PlayReady 3.0). A full list of improvements and the new Pascal desktop GPUs is available in our dedicated Pascal architecture article.

Performance

The performance of the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti can vary quite a lot depending on the cooling performance of the laptop. Nvidia states that the Max-Q variant should be about 10 to 15% slower than a regular GTX 1050 Ti for laptops. Therefore, the GPU is most suited for Full HD and high quality settings for games of 2016.

Power Consumption

The power consumption of the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti with Max-Q design is rated at 40 to 46 Watt and therefore a lot lower than a regular GTX 1050 Ti for laptops (53 Watt). This means that the Max-Q GTX 1050 Ti is also suited for thin and light laptops.