NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 Max-Q vs NVIDIA Quadro P5000 vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 SLI (Laptop)

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 Max-Q

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 with the Max-Q design is a mobile high-end GPU from the Pascal series. It is designed for thin and light laptops and about 10-15% slower than a regular GTX 1060 for laptops based on the cooling capabilities. The base frequency (1063-1265 MHz) is also much lower than on the regular GTX 1060 (1506 MHz, at least -16%) and the Boost (1341-1480 MHz) is also much lower compared to 1708 MHz (at least -13%) for the regular GTX 1060. The memory clock, however, is identical.

The clock is not the only difference compared to the regular GTX 1060 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 GP106 chip is produced in 16nm FinFET at TSMC and offers a range of new features, like DisplayPort 1.4 (ready), HDMI 2.0b, HDR, Simultaneous Multi-Projection (SMP) and improved H.265 video de- and encoding (PlayReady 3.0). A list of improvements and features can be found in our article on the Pascal architecture.

The power consumption of the Max-Q design is notably lower than the normal GTX 1060 for laptops and ranges between 60 and 70 Watt (TGP) according to Nvidia.

NVIDIA Quadro P5000

The Nvidia Quadro P5000 is a mobile high-end workstation graphics card for notebooks. Similar to the consumer GeForce GTX 1070 (Laptop), it is based on a slimmed-down GP104 chip with 2048 shaders. The graphics card is designed for the Kaby Lake generation and is the successor to the Quadro M5000M (Maxwell). However, the P5000 is equipped with 16 GB GDDR5 video memory (at a lower bandwidth), while GTX 1070 is limited to 8 GB. The clock rates range between 1164 MHz (base) to 1506 MHz (typical Boost) and up to 1657 MHz (max.). 

The Quadro GPUs offer certified drivers, which are optimized for stability and performance in professional applications (CAD, DCC, medical, prospection, and visualizing applications). The performance in these areas is therefore much better compared to corresponding consumer GPUs.

Performance

The theoretical performance should be on par with the GTX 1070 (if the clocks did not take a massive hit), so the GPU should be significantly faster than the previous M5000M. Even the old M5500M could be beaten.

Power Consumption

The power consumption of the Quadro P5000 is similar to the old Quadro M5000M at 100 Watts TGP (max power consumption incl. memory) resp. 73.4 W TDP according to Nvidia. The card is therefore suited for large 17-inch notebooks.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 SLI (Laptop)

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 SLI for laptops is a combination of two GTX 1070 graphics cards in SLI mode. Each card renders one frame at a time (AFR mode) but depends for most games on a good profile in the driver. Therefore, the performance can range from no gains over a single GTX 1070 to up to 90% faster performance. In most games with SLI support, the GTX 1070 SLI is therefore faster than a single GTX 1080. However, sometimes the combination also suffers from micro-stuttering.

The technical details of the card are identical to a single GTX 1070 (see for more information) and the power consumption is doubled. Therefore, the 1070 SLI combination is only found in huge clunky laptops.