
Lenovo ThinkPad W550s Workstation Review
Intel Core i7-5500U | NVIDIA Quadro K620M | 15.50" | 2.4 kg
The Nvidia Quadro K620M is a DirectX 11 and OpenGL 4.5-compatible graphics card for mobile workstations. It is a Maxwell-based GPU built on the GM108 chip with 384 shader cores and manufactured in 28 nm by TSMC. The Quadro K620M is the successor to the significantly slower Quadro K610M. Usually, the GPU comes with 2 GB DDR3 memory clocked at 1000 MHz (2000 MHz effective, 16 GB/s).
The Quadro series offers certified drivers that are optimized for stability and performance in professional applications like CAD or DCC. OpenGL performance, for example, should be significantly better than with GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications.
Architecture
Compared to Kepler, Maxwell has been optimized in several details to increase power efficiency. Smaller Streaming Multiprocessors (SMM) with only 128 ALUs (Kepler: 192) and an optimized scheduler should lead to better utilization of the shaders. Nvidia promises that a Maxwell SMM with 128 ALUs can offer 90% of the performance of a Kepler SMX with 192 ALUs. GM108 features 3 SMMs and thus 384 shader cores, 24 TMUs and 8 ROPs (64-bit interface).
Another optimization is the massively enlarged L2 cache. The larger size can reduce some of the memory traffic to allow for a relatively narrow memory interface without significantly hurting performance.
GM108 supports DirectX 11.2 (feature level 11.0 only) as well as DirectX 12.
Performance
Due to their identical specifications, the Quadro K620M offers a similar 3D gaming performance as the consumer GeForce 840M. Most games from 2014/2015 will run fluently in low or medium settings. Compared to other Quadro GPUs, the K620M performs almost similar to the older K1100M.
Features
The feature set should include support for up to 4 active displays. High-resolution monitors of up to 3840x2160 pixels can be connected using DisplayPort 1.2 or HDMI 1.4a (HDMI 2.0 not supported). HD-Audio codecs, such as Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD, can be transmitted via bitstream mode through the HDMI port. However, as most laptops will feature Optimus, the integrated GPU will likely have direct control over the display ports and may limit the feature set available by the Nvidia Kepler cards.
Using CUDA or OpenCL, the cores of the Quadro K620M can be used for general calculations.
GM108 integrates the sixth generation of the PureVideo HD video engine (VP6), offering a better decoding performance for H.264 and MPEG-2 videos. Of course, VP6 supports all features of previous generations (4K support, PIP, video encoding via NVENC API).
Power Consumption
The power consumption of the Quadro K620M should be about 30 W including the board and memory components. Therefore, the GPU is best suited for laptops 13 - 14-inches in size and above. The K620M also supports Optimus to automatically switch between an integrated graphics card and the Nvidia GPU.
Quadro K Series
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Architecture | Maxwell | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pipelines | 384 - unified | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Core Speed | 1029 - 1124 (Boost) MHz | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Memory Speed | 2000 MHz | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Memory Bus Width | 64 Bit | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Memory Type | DDR3 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Max. Amount of Memory | 2048 MB | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Shared Memory | no | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
API | DirectX 11, Shader 5.0, OpenGL 4.3 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Power Consumption | 30 Watt | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
technology | 28 nm | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Features | Optimus, PhysX, CUDA, OpenCL, 3D Vision, 3DTV Play | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Date of Announcement | 01.03.2015 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Link to Manufacturer Page | www.nvidia.de |
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.
low | med. | high | ultra | QHD | 4K | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Ryse: Son of Rome | 35 | 23 | 10 | |||
GRID: Autosport | 151 | 76 | 32 | 18 | ||
Thief | 21 | 26 | 13 | 10 | ||
Total War: Rome II | 61 | 48 | 40 | 10.5 | ||
Saints Row IV | 75 | 59 | 22 | 11 | ||
Company of Heroes 2 | 35 | 31 | 21 | 7 | ||
GRID 2 | 128 | 41 | 58 | 20 | ||
Metro: Last Light | 49 | 38 | 23 | 11 | ||
BioShock Infinite | 73 | 52 | 42 | 15 | ||
Tomb Raider | 134 | 66 | 36 | |||
Assassin´s Creed III | 23 | 22 | 10 | |||
Hitman: Absolution | 55 | 37 | 26 | 14 | ||
World of Tanks v8 | 98 | 62 | 38 | 22 | ||
F1 2012 | 111 | 96 | 90 | 47 | ||
Torchlight 2 | 124 | 105 | 98 | |||
Sleeping Dogs | 88 | 44 | 31 | 8 | ||
Dirt Showdown | 98 | 75 | 52 | 17 | ||
Diablo III | 72 | 57 | 59 | 42 | ||
Alan Wake | 41 | 25 | 13 | |||
Batman: Arkham City | 101 | 62 | 36 | 16 | ||
Total War: Shogun 2 | 76 | 36 | 19 | |||
StarCraft 2 | 185 | 79 | 54 | 18 | ||
World of Warcraft | 251 | 152 | 49 | 26 | ||
low | med. | high | ultra | QHD | 4K | < 30 fps < 60 fps < 120 fps ≥ 120 fps | 1 5 10 6 | 4 10 8 1 | 7 12 1 | 18 2 1 | | |
For more games that might be playable and a list of all games and graphics cards visit our Gaming List
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External Review » Lenovo ThinkPad W550s 20E2-000PGE
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