NVIDIA Quadro K2000M vs AMD Radeon HD 8790M

NVIDIA Quadro K2000M

The NVIDIA Quadro K2000M (or K2100M due to an internal code name) is a mid-range, DirectX 11.1-compatible graphics card for mobile workstations. It is a Kepler-based GPU built using the GK107 chip and is manufactured in 28nm at TSMC.

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 GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications.

Architecture

The Kepler architecture is the successor to the Fermi architecture that first appeared in laptops with the GeForce 400M series. The GK107 Kepler core offers two shader blocks, called SMX, each with 192 shaders for a total of 384 shader cores that are clocked at the same speed as the central core. Although more shader cores are available in the Kepler architecture as compared to the Fermi design, the Kepler shaders are still expected to be up to twice as power efficient. However, due to the missing hot clock of the shader domain, two shaders of a Kepler chip are about as fast as one shader of a Fermi chip (as the latter is clocked twice as fast).

PCIe 3.0 is now supported by the mobile Kepler series and an optional Turbo mode can automatically overclock the Nvidia card by a theoretical 15 percent if the laptop cooling system allows it. The implementation of this boost mode is done in the BIOS, but it is ultimately dependent upon the manufacturer of the laptop.

Performance

Depending on the clock speeds,  the gaming performance should be similar or slower than the consumer GeForce GT 650M equipped with DDR3 graphics memory. Games of 2012 will run fluently on medium or high settings.

Features

The improved feature set now includes support for up to 4 active displays. Furthermore, high resolution monitors of up to 3840x2160 pixels can now be connected using DisplayPort 1.2 or HDMI 1.4a if available. 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.

The 5th generation PureVideo HD video processor (VP5) is also integrated in the GK107 core and offers hardware decoding of HD videos. Common codecs such as MPEG-1/2, MPEG-4 ASP, H.264 and VC1/WMV9 are fully supported up to 4K resolutions while VC1 and MPEG-4 are supported up to 1080p. Two streams can be decoded in parallel for features such as Picture-in-Picture. Another novelty is the inclusion of a dedicated video encoding engine similar to Intel QuickSync that can be accessed by the NVENC API.

The power consumption of the K2000M is rated at 55 Watt (TGP according to Nvidia) and therefore suited for medium-sized notebooks of 15-inches or greater.

AMD Radeon HD 8790M

The AMD Radeon HD 8790M (sometimes known as the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 8790) is a DirectX 11.1 graphics card for laptops. It is based on the Mars chip (28nm GCN architecture) with 384 shader cores, 24 TMUs, and 8 ROPs. The core is clocked at 850 MHz (900 MHz Boost) with GDDR5 VRAM at 1125 MHz (4500 MHz effective).

The performance of the Radeon HD 8790M is similar to the Nvidia GeForce GTX 660M or GT 750M and therefore in the upper mid-range category. Most games of 2013 can be played fluently in medium or high details and the WXGA resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels.

The 384 shaders can be used with OpenCL 1.2 for general-purpose calculations (as 6 compute units). Compared to old TeraScale 2 chips, the GCN-based Mars architecture offers improved performance in this framework.

Features of the 8790M include video decoding via UVD3 for decoding MPEG-4 AVC/H.264, VC-1, MPEG-2, and Flash directly from the AMD GPU. Multi-View Codec (MVC) and MPEG-4 part 2 (DivX, xVid) HD videos are now compatible as well.

The 8700M series also supports automatic graphics switching between the integrated GPU and discrete GPU. Called Enduro, the technology supersedes AMD's Dynamic Switchable Graphics and is similar to Nvidia's Optimus. Furthermore, the 8790M can directly support up to 2 connected monitors using Eyefinity Technology if Enduro is disabled.

Other features of the 8700M series include ZeroCore for reducing power consumption when the display is turned off and Power Gating to power down areas of the chip that are not used. PowerTune allows automatic overclocking and underclocking of the graphics card as long as the GPU is within its TDP limit. For example, the chip may be underclocked when running FurMark and OCCT, but will overclock in certain games like Lost Planet, Crysis or Resident Evil 5.

The integrated HD audio processor is able to transmit HD Audio (TrueHD or DTS Master Audio) over HDMI and DisplayPort (e.g., for Blu-Ray videos). Additionally, it now allows audio to output simultaneously and in parallel to multiple devices with the new Discrete Digital Multipoint Audio (DDMA) feature.

The power consumption should be slightly higher than the previous 7690M chip when under load (2 Watt difference according to the desktop setup from Techreport). However, the 8790M can potentially draw less power when idle (if not disabled by Enduro). Overall, the 8790M is best suited for 15-inch notebooks or bigger.