The Nvidia Quadro M520 is a DirectX 12 (FL 11_0) 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. That means its similar to the Quadro M500M (DDR3) but uses faster GDDR5 memory. The GeForce 940MX with GDDR5 memory is the consumer variant of the Quadro M520.
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
Currently the clock speeds are not known of the M520 variant. They should be similar to the consumer 940 MX with GDDR5. Therefore, the performance should be similar to the Quadro K620M.
Features
The feature set should include support for up to four 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 M520 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 M520 is rated at 25 Watt TGP (max power consumption including memory and board). That is slightly below the M500M that is rated at 30 Watt. Therefore, the GPU is best suited for laptops 13 - 14-inches in size and above. The M500M also supports Optimus to automatically switch between an integrated graphics card and the Nvidia GPU.
The NVIDIA Quadro 5010M is a professional workstation graphics card based on the Fermi architecture (GF100 chip). Therefore, the 5010M is closely related to the consumer GeForce GTX 480M. The Quadro 5010M is the successor to the Quadro 5000M and also offers ECC RAM and double-precision floating point cores.
The Quadro series offers certified drivers that are optimized for stability and performance in professional applications like CAD, DCC, medicine, or visualisation areas. The OpenGL performance, for example, should be significantly better than GeForce graphics cards with similar specifications.
The shader / CUDA cores can be accessed using DirectX 11 or OpenGL 4.1 for graphics rendering and DirectCompute, OpenCL, AXE, and CUDA for general purpose calculations. Due to the new Fermi architecture, the 5010M should offer higher levels of performance in general purpose calculations compared to its predecessors.
Furthermore, the Nvidia Quadro 5010M is compatible with the new stereoscopic solution by Nvidia called 3D Vision Pro.
To automatically switch between the integrated graphics card and the Quadro, the 5010M supports Nvidia Optimus. Note, however, that whether this feature is integrated or not depends on the notebook manufacturer.
Similar to the GeForce GTX 480M, the Quadro 5010M is specified at 100 Watt TDP. As a result, only very large laptops, such as the Clevo D901F, are able to house this high-end card.
At the time of arrival (Feb. 2011), the Quadro 5010M succeeds the older Quadrio FX 5000M as the fastest professional workstation graphic card for laptops.
The NVIDIA Quadro 2000M is a professional workstation graphics card based on the Fermi architecture (likely the GF104 or GF106). It offers the same amount of shaders like the GeForce GTX 460M, but only a 128 Bit memory bus for DDR3 memory. The slow DDR3 memory in particular could be a bottleneck to the GPU
The Quadro series offers certified drivers that are optimized for stability and performance in professional applications like CAD, DCC, medicine, or visualisation areas. OpenGL performance, for example, should be significantly better than GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications.
The shader/CUDA cores can be accessed using DirectX 11 or OpenGL 4.1 for graphics rendering and DirectCompute, OpenCL, AXE, and CUDA for general purpose calculations. Due to the new Fermi core, the 2000M should offer high performance in general purpose calculations.
Furthermore, the Nvidia Quadro 2000M is compatible with the new stereoscopic solution by Nvidia, NVIDIA 3D Vision Pro.
To automatically switch between the processor graphics card and the Quadro, the 2000M supports Nvidia Optimus. The implementation of the technology into specific notebook models is dependent on the laptop vendor.
The Quadro 2000M is specified at 55 Watt TDP and is therefore best suited for 15.6" or greater laptops.
- Range of benchmark values for this graphics card - Average benchmark values for this graphics card * Smaller numbers mean a higher performance 1 This benchmark is not used for the average calculation
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.
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- Average benchmark values for this graphics card
