Intel UHD Graphics 617 vs Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4 (Ice Lake 48 EU) vs Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 (Ice Lake 64 EU)
Intel UHD Graphics 617
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The Intel UHD Graphics 617 (GT2) is a low-end integrated graphics unit, which can be found in the Y-series of the Amber-Lake generation. This "GT2" version offers 24 Execution Units (EUs) clocked at up to 1050 MHz (depending on the CPU model). Due to its lack of dedicated graphics memory or eDRAM cache, the UHD 617 has to access the main memory (2x 64bit DDR3L/LPDDR3). Compared to the old HD Graphics 615 in Kaby-Lake-Y CPUs, the UHD 617 is the same GPU with slightly different clock speeds (depending on the model) and slight power/performance improvements due to the improved 14nm++ process. Compared to the similar UHD Graphics 615 in other Amber Lake models, the 617 looks to be higher clocked (+50 MHz) and has more headroom due to the higher TDP of 7 versus 5 Watt.
Performance
The 3D performance of the UHD 617 depends on the CPU model and the cooling / TDP-setting of the laptop. Furthermore, the used main memory (single channel, DDR3(L), amount) is influencing performance. On average the UHD graphics 617 should be very similar to the Kaby-Lake HD Graphics 615 due to the same architecture and similar speeds. That means that only low demanding games like Farming Simulator 17 or Rocket League are playable in lowest detail settings.
Features
The revised video engine in the HD 615 and UHD 615 / 617 now supports H.265/HEVC Main10 profile in hardware with 10 bit colors. Furthermore, Googles VP9 codec can also be hardware decoded. The UHD 617 should support HDCP 2.2 and therefore Netflix 4K. HDMI 2.0 however is still only supported with an external converter chip (LSPCon).
Power Consumption
The UHD Graphics 617 can be found in Y processors with 7 W TDP and is therefore suited for very thin, mostly passively cooled subnotebooks like the MacBook Air 2018.
Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4 (Ice Lake 48 EU)
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The Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4(Ice Lake with 48 EUs) is an integrated graphics card in the Ice Lake SoCs (10th generation core 10xxG4) for laptops. It offers no dedicated graphics memory (no eDRAM cache like the Intel Iris Graphics 655 predecessor of the Coffee Lake SoCs). It offers 48 of the 64 EUs (Execution Units / Shader Blocks) of the Ice Lake chip and the clock rate depends on the processor model. At launch it looks like all models have a 300 MHz base clock and only differ in the boost clock (1050 - 1100 MHz). Another difference is the TDP as it can be configured from 12 - 25 Watt in the 15 Watt U-models and maybe even higher in the 25 Watt models that will come later.
The performance was not yet communicated, but due to the 25% less cores and similar clock speeds the performance should be clearly lower than the full Iris Plus G7 models. Although, the Ice Lake G4 graphics does not feature any dedicated graphics memory it should perform better than the old Iris Plus 655 with 128 MB eDRAM. Compared to AMDs offering, we suspect the performance should be similar to an AMD Radeon RX Vega 8 GPU. Therefore, the gaming performance should be only sufficient for low demanding games like Rocket League or Overwatch.
A special new feature of the Gen11 graphics card is the new Variable Rate Shading (VRS) support. With it game designers can decide where to spend shading time and e.g. shade object in the background or behind fog with less resolution (up to using only one source for a 4x4 block). With this technique early results show up to 1.3x performance in Unreal Engine POC and 1.2x speedup in Civ 6. Up to now VRS is only supported by the new Nvidia Turing architecture (GTX 1650 and up).
Another improved hardware piece is the integrated video de- and encoder that was improved significantly according to Intel. They did not specify any more details, but the previous generation was able to decode VP9 and H.265/HEVC in Main10 profile with 10 bit color depth using the dedicated hardware.
The Iris Plus G4 supports three display pipes that can each output 5K60 signals (via DisplayPort 1.4 HBR3 or HDMI 2.0b). Combining two pipes, the chip is capable to output 8k content.
The Ice Lake SoCs and therefore the integrated GPU are manufactured in the modern 10nm+ process at Intel that should be comparable to the 7nm process of TSMC.
Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 (Ice Lake 64 EU)
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The Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 (Ice Lake with 64 EUs) is an integrated graphics card in the Ice Lake SoCs (10th generation core 10xxG7) for laptops. It offers no dedicated graphics memory (no eDRAM cache like the Intel Iris Graphics 655 predecessor of the Coffee Lake SoCs). The clock rate depends on the processor model. At launch it looks like all models have a 300 MHz base clock and only differ in the boost clock (1050 - 1100 MHz). Another difference is the TDP as it can be configured from 12 - 25 Watt in the 15 Watt U-models and maybe even higher in the 25 Watt models that will come later.
The performance should be slightly above a AMD Radeon RX Vega 10 integrated GPU in the Ryzen 7 3000 series processors. e.g. Intel showed a Intel Iris Plus G7 against a Ryzen 7 3700U both configured at 25 Watt TDP and the Ice Lake GPU was able to beat the Vega 10 slightly in all games. Compared to the previous generation, Intel talks about a 2x performance improvement but wont specify the exact model. All in all the GPU should be positioned in the entry level of dedicated GPUs (Nvidia GeForce MX150 level?) and therefore most suited for less demanding games like Fortnite, Rainbow 6 Siege, or Rocket League at reduced details. The theoretical performance of the Chip is specified with 1.12 TFLOPS (FP32) and 2.25 TFLOPS (FP16) when running at 1.1 GHz.
Compared to the older Gen.9 graphics (e.g., UHD Graphics 620 in Whiskey Lake), Gen.11 is using a wider architecture and also has 3 MB dedicated L3 cache near the GPU.
A special new feature of the Gen11 graphics card is the new Variable Rate Shading (VRS) support. With it game designers can decide where to spend shading time and e.g. shade object in the background or behind fog with less resolution (up to using only one source for a 4x4 block). With this technique early results show up to 1.3x performance in Unreal Engine POC and 1.2x speedup in Civ 6. Up to now VRS is only supported by the new Nvidia Turing architecture (GTX 1650 and up).
Another improved hardware piece is the integrated video de- and encoder that was improved significantly according to Intel. They did not specify any more details, but the previous generation was able to decode VP9 and H.265/HEVC in Main10 profile with 10 bit color depth using the dedicated hardware.
The Iris Plus G7 supports three display pipes that can each output 5K60 signals (via DisplayPort 1.4 HBR3 or HDMI 2.0b). Combining two pipes, the chip is capable to output 8k content.
The Ice Lake SoCs and therefore the integrated GPU are manufactured in the modern 10nm process at Intel that should be comparable to the 7nm process of TSMC.
Intel UHD Graphics 617 | Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4 (Ice Lake 48 EU) | Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 (Ice Lake 64 EU) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Gen. 11 Series |
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Codename | Kaby-Lake GT2 | Ice Lake G4 Gen. 11 | Ice Lake G7 Gen. 11 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Architecture | Gen. 9 Amber Lake | Gen. 11 Ice Lake | Gen. 11 Ice Lake | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pipelines | 24 - unified | 48 - unified | 64 - unified | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Core Speed | 300 - 1150 (Boost) MHz | 300 - 1100 (Boost) MHz | 300 - 1100 (Boost) MHz | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Memory Bus Width | 64/128 Bit | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Memory Type | DDR3L/LPDDR3 | DDR4 | DDR4 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Shared Memory | yes | yes | yes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
API | DirectX 12_1, OpenGL 4.4 | DirectX 12_1, OpenGL 4.5 | DirectX 12_1, OpenGL 4.5 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
technology | 14 nm | 10 nm | 10 nm | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Features | QuickSync | QuickSync | QuickSync | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Date of Announcement | 30.10.2018 | 28.05.2019 | 28.05.2019 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Power Consumption | 12-25 Watt | 12-25 Watt |
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Benchmarks
3DM Vant. Perf. total + Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4 (Ice Lake 48 EU)
Cinebench R15 OpenGL 64 Bit + Intel UHD Graphics 617
GFXBench T-Rex HD Offscreen C24Z16 + Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4 (Ice Lake 48 EU)
Average Benchmarks Intel UHD Graphics 617 → 100% n=14
Average Benchmarks Intel Iris Plus Graphics G4 (Ice Lake 48 EU) → 190% n=14
Average Benchmarks Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 (Ice Lake 64 EU) → 228% n=14

* 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.

Ready or Not
2023
EA Sports WRC
2023
Total War Pharaoh
2023
EA Sports FC 24
2023
Counter-Strike 2
2023
Armored Core 6
2023
Dead Island 2
2023
Company of Heroes 3
2023
Sons of the Forest
2023
Atomic Heart
2023
Hogwarts Legacy
2023
Dead Space Remake
2023
High On Life
2023
The Quarry
2022
Vampire Bloodhunt
2022
Ghostwire Tokyo
2022
Elden Ring
2022
Forza Horizon 5
2021
Riders Republic
2021
Back 4 Blood
2021
Alan Wake Remastered
2021
FIFA 21
2020
Serious Sam 4
2020
Crysis Remastered
2020
Death Stranding
2020
F1 2020
2020
Gears Tactics
2020
Doom Eternal
2020
Hunt Showdown
2020
Escape from Tarkov
2020
Need for Speed Heat
2019
GRID 2019
2019
FIFA 20
2019
Borderlands 3
2019
Control
2019
F1 2019
2019
Rage 2
2019
Anno 1800
2019
The Division 2
2019
Dirt Rally 2.0
2019
Anthem
2019
Far Cry New Dawn
2019
Metro Exodus
2019
Apex Legends
2019
Just Cause 4
2018
Battlefield V
2018
Forza Horizon 4
2018
Monster Hunter World
2018
Far Cry 5
2018
X-Plane 11.11
2018
Fortnite
2018
Destiny 2
2017
ELEX
2017
Team Fortress 2
2017
Rocket League
2017
Prey
2017
For Honor
2017
Resident Evil 7
2017
Civilization VI
2016
Overwatch
2016
Doom
2016
Rainbow Six Siege
2015
World of Warships
2015