Motherboard with Intergrated video or not?

[Pronam]

I'm on to buying an upgradeable rig for my low budget. All I'll buy is a decent motherboard, then some ram and a CPU to start off with. Along the way I'll upgrade it when needed.

Simply said I've got a low budget, so that's why this will be a thing for me to question. An integrated card or not?

 

In essence it's just a buck more and only the Sata speed seems to suffer from it. (instead of 6gb/s, just 3gb/s. I'll check on as the amd 890 seems more powerful. The difference with 890 is 700mhz instead of 500mhz on the graphics.) I don't worry much about the speed as I'm not getting an SSD anyway and I'll use an HD from my old PC.

Yet...is it better to start off with or an without an integrated video card? And yes, I know a loose card is better...I just mean that when I do have a better psychical graphics card will in any sort the performance be less than when I picked a motherboard without a integrated video card? In essence, will a integrated video card harm in the long run as well?

//

Reading a few more reviews, it seems that you can run a dual mode with a regular video card to improve its performance up to 25%. That's a pro integrated point.

[bben46]

An integrated video card typically doesn't have any ram of it's own so it must 'steal' its ram from the system ram. This leaves less ram for the system to use. So, you must plan for that when you look at using an onboard video subsystem - what you save in not getting a dedicated video card is going to be partially eaten by needing to purchase more ram to start with. An integrated audio subsystem Also steals some memory, but not quite as much. A cheap audio card may not have its own memory either so be sure to look at the specs before buying one.

 

Having an integrated video or audio is usually not a problem when you do get around to getting a separate card as the integrated video and audio can be disabled in the motherboard BIOS.

[Pronam]

Thanks :). I think I'll go for with an integrated one. That way I've got something to fall back on when a video card dies. I was mostly worried if it'd harm somehow even if it was disabled.

The importance of ram is indeed significant with integrated cards, I've seen that with my laptop. I'll check out if I can find a version that does have some memory. I read somewhere that some 890x version has a separate 128mb ram onboard dedicated for the video. If it's true and not too expensive I'll give that one a go :).

//

"128MB DDR3 1333 sideport memory support "

Lets see what that actually means >.> lol

[Dark0ne]

Personally I'd much rather have a dedicated graphics card than a SSD drive. SSD's are nice but massively overpriced right now for the amount of space you get. Video cards on the other hand fit well in to low budget builds and drastically improve performance and visuals in modern games. If you're looking to play off-the-shelf games released this year (like Dragon Age 2, The Witcher, Skyrim, etc.) on your new rig then the video card will be much better for you.

[Illiad86]

Thanks :). I think I'll go for with an integrated one. That way I've got something to fall back on when a video card dies. I was mostly worried if it'd harm somehow even if it was disabled.

The importance of ram is indeed significant with integrated cards, I've seen that with my laptop. I'll check out if I can find a version that does have some memory. I read somewhere that some 890x version has a separate 128mb ram onboard dedicated for the video. If it's true and not too expensive I'll give that one a go :).

//

"128MB DDR3 1333 sideport memory support "

Lets see what that actually means >.> lol

 

 

Yeah ones with sideport memory are pretty nice ;) No "stealing" from your system RAM. I don't believe they cost too much more :thumbsup:

[scrivener07]

And dont forget a quality power supply. This is very important, corsair is known to make good units. When you got the cash of course this should be your next upgrade.

[Pronam]

I already have one ;). I was actually a tad disappointed by how much cables mine had, but the quality and durability is certainly better. (I didn't really check for reviews back then, so that's my own fail.)

 

 

If anyone wondered my choices, keep in mind it's just for a few months (till skyrim :sweat: ). Once I'll have saved up enough I'll get better parts...starting with a decent video card of course :D :

Motherboard: Asus M4A89GTD PRO (890GX series with the sideport memory, just 20% more but ah well :D )

Memory: Corsair XMS3 DDR3 4GB kit

CPU: MD Athlon II X4 640, sAM3 (3.0Ghz x4)

Case: Cooler Master Elite 430 (I actually wanted a full tower, but I've been recommended using this one. The power supply is placed below.)

Total is: €280, ~$400. (Yes there are cheaper places, but I rather get it all at once from a good supplier which has on site support.)

 

I already have:

WD 1TB hard disk (Green caviar)

Windows 7 Professional. (64 bit)

Corsair 550watt power supply (No video card atm anyway.)

Pioneer DVD RW 8x8 (107D)

2 proper 120mm fans. (1 even brand new.)

 

Btw, if you wondered what happened with my previous one...it short circuited. Frying the motherboard and almost everything on it. Shortly said, I don't like MSI-boards anymore :). I don't even overclock >.> and keep my pc quite free of dust. I can't wait to assemble this new PC :).

[Nobody09]

Well you see the problem with integrated video is it goes on what's called a multi chip package. Ram is easiest to make, then cpu's, the gpu's then multichip packages and systems on a chip. So integrated video is going to be one process size too big to be of much use. For instance when the 8200 8300 came out it was on 80nm while the 8400gs discrete card which is the exact same gpu came out at 80nm and then switched to 65 nm. Both versions the chipset gpu and the discrete gpu ran at 450 mhz at 80nm. When they shrunk the add in card version to 65nm the speed went up to 567 mhz.

 

Not so much a problem for AMD though as they tend to use the cutting edge for chipsets. As you said the 65nm version of that the gpu on it would go 550ish mhz. On the 890 chipset it's 55nm and the gpu goes upwards of 700 mhz. You can't run oblivion with eye candy on any integrated gpu unless it's at really low resolution like 1024x768.

 

Now the memory thing isn't too much of an issue. The sideport ram isn't to make speed as much as it makes the frame buffer that the video card reads to display the monitor a known entity. If you run oblivion or morrowind simply pull up the console tdt command. It'll display frames per second. Then bring up the inventory screen. You'll see it set to a solid 30fps or 45fps or struggle if there's something in the background that is moving. In a non moving background the engine is simply making the video card read the same memory locations and display it to the monitor over and over 30 times a second. The sideport isn't to speed things up as it's to make a known ram location that the gpu has to go to in order to secure protected content. It's also a security issue. The cpu can be forced to get to ram that the gpu is using if it's using system ram. It can also be forced to get to ram that the gpu uses but it has protection measures that are more easily enforced to stop you. The gpu's ram is simply set up an 64mb agp port buffer or as a 64 or 128mb "device" window in the address space. It then sets up how ever many "pages" of ram it needs to use all the video ram.

 

The only problem using system ram isn't bandwidth any more as system ram is pretty close to video ram speeds on most cards unless you are using a very high end card with the special 7mb/sec gddr5 there's plently of memory bandwidth as that memory is only about 15 percent faster than plain old 800mhz ddr2. But it's only 64 bit. There's 128bit hdr and bloom operations but I never use high dynamic range settings on any engines because it just looks like a shiny watery eyed gaussian blurr to me. I like the old school light source transforms much better than hdr. So 128 bit hdr would need 128 bit system bus to be fast.

 

Now the using a low end discrete gpu with an integrated gpu is called hybrid sli on nvidia or hybid crossfire on amd. It's pretty sucky. When you do SLI you have 2 strategies. One is to allow one gpu to render half the screen while the other gpu renders the other half of the screen. The the other procedure is to allow one gpu to render one frame while the other gpu renders the next frame. If you've got a 890 based motherboard and a 4550 video card the speeds are pretty closely matched but it's a pain because a the 4550 costs nearly as much as a bigger mainstream card. Using a discrete-integrated gpu crossfire if you do either method of rendering your discrete card is going to be slown down to match the integrated gpu.

 

The other option is the AMD zecate based motherboard. It puts the gpu stuff right along side the cpu sutff within the cpu. The problem here is clock speed. The system clock speed is lower on gpu's than it is on cpu's because gpu operations are much more intensive and trigger much longer chains of transisters that have to get all the way to the end off the process before completing it's instructions. Zecate having these intense gpu instructions in the cpu causes it to slow down the cpu quite a bit. So normal integer operations suffer from the lower clock speed that they can work at. Zecate runs at about 1.3 to 1.5 ghz which is really slow for a cpu and really really fast for a gpu as only 40nm gpu's are able to break 1 ghz barrier. You can get a 55nm gpu up to high 800ish mhz. So the problem with zecate is really that it's very capable in video department but it's a bit too light to fight and too thin to win in some of the other normal cpu integer operations. If they can get that chip up to 1.8 to 2.0 ghz at 28 or 22nm then it would be an awesome system able to do light to medium gaming.

 

So enough of the gritty technical details. It does look like the future is going to be integrated gpu/cpu in small ITX motherbords. So for now any cheap mATX motherboard is likely to come with a gpu anyway and it's really a no charge deal. So just get whatever is almost the cheapest cpu. Throw 2 to 4gb in it and get a decent mainstream video card like a GT220 GTX430 or ati 5670. Any low end athlon II or the 640 you like will likely be plenty of cpu.

 

And you ran into the video local bus problem. I had an old system where the fan on the video card blew out the bearing and didn't shut off current it over amped and just by pulling too many amps through the agp port it knocked out the video card the entire motherboard destroying the sound, lan, everything in the chipset. The cpu was fine and the ram was fine but not having any electrical isolation between between the video card and the system buses it all goes at once. The exact same thing happens with pci express though it is slightly tougher. Also watch out for front side USB ports. If you get a huge static charge built up on you like during a freakish dry spell in the middle of winter and you touch one of the metal usb front ports on on the case it will do the same thing. Zap not only your system boards usb ports but likely the sound, lan, video everything hooked up to that same chip.But be careful bumping or knocking the video card or having a cheap fan on a video card go out. Stick to one that uses one of the larger 70 or 80mm fans like this one.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125360

Edited March 8, 2011 by Nobody09

[Pronam]

The front side USB ports is what probably started the whole thing. They usually get damaged and that happened. The case itself was a nightmare though, I've had days I could get a shock when touching it. I already replaced the motherboard once, but that was because someone thought to be smart and add random ram to it...sigh it was the wrong speed. So the original one (acer, it was an acer pc) had a hit already. So the CPU probably didn't get too clean out of that either.

 

I liked using HDR with forced AA :D , but they say it's really dependent on what video card and screen you use. With bloom you can notice a lot of difference at different PCs. Still it's a matter of opinion of course :).

 

Btw, as you seem to know quite a bit. What's with it that they seem to stick to 128 bit and not set to 256 bit? Is the performance not better, even for lower to mid end cards? I usually try to balance between speed, ram, but I've got no idea if it's useful to watch if it's 128 or 256 as a lot of newer video cards still seem to use the 128 interface.

 

My aim as always to get a card just below high end. The one your pin pointing at is an example I'll get in a month or two for in between :) And yeah, I've had experience with video cards. It's less awful as in the past, but the stock fans are still not that proper. Buying your own fan quite cheap and you usually get a lot of (passive) extras to aid the cool-down even more.

[Ethre]

I already have one ;). I was actually a tad disappointed by how much cables mine had, but the quality and durability is certainly better. (I didn't really check for reviews back then, so that's my own fail.)

 

Case: Cooler Master Elite 430 (I actually wanted a full tower, but I've been recommended using this one. The power supply is placed below.)

 

Btw, if you wondered what happened with my previous one...it short circuited. Frying the motherboard and almost everything on it. Shortly said, I don't like MSI-boards anymore :). I don't even overclock >.> and keep my pc quite free of dust. I can't wait to assemble this new PC :).

 

A solid case. Be sure to think out your cooling pathways though (more fans will not necessarily provide you with a better cooling system - and can actually negatively affect cooling if they are improperly arranged).

These problems can come up in full tower cases too. In my opinion, the main benefit there is the ease of distribution for storage drives (or the additional bays if you are running expansion controller cards).