One of AMD’s new Trinity chips have been thoroughly tested and it looks like a modest improvement for integrated graphics.There has been much talk about how Intel’s integrated HD 4000 graphics in the new Ivy Bridge CPUs would be the “death of dedicated graphics”. However, only so-called financial analysts bought into that scenario, while anyone with a modicum of industry know-how knew that there was no chance whatsoever of that happening. Nor will it happen in the foreseeable future.
Sure, HD 4000 is better than HD 3000, but still not half as fast as a mid-range dedicated graphics card from AMD or Nvidia. It is more interesting that AMD is just about to launch its next-generation Trinity APUs with an improved graphics core known as HD 7660G, which replaces the current HD 6620G.
AnandTech has looked into the 7660G and found it to be 20% faster than Intel’s Ivy Bridge HD 4000 graphics on average. This is obviously not a huge improvement over its competitor, but it is also important to note that we are still talking about integrated graphics and that laptops with the new AMD chips are expected to sell for much less than their Intel-based counterparts.
(Chart from AnandTech)
Although the 7660G has no chance of competing with a mid-range GPU, it is powerful enough to replace most current entry-level dedicated GPUs. What this means in the real world is playable frame rates in most games at low- to medium settings and resolutions. Another likely result is that you may finally be able to play games on some quite cheap laptops in a near future.
