1. Introduction: Notebooks With DirectX 9-Capable GPUs Really Do Exist

As early as CeBIT (March 13, 2003), ATi introduced its DirectX 9-capable GPU with Mobility Radeon 9600, as did nVIDIA with its GeForce FX Go 5600.

The notebook makers vowed to provide their respective chips by May 2003, but the first machines were not available in stores until mid-July. nVIDIA's chip is currently available only in the Toshiba Satellite 5205-S705 (in Europe: Satellite 5205-S705); ATi's MR9600 is built into the notebooks of the European manufacturer Gericom, along with Peacock and Packard Bell.

Asked about the delay in integration, manufacturing insiders from both camps told us that there were "technical" problems. Several of them went further in their statements and spoke of heat problems. But no one was ready to make an official statement.

The buzz-phrase "heat problem" leads us directly to the two decisive criteria that must be taken into account in any test of a notebook's GPU: energy use/ power consumption and 2D/ 3D performance. After all, what good is the fastest graphics solution if it sucks the notebook battery dry in no time, because the graphics subsystem always works at full power? An intelligent power management system is therefore at least as much in demand in a GPU as it is in a mobile CPU.

The power management systems of the two manufacturers' GPUs are similar in principle: dynamic clock scaling and dynamic clock gating ensure that the speed is as low as possible given the currently running application, or that only those parts of the GPU that are needed are active. This is the only way to ensure effective power saving. If the application needs more graphics performance, the clock speed automatically increases and, if necessary, other functional units of the GPU are enabled.

The fact that both factors, performance and power consumption, need to be taken into consideration led THG to forgo a direct comparison of the two products, because at the time of the test, there weren't products on the market that were directly comparable. Therefore, in this article we will limit ourselves to testing the Toshiba Satellite 5205-S705 with nVIDIA's GeForce FX Go 5600 and, in a few days, we'll follow up with a test of a mobile PC with ATi's "secret weapon," the Mobility Radeon 9600.