How much power does intel hd graphics consume?

[Ashish Joseph]

I am talking about the intel hd graphics in haswell desktop cpus, intel hd graphics 4600
The haswell i3 has 54W tdp, so it also has to include hd 4600's tdp as well.
So, for those who have a dedicated gpu, intel hd will be disabled, and the cpu should consume less power.
I read on a thread that intel hd 4600 is close to the gt 430 in performance. The gt 430 has 49W tdp. Shouldn't intel hd consume atleast 20W? Then that will make the i3's tdp only 34W which is very low
So, how much power does the hd 4600 consume?

And how much powerful is intel hd graphics 4600 on a desktop i3, if we give it 2 x 4gb ddr3 1600 mhz dual channel ram? Comparable to which dedicated gpu(i know it can't do any serious gaming)?
Is intel hd graphics on desktop more powerful than laptop intel hd graphics?

 

[Karsten75]

You ask some really interesting questions. I've never seen anynumbers attempting to isolate the TDP of integrated GPUs.

This article is near that, but still does not provide exact numbers.

However, we can ascertain from that that even with high-end integrated (and I use those words with caution, since no integrated graphics really are high-end) graphics, the total DPS can go as low as 25W. You most certainly can't take a GT 430 as a guide - everything has dropped in TDP since those days.

Note that sole ULT processors in the Intel Haswell lineup goes as low as 7W, so they really don't consume much power at all.

Now as to how powerful HD4600 graphics are? Not very.

Also, bear in mind that the integrated graphics uses RAM for processing, and thus if you have more and faster RAM, that affects performance in a good way. That makes 8 GB of DD3-1600 not great either. You will do better with DDR3-1866 or even faster.

 

[Guest]

I... umm.... never thought of it like that.

Well, let's get the basics out of the way first - The onboard graphics aren't going to come close to even the lowest end of dedicated video card. It's designed to put a picture on the screen and not much else. Intel have made some improvements when it comes to their Iris graphics, but not too much to really care about.

I'm not an expert on the subject, but I'm fairly certain you're not going to warrant any huge power saving upgrades by running a discrete card while the Intel graphics is 'disabled'. Certainly not to the point of the i3 consuming just 20w. Blimey, if that was the case you'd have thought Intel would release an i5 or i7 without the onboard GPU by now, boasted about its TDP, lowered the price and created a press release featuring only one line "In your face AMD!".

The 430 is an old card, you have to remember that they can't be compared based on their performance. If you jump back in time about 3 or 4 generations you'll find GPUs at the top of the range that consume about 250w - Much like the top-end GPUs today. However, due to the way technology develops, you're almost certain to find that you can gain the same performance with half the wattage using a modern mid-range card today compared to that old one. It's just how things work. Die-shrinks happen, more performance-per-watt is squeezed out with less heat and things move forward.

Is the desktop version "More powerful" than the laptop version? Most probably. Either that or they're exactly the same.
I honestly don't know on this one, but I do know that mobile CPUs will be significantly cut down to save on power and heat, due to the form factor they need to fit in, so it stands to reason that the onboard GPU would also get a cut.
Throwing more and faster RAM at something is always going to help, it especially helps the APUs, but you're not going to get any insane performance boost out of the onboard stuff with Intel.

Bottom line is, I'm not sure why you worry so much. The starting TDP of the i3 is so insanely low that even one of those 10 quid power supplies that go pop at the first sign of trouble could manage it. If you want to do anything seriously GPU intensive you will need to buy a separate card.
Think of it this way, one of the 4 halogen bulbs in my ceiling light consumes about the same power as that processor. It's not going to cost you a fortune on the 'leccy bills.