News Intel Gen11 Takes iGPU Performance To Another Level

[abryant]

Benchmarks of Intel's Gen11 iGPU (Integrated Graphics Processing Unit) in GFXBench and CompuBench have finally surfaced. Read more here.

ZHIYE LIU
@zhiyeliu
Zhiye Liu is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He covers CPU, GPU and motherboard news.

 

[hannibal]

It all depends on graphic drivers... if Intel can make them good, why not!

 

[mras]

What is missing in the picture, is that it's an 'iris plus' variant, that was seen also at the Broadwell mobile segment.
It have its own dedicated 'level4 cache' at cpu, of 64MB (at the Broadwell).
Since the Iris Pro variants are so sparse to see (it was only made for Broadwell, mobile unit), its doubtful these testresults are that impressive.
Broadwell they were named Iris Pro, these are called Iris Plus... Some info are definitely not here, for us to make a fair judgement vs current (620) version.
The Broadwell Iris Pro variant, showed immense nice results as well, but since its not included on most cpu's from intel, its like comparing an orange with a watermelon...

 

[bit_user]

<pic>

I wonder what that block labelled "POSH" does. Sounds expensive...
; )

Anyway, if we assume the same clock speed, then 64 EUs should be 166.7% faster than their current UHD 620 GPU, with its 24 EUs. So, this is looking like it's bottlenecked by memory and/or power. Not surprising, especially if we're really talking about 15 W, here.

 

[Roger Har Dang]

so the AMD apu was a temporary solutions

 

[bit_user]

What is missing in the picture, is that it's an 'iris plus' variant, that was seen also at the Broadwell mobile segment.
It have its own dedicated 'level4 cache' at cpu, of 64MB (at the Broadwell).
Since the Iris Pro variants are so sparse to see (it was only made for Broadwell, mobile unit), its doubtful these testresults are that impressive.

Broadwell had a GT3 variant, with 48 EUs. However, in Skylake, there was a GT4 variant with 72 EUs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_graphics_processing_units#Eighth_generation

According to what I recall, the Iris Pro w/ eDRAM were possibly even bottlenecked on accessing it. The eDRAM bandwidth was much lower than you'd expect.

 

[bit_user]

so the AMD apu was a temporary solutions

You mean Kaby Lake G?

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/codename/136847/kaby-lake-g.html

I think that was pretty much a given. At least, once Intel announced the formation of its graphics division and there wasn't any announcement of it purchasing part of AMD, it was clear that arrangement wouldn't continue.

 

[yankeeDDL]

I have a question: isn't "Iris Plus" indicating that the CPU is actually a SoC, with a dedicated GPU?
So aren't we comparing apples with oranges?
Also, if I'm not mistaken, the previous Iris chip from Intel was more expensive than buying a discrete GPU, so price of this thing is also important, no?

 

[s1mon7]

Wait, this is not going to end up in your regular i3/i5-powered devices, correct? In that case, the discrete graphics in i7-grade laptops are vastly superior, while the Ryzen chips are much cheaper.

On another hand if this is the default iGPU on the upcoming Intel chips, that's a neat upgrade and will allow people to actually game on Intel chips to some extent, and it's been way overdue.

If this is a 64 EU chip that performs so poorly, on another hand, what's up with the talk of the brand new iGPU arch? It's either clearly not this or it isn't substantially better than what's currently out there - it's just a lot of EUs at a relatively poor performance each then, all things considered. It doesn't seem like much of an improvement per processing unit and there are no groundbreaking upgrades other than throwing more old firepower at bad bottlenecks.

 

[Math Geek]

the last time they made a worthwhile iGP like this, they only put it in a single high end expensive chip.

if they decide to make this a mobile chip exclusive it would be a heck of a big deal. if they went with the full line-up to get this, it would be a massive deal.

this might be why we're seeing all the IGP free sku's coming put. we might start seeing chips with and without this decent performing iGP like AMD does.

 

[thisisaname]

If they can make a great GPU for their discrete graphic card and make them work with this iGPU 2020 could be very interesting.

 

[mras]

Broadwell had a GT3 variant, with 48 EUs. However, in Skylake, there was a GT4 variant with 72 EUs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_graphics_processing_units#Eighth_generation

According to what I recall, the Iris Pro w/ eDRAM were possibly even bottlenecked on accessing it. The eDRAM bandwidth was much lower than you'd expect.

Acording to tests, I think here at tomshardware, they were upward 150% faster than (2.5 times) than their none edramm variants.
And yes, they used more power, than their counter mobile parts, but it smashed all in the tests I saw it at, at integrated gpu level.

Going on package 64-128MB level cache/ram is defo gonna be faster than accessing your ddr4 memory; or, said in other words: The Increase in EU from 48 to 72, couldn't alone make up for that 'giant' improvement over the none edram versions, from the tests I saw.

My point is just, that a Iris variant beats out a HD variant, ain't that impressive at all, since they' always done that, with huge margins.

NB: The listed memory speeds at wiki, is the speed of the ddr4 memory, not the edram
NBB: Im' quite sure i've read Intel was opening up for using the edram for cpu, in scenarios where the igp couldn't use all of the level4 cache(which technical was a cache for the igp, at first, but promised also cpu later..). I never read that this came true however..

 

[cryoburner]

If they can make a great GPU for their discrete graphic card and make them work with this iGPU 2020 could be very interesting.

You mean like a multi-GPU configuration paired with the integrated graphics? Considering that this appears to only offer roughly GT 1030-level performance, while even something like a GTX 1060 or RX 580 would likely be around 4 times as fast, any performance benefits from pairing it with anything but a low-end card would be minimal. AMD offered something similar some years back...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_Hybrid_Graphics