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10 Replies Last post: Jun 27, 2007 11:40 AM by ukrdennis  
Click to view ukrdennis's profile New Member 6 posts since
Jun 26, 2007
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Jun 26, 2007 2:58 PM

A question conserning GeForce 8400M GS, please help!

Ok, I got a question. I'm buying a new laptop. It is an HP special Edition. So, then I go customize it and they give me an option "383MB NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS" or "Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator X3100".
I choose the geforce card, then when I read about it. It says, "The NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) 8400M GS delivers improved quality and performance levels in 3D graphics. If configured with the 1GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm), there will be 128MB dedicated memory and up to 255MB shared memory. If configured with the 2GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm), there will be 128MB dedicated memory and up to 767MB shared memory. Key Features: Fully unified shader core dynamically allocates processing power to geometry, vertex, and pixel shading operations, enabling life-like realism and even in complex scenes. Completely unified and optimized for current DirectX 9 and next generation Direct X 10 games and applications. NVIDIA Lumenex(tm) engine delivers incredible image quality, floating point accuracy, and fast frame rates. DISCLAIMERS: Shared video memory (UMA) uses part of the total system memory for video performance. System memory dedicated to video performance is not available for other use by other programs. NVIDIA and GeForce are registered trademarks of NVIDIA Corp." So I on other hand got 4GB of ram. This somewhat of confused me, and I know this may sound stupid, and that I should go to the 1st grade to learn english all over again but I'm confused, so does it have 128mg? 255mg? or 383mg? or what? And again I know this may sound stupid but I really wanna make sure before I buy it. If you know the answer it would help if you could e-mail it to me or if you don't want ot just post a replay, but e-mail would be nice because i don't realy chec k my forums alot. Well, thank you if you know for the answers (if you have any), and have a great day or night. Whatever works for you guys. :) Oh crap almost forgot my e-mail, it is ukrdennis at AOL dot com

Sincerely ukrdennis or Dennis Khalevskyy :)
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Click to view smax013's profile Member Moderators 3,720 posts since
Jan 28, 2007
2. Jun 26, 2007 3:08 PM in response to: ukrdennis
Re: A question conserning GeForce 8400M GS, please help!
ukrdennis wrote:Ok, I got a question. I'm buying a new laptop. It is an HP special Edition. So, then I go customize it and they give me an option "383MB NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS" or "Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator X3100".

I choose the geforce card, then when I read about it. It says, "The NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) 8400M GS delivers improved quality and performance levels in 3D graphics. If configured with the 1GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm), there will be 128MB dedicated memory and up to 255MB shared memory. If configured with the 2GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm), there will be 128MB dedicated memory and up to 767MB shared memory. Key Features: Fully unified shader core dynamically allocates processing power to geometry, vertex, and pixel shading operations, enabling life-like realism and even in complex scenes. Completely unified and optimized for current DirectX 9 and next generation Direct X 10 games and applications. NVIDIA Lumenex(tm) engine delivers incredible image quality, floating point accuracy, and fast frame rates. DISCLAIMERS: Shared video memory (UMA) uses part of the total system memory for video performance. System memory dedicated to video performance is not available for other use by other programs. NVIDIA and GeForce are registered trademarks of NVIDIA Corp." So I on other hand got 4GB of ram. This somewhat of confused me, and I know this may sound stupid, and that I should go to the 1st grade to learn english all over again but I'm confused, so does it have 128mg? 255mg? or 383mg? or what? And again I know this may sound stupid but I really wanna make sure before I buy it. If you know the answer it would help if you could e-mail it to me or if you don't want ot just post a replay, but e-mail would be nice because i don't realy chec k my forums alot. Well, thank you if you know for the answers (if you have any), and have a great day or night. Whatever works for you guys. :) Oh crap almost forgot my e-mail, it is ukrdennis at AOL dot com


Sincerely ukrdennis or Dennis Khalevskyy :)


It sounds like this graphics card makes use of both dedicated memory as well as shared memory. The dedicated memory would used ONLY for the graphics subsystem and would be contained on/with the graphics subsystem. Shared memory is a portion of your system memory (i.e. your main RAM) that gets used when needed by the graphics subsystems. In general, it is better to have dedicated memory for graphics because if the graphics card is using system memory to have graphics processing, then that memory is not available at that time to run programs. It further seems that the amount of shared memory that the graphics card can/will use depends on how much RAM you have installed on your system. It would seem that with 4 gig of RAM, the graphics card will have 128 mb of dedicated memory and up to 767 mb of shared memory...leaving about 3.3 gb of RAM left for "normal" program use if all the shared memory is being used for graphics.

I also believe that dedicated graphics memory is typically faster as the graphics process is directly linked to it, where as the graphics process has to access the shared memory through the system bus.

Someone else might be able to elaborate more or correct me if I am wrong.


[soapbox] Backup good...no backup bad!! [/soap box]
Click to view smax013's profile Member Moderators 3,720 posts since
Jan 28, 2007
4. Jun 27, 2007 7:21 AM in response to: ukrdennis
ukrdennis wrote:well yeah but i don't think im gonig to have that much of a problem because i have so much ram in that laptop so it will probably won't effect my preformnce. I asked the HP guys they says it is good as long as you got like lots of ram like i do. And they sad it is enough to like play the newwest games and **** i asked like the guys who made oblivion they say yeah it is good card and it's a medium range graphics so yeah, well thx for the reply

Yeah, it should be LOTS better than on-board graphics. Most on-board graphics ONLY use shared memory. And since such systems tend to be "lower end" systems, they also don't necessarily have a lot of RAM. Thus, the shared memory issue can become an issue for such systems.

If you do go with it, then enjoy!


[soapbox] Backup good...no backup bad!! [/soap box]
Click to view rgreen4's profile Old Hand 3,655 posts since
Oct 22, 2006
5. Jun 27, 2007 7:39 AM in response to: ukrdennis
HP Special Edition Graphics
smax013 and ukerdennis, I don't think the graphics card will take any of the shared memory unless it needs it, and then will take only what it needs.

If you read the specs on the nVidial desktop cards, even the 512MB cards will allude to the fact that if more memory is needed, they will take "shared memory". This way when your graphics application needs more than the onboard memory it doesn't hit a wall.

ukrdennis - the special edition is a beautiful machine. I actually saw an AMD version at Best Buy. I just wish they offed that in the 9500 series. Since you have the 4GB memory option, I would assume that you got the 64bit version of Vista. I will warn you that some programs will not run in the 64bit. The current programs will catch up in a while, but that is sometimes the penalty early adopters pay. But, the plus side is that your machine will not be obsoleted for a long, long time.


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Click to view rgreen4's profile Old Hand 3,655 posts since
Oct 22, 2006
7. Jun 27, 2007 9:37 AM in response to: ukrdennis
Laptop
ukrdennis - High School is not supposed to be painful. It may seem that way sometimes. Just remember several things. Something that might seem earth shattering now, wil be totally forgotten in 10 years. Keep the laptop close and keep an eye on it. Unfortunately, they are very attractive for those who do not respect private property.

Invest in some way of backing up the laptop on a very regular basis. If you have a network at home, you might use the network to back up to a networked drive, or use a USB drive. XP had briefcase which is/was a little clunky, Vista has a syncronizing prograrm where you can sync the files on a laptop with an external drive. I can't use it because I also have some XP machines so I'm still using briefcase.


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Click to view rgreen4's profile Old Hand 3,655 posts since
Oct 22, 2006
9. Jun 27, 2007 11:00 AM in response to: ukrdennis
Laptop
Only if he is there all the time and locks the door when he leaves. Otherwise its no better than leaving it in the cafeteria.


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