How's the 8400m gs vs 9800 pro?

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White0ut442

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I'm thinking about getting the dell xps m1330, but I'm worried about the 8400. This laptop will have to last me 3-4 years and I don't have any idea how good it is relative to my current 9800 pro 256. What can I expect from it?

if this belongs in the mobile computing section please move it
 
The 9800 pro is much faster. I don't know the mem bandwidth of the 8400 mobile, but I'm guessing it's no where near the 20 something GB/s the 9800 pro provides.
 
The 8400 could be better, but its nothing you would want to game on. For general usage it will be fine, but I doubt it will run any current games very well, let alone games in 2+ years you expect to have it.
 
I would probably agree, the 8400 is NOT a gaming card, it's like... an intergrated graphics card :D

The 9800 Pro is pretty old, but I had one in my older computer, it's not going to run anything on high settings, but games that are a bit older, like FEAR and Oblivion you can get away with pretty decent medium settings.

I think we tried Gothic 3 on it though... I don't think the 128mb VRAM agreed with that game. Ran like absolute crap.
 
http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_8400M.html

If you get an 8400M GT, it will kick the sh!t out of the 9800pro, hands down.


EDIT: The 8400M GT matches the 9800pro in memory bandwidth (19.2GB/s) but differs on the memory bus width (128-bit for the 8400 and 256-bit for the 9800), but beats it in texture fill rate, shader fill rate, and amount of memory (up to 512MB).

Now granted, this is still not a gaming card, but you can play most games (DX9) between 1024x768 to 1280x1024 on medium-high settings, but nothing like what you could do with a 8600M or higher card.

The 8400M G and GS both suck. The memory bus width (64-bit) is crappy as hell, and you would be lucky to play today's games at 1024x768 on medium settings. The 64-bit bus width is the biggest bottleneck I have ever seen! Yeah, integrated graphics is what I was thinking too, Citizen86. The only real difference is that the memory won't be shared (in most cases).
 
Oops, didn't read the first post well enough, it IS intergrated graphics :rolleyes:

I think you'll be able to play games, just don't expect them to always be running silky smooth;)
 
Hmm, I'll definitely be playing Warcraft 3, cs:source, starcraft, starcraft 2 when it comes out, ut2k4, halo, half-life 2, guild wars, and some more that I'm not thinking of. Not sure about future games other than starcraft 2, 3-4 years is a long time...

No problems with those?
 
Other than UT2k4 and maybe Starcraft 2, who knows, those games shouldn't be a huge problem. They're not too demanding, half-life 2 scales really well. Guild wars and Warcraft aren't very demanding as far as I remember. Don't expect amazing graphics, but I would expect that card to play it decent enough.
 
Halo might have some slow downs, I remember it didn't run all that great when it first came out, though that might have just been driver problems and I don't even remember the hardware it ran off at the time tbh, never cared for it much.

HL2 would be hard on it if you turn up the settings, but playing at lower ones should be fine, as it does a good job of scaling down (along with doom3).

Don't expect to play any future games expect ones like starcraft 2 which most likely won't have any special lightning and such, just good looking low poly models.
 
Red Falcon said:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_8400M.html

If you get an 8400M GT, it will kick the sh!t out of the 9800pro, hands down.


EDIT: The 8400M GT matches the 9800pro in memory bandwidth (19.2GB/s) and memory bus width (128-bit), but beats it in texture fill rate, shader fill rate, and amount of memory (up to 512MB).

Now granted, this is still not a gaming card, but you can play most games (DX9) between 1024x768 to 1280x1024 on medium-high settings, but nothing like what you could do with a 8600M or higher card.

The 8400M G and GS both suck. The memory bus width (64-bit) is crappy as hell, and you would be lucky to play today's games at 1024x768 on medium settings. The 64-bit bus width is the biggest bottleneck I have ever seen! Yeah, integrated graphics is what I was thinking too, Citizen86. The only real difference is that the memory won't be shared (in most cases).
Click to expand...
Unsure where you got your misinformation, but the 9800 is a 256-bit bus.
http://ati.amd.com/products/radeon9800/radeon9800pro/specs.html
Memory does not come into major play game-wise until you have the AA/AF cranked up, which few mobile solutions can do anyway. 128m is plenty most of the time.
 
how would an 8400 GS do with Source games? I just bought a Dell Vostro 1400.

I play Day of Defeat Source regulary on my desktop with an x1800xt but I cant bring it with me when I go abroad and I am anticipating to play Team Fortress 2 the day it comes out.

I dont care if it doesnt look that nice I just need some multiplayer action once a week or so.
 
Make sure to get an 8400M GT with 256MB or 512MB.

DO NOT get the 8400GS (mobile). It sux. Read my posts above to find out why.

Unless you enjoy playing your Source games at 800x600 (if you're lucky) on low settings, then by all means, go for it.

But for something better, I would highly recommend the 8400M GT.

Also, look here for more info.


BTW, I get almost all of my GPU info here.

Enjoy!

misan-thrope: You're right. The 9800 Mobility does in fact have a 256-bit memory bus, shader model 2.0b, and DX9.0c. This is a very good card (I used to have a 9600 mobility).
 
unfortunately I do not have a choice because I am on a budget and Dell does not offer the 8400gt as an upgrade option.
 
Then the best you're going to do is a lower res with low-medium settings.

Good luck to you.

If you do get it, could you please post some benchmarks on here from your personal experience. Thanks.
 
well the thing is my brother's desktop has a 9200 SE and he plays Counter-Strike Source on low-medium settings @ 1024x768.

I figured I should be able to at least do as well if not better?
 
yes a 9200se is junk .... source runs slower hardware really well.
 
It's probably coming with Vista as well? You better get 2 gigs of RAM if you want any type of Video I think.
 
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