AMD Radeon HD 7290 vs NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS

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General info

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in performance rankingnot ratednot rated
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
ArchitectureG8x (2007−2008)Terascale 2 (2009−2015)
GPU code nameG84MZacate
Market segmentLaptopLaptop
Release date9 June 2007 (16 years old)1 July 2011 (12 years old)
Current price$66 $160

Technical specs

General performance parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. These parameters indirectly speak of performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider their benchmark and gaming test results. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores1680
Core clock speed600 MHz280 MHz
Boost clock speedno data400 MHz
Number of transistors210 million450 million
Manufacturing process technology80 nm40 nm
Power consumption (TDP)20 Watt18 Watt
Texture fill rate3.6003.200
Floating-point performance28.8 gflopsno data

Size and compatibility

Information on GeForce 8600M GS and Radeon HD 7290 compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For notebook video cards it's notebook size, connection slot and bus, if the video card is inserted into a slot instead of being soldered to the notebook motherboard.

Laptop sizemedium sizedno data
InterfaceMXM-IIIGP

Memory

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory typeGDDR3, GDDR2System Shared
Maximum RAM amount512 MBSystem Shared
Memory bus width128 BitSystem Shared
Memory clock speed700 MHzSystem Shared
Memory bandwidth12.8 GB/sno data
Shared memory-+

Video outputs and ports

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display ConnectorsNo outputsNo outputs

API support

List of supported graphics and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX11.1 (10_0)11.2 (11_0)
Shader Model4.05.0
OpenGL3.34.4
OpenCL1.11.2
VulkanN/AN/A
CUDA1.1no data

Synthetic benchmark performance

Non-gaming benchmark performance comparison. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.


Passmark

This is the most ubiquitous GPU benchmark, part of Passmark PerformanceTest suite. It gives the graphics card a thorough evaluation under various types of load, providing four separate benchmarks for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11 and 12 (the last being done in 4K resolution if possible), and few more tests engaging DirectCompute capabilities.

Benchmark coverage: 25%

8600M GS 70
HD 7290 111
+58.6%

Radeon HD 7290 outperforms GeForce 8600M GS by 59% in Passmark.

Advantages and disadvantages


Recency 9 June 2007 1 July 2011
Maximum RAM amount 512 MB System Shared
Chip lithography 80 nm 40 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 20 Watt 18 Watt

We couldn't decide between GeForce 8600M GS and Radeon HD 7290. We've got no test results to judge.


Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

User ratings

Do you think we are right or mistaken in our choice? Vote by clicking "Like" button near your favorite graphics card.


NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS
GeForce 8600M GS
AMD Radeon HD 7290
Radeon HD 7290

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4.5 11 votes

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3.3 16 votes

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Questions and comments

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