can it be done ? IGPU + Quad Channel

The_Vincent · May 2, 2019

I've recently been looking into what the experience of gaming on an IGPU would be like while saving up for top tier graphics card.
So i did what I usually do and looked to youtube to show me but nothing.
I google research and it turns out the only way to do it is maybe with the older and still very expensive cpus and DDR3 but not any current combination of Chip Socket, Chipset, and Chip .

Can someone capable like *cough* linus tech tips * cough* this forums users double check this for me and if possible review what the experience is like.

This was all brought on by wondering if an IGPU/AGPU coupled with Quad Channel DDR4 2666+Mhz could provide a good 1080p experience or better yet where it would rank in comparison to a dedicated GPU.

badreg · May 2, 2019

There is no APU/iGPU on the market that supports quad channel memory. Additionally, graphical performance is primarily determined by the number and speed of stream processors, rather than the speed of memory.

porina · May 2, 2019

The Ryzen APUs would still count as iGPU, and they could offer some basic performance that wont totally suck. Look up some reviews of 2400G for example. https://www.anandtech.com/show/12425/marrying-vega-and-zen-the-amd-ryzen-5-2400g-review

As for the question if quad channel ram would help, then yes to an extent. It's always a balance of both bandwidth and also the cores in the GPU. If you swing much one way, the other side becomes the bigger limit. This is in part why even if they wanted to, they can't put too much GPU in a CPU socket as they'll both fight for limited ram bandwidth. Also quad channel doesn't make sense in lower cost builds even if it were to be supported.