Question about the GTX 965M (N16E-GR)

[Ho0pz4sho]

Hey guys,

 

So I've recently decided to buy a new budget gaming laptop (with a budget of roughly 1100 euros). I've stumbled across a Clevo N150RF laptop. It has pretty much everything you'd want for a budget gaming laptop:

• 15.6”(39.62cm) IPS FHD (1920x1080) 16:9 panel, 3.5mm
• Intel Core i5-6700HQ Quad Core (SkyLake) 2,6 - 3,5 Ghz 6MB L3 45W
• NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 965M (N16E-GR) 2GB GDDR5
• 1x8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X IMPACT 1600MHz CL9 DDR3L
• 1000GB HDD 7200rpm
• 240GB KINGSTON SSDNow M.2 2280 G2, SATA 6Gb/s (550MB/R, 330MB/W)
• Ultra Slim 8x SATA DVD±R/RW/Dual Layer (+ 24x CD-RW)
• Intel® Dual Band Wireless-AC 8260

The final price is roughly 1100 euros, so very close to my budget. However, I have a question, and this is probably the best sub-forum to post it in.

Does anyone else have a laptop with the 965M (N16E-GR) installed? It came out in Q1 of 2016, it's supposedly the "refreshed" version of the old 965M and 15% faster than it. I've searched high and low for more details about the card, but besides a few NotebookCheck pages and a couple of YouTube videos, nothing comes up.

 

If anyone around here has a laptop equipped with it, and has similar specs to the above one, can you please tell me if it's good enough for medium-high, 1080p gaming?

 

Thanks in advance!

Chris

[don_svetlio]

There are no old revisions being sold IIRC.

[Ho0pz4sho]

2 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

There are no old revisions being sold IIRC.

What do you mean?

[don_svetlio]

Just now, Ho0pz4sho said:

What do you mean?

You can only buy the new revision as the old one is not being made

[Ho0pz4sho]

1 minute ago, don_svetlio said:

You can only buy the new revision as the old one is not being made

While I appreciate your answer, I don't think it answers my question.  I understand that the old 965M may not be sold anymore, but I was asking about the performance of the current one. Regardless of the old one being sold or not, some people may still have it, and I'm not interested in reviews for the old card. That's why I specified that I'm interested about the new version.

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, Ho0pz4sho said:

While I appreciate your answer, I don't think it answers my question.  I understand that the old 965M may not be sold anymore, but I was asking about the performance of the current one. Regardless of the old one being sold or not, some people may still have it, and I'm not interested in reviews for the old card. That's why I specified that I'm interested about the new version.

What game are you interested in?

[Ho0pz4sho]

• GTA V
• Star Citizen
• The Division
• DOOM
• NBA 2K16
• The Witcher 3
• The Evil Within
• Fallout 4

 

Just to name a few. I'm a bit concerned about the 2GB of VRAM it offers. And of course, the overall performance in these games, because I intend to buy the laptop to actually be able to play these games at reasonable resolution/texture details/fps.

 

Thanks!

 

[carzacc]

2 minutes ago, Ho0pz4sho said:

• GTA V
• Star Citizen
• The Division
• DOOM
• NBA 2K16
• The Witcher 3
• The Evil Within
• Fallout 4

 

Just to name a few. I'm a bit concerned about the 2GB of VRAM it offers. And of course, the overall performance in these games, because I intend to buy the laptop to actually be able to play these games at reasonable resolution/texture details/fps.

 

Thanks!

 

The VRAM won't be the problem since the GPU isn't powerful enough to get to a point where VRAM becomes the bottleneck

[Ho0pz4sho]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

The VRAM won't be the problem since the GPU isn't powerful enough to get to a point where VRAM becomes the bottleneck

How do you know? I've heard the same argument when it comes to the GTX 960M 4GB version. The new card uses a different architecture, I'm not too good at this, but still, how can you know it's not powerful enough?

[don_svetlio]

2 minutes ago, Ho0pz4sho said:

How do you know? I've heard the same argument when it comes to the GTX 960M 4GB version. The new card uses a different architecture, I'm not too good at this, but still, how can you know it's not powerful enough?

He is wrong, VRAM usage is not connected to core usage. 2GB is tight, yes. 4GB is optimal.

As for performance, medium settings 50fps is what you can expect in AAA titles

[carzacc]

3 minutes ago, Ho0pz4sho said:

How do you know? I've heard the same argument when it comes to the GTX 960M 4GB version. The new card uses a different architecture, I'm not too good at this, but still, how can you know it's not powerful enough?

It has the same number of CUDA cores of the 960 but lower clock speed, and the 960 is going to get higher boost clocks still since it is in a desktop environment and the 960 doesn't need more than 2 GB

[carzacc]

2 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

He is wrong, VRAM usage is not connected to core usage. 2GB is tight, yes. 4GB is optimal.

As for performance, medium settings 50fps is what you can expect in AAA titles

VRAM usage is related to game settings and resolution, and that card sure can't power anything that will require more than 2 GB of VRAM

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

It has the same number of CUDA cores of the 960 but lower clock speed, and the 960 is going to get higher boost clocks still since it is in a desktop environment and the 960 doesn't need more than 2 GB

the 2GB 960 has VRAM issues in modern games like Tomb Riader 2016 (hell, my 860K uses 4GB in that game)

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

VRAM usage is related to game settings and resolution, and that card sure can't power anything that will require more than 2 GB of VRAM

It can. It can max textures at 1080p an those take up a LOT of VRAM.

[carzacc]

2 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

the 2GB 960 has VRAM issues in modern games like Tomb Riader 2016 (hell, my 860K uses 4GB in that game)

I guess it's more of an exception than the norm

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

I guess it's more of an exception than the norm

GTA V does this, Skyrim does this, TitanFall does this. Most modern game do this

[carzacc]

2 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

It can. It can max textures at 1080p an those take up a LOT of VRAM.

Maybe I am a bit too skeptical about laptop GPU's then

:C my fault, I am sorry

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

Maybe I am a bit too skeptical about laptop GPU's then

:C my fault, I am sorry

Laptop GPUs can use a LOT of VRAM - the 980M comes in 8GB versions

[carzacc]

3 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

Laptop GPUs can use a LOT of VRAM - the 980M comes in 8GB versions

What? That's more than a 980 Ti has

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

What? That's more than a 980 Ti has

Yup. The laptop 980 (desktop class 980) also come with 8GB

[carzacc]

1 minute ago, don_svetlio said:

Yup. The laptop 980 (desktop class 980) also come with 8GB

Because that's a 980, so it's obvious that it has to be the same as a standard desktop 980

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, carzacc said:

Because that's a 980, so it's obvious that it has to be the same as a standard desktop 980

It's the same, at 1200MHz core if well cooled and with 8GB GDDR5

 

[Zodiark1593]

1 hour ago, carzacc said:

VRAM usage is related to game settings and resolution, and that card sure can't power anything that will require more than 2 GB of VRAM

Certain settings require additional shader power and a small amount additional VRAM. Some settings require both a substantial sum of VRAM and shader power (shadows), and some settings simply require more VRAM and texture fillrate (textures). 

 

Textures in particular cost a negligible performance hit (fps) in exchange for a very noticeable bump in quality, so long as enough VRAM is onboard. However, once VRAM runs out, the latency and speed of moving data across the PCI-e bus can introduce highly inconsistent performance, something considered worse than consistent low performance.

[Ho0pz4sho]

3 hours ago, don_svetlio said:

He is wrong, VRAM usage is not connected to core usage. 2GB is tight, yes. 4GB is optimal.

As for performance, medium settings 50fps is what you can expect in AAA titles

I guess I'll wait a bit more and see if the laptop supplier brings in the 4GB version of the card. Thanks for the answer.

[Ho0pz4sho]

3 hours ago, carzacc said:

Maybe I am a bit too skeptical about laptop GPU's then

:C my fault, I am sorry

Why did you answer to the topic if you don't know much about laptop GPUs then?