3 ms·

My macbook runs on Intel integrated graphics, and I frequently want just a little bit more performance for day-to-day work. In particular, if you set a 4k moni

My macbook runs on Intel integrated graphics, and I frequently want just a little bit more performance for day-to-day work. In particular, if you set a 4k monitor to 1440p effective resolution in macOS, it renders a 5k (1440p doubled) image and then down-scales that to 4k. This seems like it would be ideal but in practice, things are too laggy. I upgraded from a 1440p monitor to a 4k one, but I ended up going down to 1080p effective in order to get acceptable performance due to intel's under-powered integrated graphics. I'm fairly positive that AMD's APUs would be sufficient in this scenario. On the gaming side, I also just got a GPD Win 2, which is a little handheld gaming computer that runs on a Intel Core m3 (graphics and all). At 720p, the Intel integrated graphics can actual run a lot of games, especially older ones. But OF COURSE I'd like to see better performance there. Unfortunately, AMD doesn't have anything available yet for that power/TDP range (7w).

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
> This seems like it would be ideal This seems lazy. Instead of properly supporting 2160p you get a sad kludge instead.
- xenadu02 8y ago
  The work required of developers to support arbitrary DPI is more or less impossible. No system anywhere has ever managed it. Intel GPUs are underpowered and have been for a long time. Their drivers are also full of bugs and odd edge cases. Intel saw iGPUs as a value-add for makers of cheap systems and treated them as such. That's a major point of Sinofsky's piece: graphics ended up being important and Intel knee-capped themselves and all their partners by failing to understand that. He gives an example: You can't put a discrete GPU into that 10" laptop or Intel will kill you by removing your discounts and kickbacks, making your laptop more expensive than your competitors.
  - OkGoDoIt 8y ago
    Windows has been attempting to get this working well for years, and for the most part it was horrible. But over the last year or so I've found arbitrary DPI scaling on Windows has worked very well, at least meeting my expectations and being more flexible than Mac's implementation. Mac took the less painful route but at this point Windows might finally start having the advantage here.

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago

> This seems like it would be ideal This seems lazy. Instead of properly supporting 2160p you get a sad kludge instead.

xenadu02 8y ago
The work required of developers to support arbitrary DPI is more or less impossible. No system anywhere has ever managed it. Intel GPUs are underpowered and have been for a long time. Their drivers are also full of bugs and odd edge cases. Intel saw iGPUs as a value-add for makers of cheap systems and treated them as such. That's a major point of Sinofsky's piece: graphics ended up being important and Intel knee-capped themselves and all their partners by failing to understand that. He gives an example: You can't put a discrete GPU into that 10" laptop or Intel will kill you by removing your discounts and kickbacks, making your laptop more expensive than your competitors.
- OkGoDoIt 8y ago
  Windows has been attempting to get this working well for years, and for the most part it was horrible. But over the last year or so I've found arbitrary DPI scaling on Windows has worked very well, at least meeting my expectations and being more flexible than Mac's implementation. Mac took the less painful route but at this point Windows might finally start having the advantage here.