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The n100 is at least “not awful” at 3d graphics in my experience. It doesn’t compare to a discrete GPU of course, but it can handle basic games. Mine has been a

The n100 is at least “not awful” at 3d graphics in my experience. It doesn’t compare to a discrete GPU of course, but it can handle basic games. Mine has been able to run dolphin at the consoles’ native resolution. Although I think I had occasional stutters in some circumstances. I have an n100 mini pc hooked to a TV and I play couch coop games on it occasionally. It can do reasonably well tbh, but for simplicity I do end up streaming most games from a more powerful machine. I’ve heard performance is better in windows but I’m running mine slightly handicapped- as a proxmox VM with GPU pass through, and not a lot of ram. This same box also runs all my home automation and a few other services.

metadat 2y ago
Isn't discrete GPU the bottom of the barrel?
- snailmailman 2y ago
  A discrete gpu is like AMD/Nvidia cards. They are very capable for graphics, and essentially required for any higher end gaming. This machine would just have integrated graphics. Which aren’t the best but they are okay-ish. Better than I expected to be honest. I think AMD probably has better integrated graphics? I’ve heard great things about what the Steam deck is capable of for instance. But the N100’s price point is very hard to beat.
  - metadat 2y ago
    Oh you're right, I was thinking of integrated graphics! Thanks for setting me straight, haha.
  - kmeisthax 2y ago
    The reason why integrated graphics usually sucks is because the people putting the GPU on the chip expect you to put a dedicated card in anyway. An integrated GPU has to compete with the CPU cores for power budget, memory access[0], and die area. Intel doesn't want to risk half the die on a GPU nobody will use when they could sell more cores or cache instead. AMD instead manufactures separate "APU" product lines for people who want integrated graphics[1], and those have smaller core counts as a result. E.g. a Ryzen 8700G, the top of the APU stack, only has 8 cores while Ryzen 7950X3D will go up to 16. Apple's M-series chips[2] have similar core counts. The Steam Deck is even more graphics-specialized, having only 4 CPU cores in total. Intel would be wise to copy AMD's strategy and just completely omit the GPU from their desktop chips, save for a separate integrated graphics SKU. I suspect OEMs wouldn't like that, though, because it would require putting a bunch of e-waste GPUs[3] into high-end general-purpose systems. AMD traditionally has made a lot of enthusiast and system builder sales but I wonder if that will change in the future. The kinds of applications N100 is built for is going to be more graphics-heavy. I expect these chips to find their way into a lot of weird industrial shit, e.g. digital signage controllers, touchscreen kiosks, etc. where CPU performance doesn't matter but you need a display output and some graphics acceleration. The CPU is absolutely going to be bottom of the barrel anyway, so it's not hogging as many resources from the GPU. [0] CPUs want low memory latency since they run latency-sensitive code. GPUs want more memory channels and bandwidth since they run everything in extreme levels of batch processing and turn-around times don't matter. [1] AM5 Ryzen CPUs do have display outputs now, but AFAIK there's no hardware acceleration on it, you need a dedicated GPU anyway. [2] Excluding Pro/Max/Ultra. They are unique in that they are very large workstation chips with integrated graphics. They basically don't have any competition, everyone else just wires separate dies together at this scale, even in mobile workstations where this would make sense to do. Apple is so married to the integrated everything mentality that they even configured their MMUs and PCIe controllers to forbid external GPU access. [3] Anything in the $40-100 range. If you just need a display output you can buy cheaper and if you want to play games anything even slightly more expensive is a dramatically better value.

metadat 2y ago

Isn't discrete GPU the bottom of the barrel?

snailmailman 2y ago
A discrete gpu is like AMD/Nvidia cards. They are very capable for graphics, and essentially required for any higher end gaming. This machine would just have integrated graphics. Which aren’t the best but they are okay-ish. Better than I expected to be honest. I think AMD probably has better integrated graphics? I’ve heard great things about what the Steam deck is capable of for instance. But the N100’s price point is very hard to beat.
- metadat 2y ago
  Oh you're right, I was thinking of integrated graphics! Thanks for setting me straight, haha.
- kmeisthax 2y ago
  The reason why integrated graphics usually sucks is because the people putting the GPU on the chip expect you to put a dedicated card in anyway. An integrated GPU has to compete with the CPU cores for power budget, memory access[0], and die area. Intel doesn't want to risk half the die on a GPU nobody will use when they could sell more cores or cache instead. AMD instead manufactures separate "APU" product lines for people who want integrated graphics[1], and those have smaller core counts as a result. E.g. a Ryzen 8700G, the top of the APU stack, only has 8 cores while Ryzen 7950X3D will go up to 16. Apple's M-series chips[2] have similar core counts. The Steam Deck is even more graphics-specialized, having only 4 CPU cores in total. Intel would be wise to copy AMD's strategy and just completely omit the GPU from their desktop chips, save for a separate integrated graphics SKU. I suspect OEMs wouldn't like that, though, because it would require putting a bunch of e-waste GPUs[3] into high-end general-purpose systems. AMD traditionally has made a lot of enthusiast and system builder sales but I wonder if that will change in the future. The kinds of applications N100 is built for is going to be more graphics-heavy. I expect these chips to find their way into a lot of weird industrial shit, e.g. digital signage controllers, touchscreen kiosks, etc. where CPU performance doesn't matter but you need a display output and some graphics acceleration. The CPU is absolutely going to be bottom of the barrel anyway, so it's not hogging as many resources from the GPU. [0] CPUs want low memory latency since they run latency-sensitive code. GPUs want more memory channels and bandwidth since they run everything in extreme levels of batch processing and turn-around times don't matter. [1] AM5 Ryzen CPUs do have display outputs now, but AFAIK there's no hardware acceleration on it, you need a dedicated GPU anyway. [2] Excluding Pro/Max/Ultra. They are unique in that they are very large workstation chips with integrated graphics. They basically don't have any competition, everyone else just wires separate dies together at this scale, even in mobile workstations where this would make sense to do. Apple is so married to the integrated everything mentality that they even configured their MMUs and PCIe controllers to forbid external GPU access. [3] Anything in the $40-100 range. If you just need a display output you can buy cheaper and if you want to play games anything even slightly more expensive is a dramatically better value.