Intel Iris Pro 5200 Graphics Review: Core i7-4950HQ Tested
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 1, 2013 10:01 AM ESTThe Core i7-4950HQ Mobile CRB
At a high level, Iris Pro 5200 would seem to solve both problems that plagued Intel graphics in the past: a lack of GPU hardware and a lack of memory bandwidth. As a mostly mobile-focused design, and one whose launch partner isn’t keen on giving out early samples, it seemed almost impossible to evaluate Iris Pro in time for the Haswell launch. That was until a week ago when this showed up:
What may look like a funny mid-tower from a few years ago is actually home to one of Intel’s mobile Customer Reference Boards (CRB). Although the chassis is desktop-sized, everything inside is optimized for mobile. It’s just easier to build things larger, especially when it comes to testing and diagnosing problems.
The silicon on-board is a 47W Core i7-4950HQ, the lowest end launch SKU with Iris Pro 5200 graphics. The chassis is obviously overkill for a 47W part, but the performance we get with this machine should be representative of any i7-4950HQ system with a cooler capable of dissipating 47W.
If you read our Haswell CPU review you’ll know that Intel tried to be stingy with telling us die sizes and transistor counts for the bulk of the Haswell lineup, electing to only give us data on dual-core Haswell GT3 and quad-core Haswell GT2. Knowing that mobile parts ship without integrated heat spreaders, I went to work on pulling off the i7-4950HQ’s heatsink (after I finished testing, just in case).
With the heatsink off and thermal paste wiped off, I used my bargain basement calipers to get a rough idea of die area. This is what I came up with:
| Intel Haswell | |||||||||||||||||
| CPU Configuration | GPU Configuration | Die Size | Transistor Count | ||||||||||||||
| Haswell GT3e (QC) | Quad-Core | GT3e | 264mm2 + 84mm2 | ? | |||||||||||||
| Haswell GT2 (QC) | Quad-Core | GT2 | 177mm2 | 1.4B | |||||||||||||
| Haswell ULT GT3 | Dual-Core | GT3 | 181mm2 | 1.3B | |||||||||||||
The Crystalwell die measures 7mm x 12mm (84mm^2), while the quad-core Haswell + GT3 die is a whopping 264mm^2 (16.2mm x 16.3mm). Working backwards from the official data Intel provided (177mm^2 for quad-core GT2), I came up with an 87mm^2 adder for the extra hardware in Haswell GT3 vs. GT2. Doubling that 87mm^2 we get a rough idea of how big the full 40 EU Haswell GPU might be: 174mm^2. If my math is right, this means that in a quad-core Haswell GT3 die, around 65% of the die area is GPU. This is contrary to the ~33% in a quad-core Haswell GT2. I suspect a dual-core + GT3 design is at least half GPU.
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Phrontis - Wednesday, June 5, 2013 - link
I can't wait for one on these on a mITX board such with 3 decent monitor outputs. Theres enough power for the sort of things I do if not for gaming.Phrontis
khanov - Friday, June 7, 2013 - link
Without a direct comparison between HD 5000/5100 and Iris Pro 5200 with Crystalwell,how can we conclude that Crystalwell has any effect in any of the game benchmarks? While it clearly is of benefit in some compute tasks, in the game benchmarks you only compare to HD 4600 with half as many EU's and to Nvidia and AMD with their different architectures.
We really need to see Iris Pro 5200 vs HD5100 to get an apples to apples comparison and be able to determine if Crystalwell is worth the extra money.
MODEL3 - Sunday, June 9, 2013 - link
Haswell ULT GT3 (Dual-Core+GT3) = 181mm2 and 40 EU Haswell GPU is 174mm^2.7mm^2 for everything else except GT3?
n13L5 - Tuesday, June 11, 2013 - link
" An Ultrabook SKU with Crystalwell would make a ton of sense, but given where Ultrabooks are headed (price-wise) I’m not sure Intel could get any takers."They sure seem to be going up in price, rather than down at the moment...
anandfan86 - Tuesday, June 18, 2013 - link
Intel has once again made their naming so confusing that even their own marketing weasels can't get it right. Notice that the Intel slide titled "4th Gen Intel Core Processors H-Processors Line" calls the graphics in the i7-4950HQ and i7-4850HQ "Intel HD Graphics 5200" instead of the correct name which is "Intel Iris Pro Graphics 5200". This slide calls the graphics in the i7-4750HQ "Intel Iris Pro Graphics 5200" which indicates that the slide was made after the creation of that name. It is little wonder that most media outlets are acting as if the biggest tech news of the month is the new pastel color scheme in iOS 7.Myoozak - Wednesday, June 26, 2013 - link
The peak theoretical GPU performance calculations shown are wrong for Intel's GFLOPS numbers. Correct numbers are half of what is shown. The reason is that Intel's execution units are made of of an integer vec4 processor and a floating-point vec4 processor. This article correctly states it has a 2xvec4 SIMD, but does not point out that half is integer and half is floating-point. For a GFLOPS computation, one should only include the floating-point operations, which means only half of that execution unit's silicon is getting used. The reported computation performance would only be correct if you had an algorithm with a perfect mix of integer & float math that could be co-issued. To compare apples to apples, you need to stick to GFLOPS numbers, and divide all the Intel numbers in the table by 2. For example, peak FP ops on the Intel HD4000 would be 8, not 16. Compared this way, Intel is not stomping all over AMD & nVidia for compute performance, but it does appear they are catching up.alexcyn - Tuesday, August 6, 2013 - link
I heard that Intel 22nm process equals TSMS 26nm, so the difference is not that much.alexcyn - Tuesday, August 6, 2013 - link
I heard that Intel 22nm process equals TSMC 26nm, so the difference is not that big.Doughboy(^_^) - Friday, August 9, 2013 - link
I think Intel could push their yield way up by offering 32MB and 64MB versions of Crystalwell for i3 and i5 processors. They could charge the same markup for the 128, but sell the 32/64 for cheaper. It would cost Intel less and probably let them take even further market share from low-end dGPUs.krr711 - Monday, February 10, 2014 - link
It is funny how a non-PC company changed the course of Intel forever for the good. I hope that Intel is wise enough to use this to spring-board the PC industry to a new, grand future. No more tick-tock nonsense arranged around sucking as many dollars out of the customer as possible, but give the world the processing power it craves and needs to solve the problems of tomorrow. Let this be your heritage and your profits will grow to unforeseen heights. Surprise us!