Nvidia uncloaks GeForce 800M GPU series for gaming notebooks Nvidia has completely revamped its notebook graphics line with a seven-GPU launch of the new GeForce 800M series, four bearing the GeForce GTX moniker and three sans GTX. Performance-improvement chart comparing Nvidia GeForce GTX 7xx series to GeForce GTX 8xx series The further down the ladder of oomph, the greater the …
Oh, every mobile GPU has something similar, even earlier nVidia's.
Pretty much, it's pointless and doesn't work as advertised.
When you're plugged in, it doesn't take effect anyway.
When you're on battery, it just dims the screens, clocks down the GPU etc. It means your games run slower on battery, so most people who buy something like this - a high-end mobile GPU in a laptop - tend to want the most bang for their buck anyway, even if it only lasts 30 minutes less, they will just disable it or set minimum speeds that they know work. If you not one of those people, then you'll suffer jerky games on switchover and while on battery quite happily anyway - which makes me question why you'd buy a high-end GPU to use while on battery in the first place.
My laptop has a 500 mobile nVidia graphics. It does the same stuff. As did my previous MSI with a similar, but earlier, chip (that one even let you "overclock" the chip with a Turbo button on the machine that voided your warranty). All the battery-saving got you a handful of minutes more out of the laptop if you were using the GPU. If you weren't, then it was mostly moot anyway and just the display-dimming saved more than enough power to get you out of a tight spot.
But when you actually want to play a game, you just plug it in. Anything else is just faffing about.
>But probably won't work on Linux ergo useless to me.
What are you using discrete graphics for under Linux? If the idea is tune power consumption for a consistant 30fps for games. Productivity applications that use the GPU tend run the GPU at max until the task (simulation, rendering, transcoding) is complete - just viewing most CAD models doesn't place that great demand on GPU, since most of the time the scene isn't moving.
If you want feature parity with Windows drivers, you might want to support SteamOS, or buy a beer or two for the Noveau mailing group who are working on nVidia Linux drivers. They have been getting help from nVidia since October.
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