No more discrete GPU.

Intel’s Haswell CPU will be released in a few weeks and it shows the direction in which integrated graphics processors are heading. Not only will the Haswell CPU – the latest variant of the i3/i5/i7 common in desktop and laptop computers – use less power than its Ivy Bridge and Sandy Bridge predecessors, it will also feature a substantially beefed up integrated graphics processor which should obviate the need for a separate graphics card in heavy-duty computers. Intel has made great strides in integrated GPUs and Haswell builds on that with a greater than ever amount of integrated GPU RAM. Specifications suggest that this will be more than enough for all but sophisticated gaming, meaning that the newest versions of PCs, Macs and Hackintoshes will be housed in far smaller enclosures, likely with cool and power frugal SSDs for storage and no need for fan cooling.

No more big boxes the volume of a handful of bricks, just a small device with HDMI and Light Peak/Thunderbolt sockets to connect to your computer display or large screen TV.

The estimable tech site AnandTech has a fascinating article on Haswell which you can read by clicking the image below:

Click the picture.

The erudite and informed Comments to that piece repay reading if GPU/CPU performance is your thing.

I expect the next HackMini chez Pindelski to be the volume of a few sticks of butter, and silent as the grave. Pricing? I would expect the usual i3/i5/i7 pricing – $130/$230/$330 for the regular Haswell, $50 more for the ones with the enhanced GPU. That’s a lot less than a discrete GT650 GPU card which runs twice that amount.

It’s common to see Intel being written off as yesterday’s news, but I would say “Not so fast”. Serious photo and video processing is not about to migrate to tablets, not just yet. We will soon be accessing Haswell-powered servers for every web search. Ostensibly only available in OEM motherboards as it’s a soldered-on design, you can bet that the smart people at Asus/Acer/Gigabyte/Zotac/PNY etc. will be making mobos with these installed for the PC and Hack builder. If I were Nvidia, the leading maker of discrete GPUs, I would be a tad concerned. And you can also bet that Apple – assuming they are not asleep, not necessarily a valid assumption – will be making a MacMini or enhanced AppleTV with this Haswell variant on board. It seems the performance will be better than the Nvidia GT650M already found in many MacBook Pros, a very decent GPU indeed.

As for my use, I can see the excellent 11″ 2012 MacBook Air moving on in favor of a Haswell powered 2013 model, the significant gain being in lower power use in a device whose battery life could always be better. Given the high resale value of these machines the net upgrade cost comes to a modest $300.