Crossfire 6650m and 6480g

Hello!!

I am looking into this laptop: Newegg.com - lenovo IdeaPad Z575 (12992PU) Notebook AMD A-Series A6-3420M(1.5GHz) 15.6" 6GB Memory DDR3 1333 500GB HDD 5400rpm DVD±R/RW AMD Radeon HD 6650M

and it supposedly uses Crossfire to use both the discrete 6650m and the integrated 6480g cards. But upon a bit of research, it seemed that some games only choose to use the slower 6480g and doesn't even use the 6650m most of the time.

I am also looking at Lenovo IdeaPad Z575 1299-2AU Notebook PC - AMD Quad-Core A8-3500M 1.5GHz, 4GB DDR3, 750GB HDD, DVDRW, 15.6 Display, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, Gray at TigerDirect.com

which is $30 cheaper with A8 3500m APU and 6620g integrated card.

Is the $30 worth the risky Crossfire?

Thank you

 

The 6650m should beat the A8's 6620g graphics by a mile even without Crossfire, and I believe the CPU performance should be pretty much the same between the A6-3420m and the A8-3500m, at least from what I've read. If there are software issues preventing the 6650m from kicking in, that's a negative, but if the 6650m can even be consistently used on its own most of the time, then you're pretty much golden with the first setup.

 

thank you for all the information.

i just found a laptop at the same price, with the a6 3420m apu, but with a discrete 7670m card. i tried to compare the 7670m to the 6650m card, and they seem to be identical in numbers, but game benchmarks show 7670m is better, and some benchmarks show that 6650m is better.

could someone clarity this please?

thank you

 

7670m is just a rebranded 6650m, they are the same chip. And 6650m is about 20-25% faster than the 6620G in the A8 but significantly faster than the 6520G in the A6 (maybe 35-40%).

 

A 6650m is definitely worth $30. Considering the shader (6650m has 20% more) and clockspeed advantage (6650m is also clocked 35% higher). It should be around (1.2*1.35)=1.62 = ~60% faster at stock speeds.

Even if crossfire doesn't work out, you can still overclock the 6650m (can't OC the 6620g) and it will pull ahead even further.

 

thanks everyone for responding! I will just decide if I want to spend the extra $30... I probably should though!

 

just a quick last question, so 7670m is the EXACT same chip as the 6650m? i wonder why they do that... same chip, different name. there must be a bit of a difference?

 

No difference. Welcome to video card marketing. nVidia has done it for years. They come out with a new product series, and just rename many of the existing products to match the numbers with the new series. AMD does it periodically too. Sometimes there's minor updates/improvements, but many times not at all. And in this case, nothing at all. Higher end products are most likely different, as they'll probably have a 7970m and 7990m, but they want the other cards to match up with their marketing product line.