Radeon HD6770M vs. FirePro M5950

Hi,
First of all, I would like to indicate that I live in Turkey and professional mobile workstation laptops are really expensive and hard to find here.
I'm thinking of buying a HP Pavilion dv6 (with a HD6770M (2 GB GDDR5), i7-2630qm, 8 GB, 750 GB) for numerical weather prediction models, this will be paid by the institution, which is about 1450$ here (buying from probably the cheapest electronics retailer). I should mention that was just my maximum limit. Is the HD6770M really bad at mathematical models (such as WRF, MM5 etc.), or is it unnecessary? Does the professional counterpart having drivers affect a lot?

Also, while I made up my mind, the salesman kept showing me the MacBooks and Dell XPS (both a lot more expensive!!!) and while the inner hardware was worse than the dv6 they kept saying that the Apple was better at handling those models, and that Intel makes them a special processor? I know that Mac OS is Unix based, would that make it more suitable for running Ubuntu, Red Hat, Fedora than Windows based laptops?

 

All laptops will run Unix systems equally well, whoever was in the store was clearly either trying to con you or was an idiot. Don't listen to them.

Are you sure the software you're running can even take advantage of GPU acceleration? Most simulation programs are all CPU based.

 

What funky said, nVidia vs ATI for GPU could be debated, but the processors in the MBPs are the same as the processors in other laptops. An i7-2630qm remains an i7-2630qm regardless of what computer it is in.

 

Unless your software is written to take advantage of OpenCL™ and/or DirectX®/C++AMP as AMD is focusing on, then the GPU will have no effect on your application.

See:
http://sites.amd.com/us/Documents/Manju%20Hegde%20Fusion%2011%20TFE%20Oct.5%202011.pdf


The same goes if you can choose a system with an nVidia GPU - your application will need to leverage CUDA tech or else the GPU will be sitting there idle.

Do you know what GPU Compute technologies your software can take advantage of, if any?

With the system you have configured and depending on the size of the model/database you're using to predict the weather, a configuration with 16/24GB+ RAM and/or a SATA3 SSD like the 256GB M4 will be your best bet to further increase the speed of your prediction program.

funky monk is correct, the salesman is just being a salesman: he wants you to buy a more expensive system because it means more $$ to him.

He also is an idiot in this day and age to tell you such outright lies about the underpowered and easy to overheat and induce to throttle MacBook and OS/x operating system.

He is right that Intel makes them a special processor though: it is the cheapest money can buy while giving them the highest margins when they sell it to you.

Hope this helps you try to figure out what GPU is required for your new machine (if it will make a difference to the main task it will be used for).

Good luck.

tijo, except when it's in a Mac.

 

Lawl.....


Anyway, the above two posters already gave good advice. Depending on the programs you use, a GPU might not even be all that important.

 

Wow that is funny that he said Intel makes special cpu's i would have slapped him haha

 

Just want to add that this may be usable (but take these benchmarks, like all such 'scores' with a pinch of salt).

Searchable, by model:
See:
PassMark Software - Video Card Benchmark Charts - Video Card Model List

Sort by performance:
See:
PassMark Software - Video Card Benchmarks - High End Video Cards

Now, you know as much as I do.

Actually, you know more (the program you're using for the weather predictions...).

 

Intel did at one time make special CPUs for Apple, specifically the Core 2 Duo E8x35 series used in some iMacs.

 

They were mostly though rebadges of some higher-end T9x00 and X9x00 C2D's.

 

I think your expert just followed the standard protocol for experts from Freakonomics. I.E he is trying to use his position as an expert to his advantage and sell you something more expensive. Current generation macs don't have special processors. The advantage is you can do your unix things from OSX. But there is no hardware advantage.