First Look at Nvidia's GeForce 9 Series mGPU

Most computer users with an interest (or need) for above average video have usually had to rely on discrete graphics cards to achieve the level of power they desired. But Nvidia's new GeForce 9-Series mGPU aims to raise integrated video to a whole new level, boldly claiming that "good enough graphics are no longer good enough." It appears others are taking note too, as the chipset is the basis of Apple's new Macbook Pro.

The MSI P7NGM Digital motherboard that the Test Center evaluated is a micro-ATX board based on the GeForce 9300 chipset and, although the company claims that it has the ability to run the top 30 games at playable frame rates (a first for integrated graphics), it also supports Hybrid SLI for those who need a little extra punch. Moreover, since it is able to offload every HD video codec from the CPU to the GPU, movies now use less than 10 percent of an Intel Core 2 system's resources.

We configured the P7NGM with an Intel dual-core E8500 processor and added 4GB of Kingston DDR2 memory (it supports up to 8GB). After installing the 32-bit version of Windows Vista Ultimate, we ran our usual benchmarking programs -- Primate Labs' Geekbench2 and Passmark's Performance Test. On both applications, although the results weren't astounding, the system produced respectable scores.

With a GeekBench2 score of 3336, the machine was about average with others that had similar configurations. Since GeekBench doesn't benchmark graphics, we also ran Performance Test, which produced an 839.7. Although this score isn't anything to get excited about, it is worth noting that the board did specifically well on the 2D & 3D graphics tests.

With VGA, DVI, and HDMI outputs, this motherboard can be used for many different purposes. It is more than capable enough for SOHO users to do their day-to-day work while pulling double duty as a gaming rig at night. Additionally, its Micro-ATX form factor makes it an extremely attractive option for HTPC's.

At the time of this review, we were unable to obtain the selling price for this board, but Nvidia's promotional material hints that it should be in the $100 range. Adding other reasonably priced components, an above average gaming system can be built for a street price of under $500 and an HTPC for not much more.

With this latest release, Nvidia is upping the bar for integrated graphics and is defying Intel to meet the challenge. It'll be interesting to see how everything plays out but one thing that's for sure is that end users will unquestionably wind up the winners.