Thanks to innovations in that sector, laptop processing power and memory can get fairly close to desktop performance. However, notebooks have always struggled to compete in graphics without bulky extensions.
Thanks to Nvidia that may be about to change. The GTX 10 series will now be coming to mobile gaming. The attachment of the name is not a ploy to garner more sales, either. Performance is almost on par thanks to the Pascal architecture.
Specifications
Though boasting a 150 percent increase over Nvidia's current M series GPUs, the laptop 10,000 series do differ slightly from their desktop counterparts.
“This is something that we've wanted to do for years,” says Mark Aevermann, Nvidia program manager, “These are very powerful… these are very advanced.”
Here is a list of the specifications of each card:
GTX 1080
CUDA Cores: 2,560
Bo: 1733 MHz
Memory: 8GB GDDR5X
Memory Speed: 10 Gbps
GTX 1070
CUDA Cores: 1,048
Boost Clock: 1645 Mhz
Memory: 8GB GDDR5
Memory Speed: 8 Gbps
GTX 1060
CUDA Cores: 1,280
Boost Clock: 1670 Mhz
Memory: 6GB GDDR5
Memory Speed: 8 Gbps
The big question, of course, is how they run on benchmarks and if they can live up to their name. The answer is very well. To prove it, Nvidia previewed the upcoming Gears of War 4 at 60fps in 4K.
In some benchmarks, the cards even outperformed their desktop counterparts. Of course, battery life is always an issue, and you would expect that the more powerful cards will mean less time between charges. Thanks to the Pascal architecture, however, battery life will be increased by around thirty percent.
Future Implications
With such a leap in performance comes a re-evaluation on what is possible on smaller devices. One of the biggest advantages would be virtual reality gaming on a portable level, and according to Nvidia, this is entirely possible.
That promise is a little shaky, however. While the GTX 1080 can run VR games relatively easily, The Verge reports that the 1060 struggles with some games. Performance will also be limited on battery power, so if you want a stable framerate, you would have to plug and play.
Even so, this is a huge step forward for notebook gaming. MSI, Lenovo, Alienware, MSI, Acer, HP, Razer and more will all release Pascal powered laptops. Though we can't expect paper thin devices, Nvidia expects them to be as slim as 19mm at a weight of 4 pounds.
That could be perfect for a new Macbook Pro, or even something from Microsoft. Both companies have been quiet on the matter, however, so we'll have to wait and see what else the future brings.