ATI RADEON® XPRESS 200M IGP

[farh81]

Hi!

I just bought a new laptop with the following specs:

Microprocessor Mobile AMD Sempron™ Processor 3000+ with PowerNow!™ Technology
Microprocessor Cache Level 2 cache 128 KB
Memory 512 MB DDR 333 MHz (1 x 512 MB)
Memory Max up to 2 GB
Video Graphics ATI RADEON® XPRESS 200M IGP graphics
Video Memory 128 MB (shared)
Hard Drive 60 GB 4200 rpm
Multimedia Drive DVD Writer Dual Format (+/-R +/-RW) with Double Layer support
Display 15.4” WXGA High Definition BrightView Widescreen
Fax/Modem High speed 56K modem
Network Card 10/100 LAN Ethernet integrated
Wireless Connectivity 54g™ 802.11b/g WLAN
Sound Altec Lansing® speakers
Keyboard 101 key compatible keyboard
Pointing Device Touch Pad with dedicated vertical Scroll Up/Down pad
PC Card Slots One ExpressCard/54 slot (also supports ExpressCard/34)

External Ports 1 VGA port
2 USB 2.0 ports
1 RJ 11 modem connector
1 RJ 45 Ethernet connector
S-video TV out
Remote control infrared port (Remote Control optional)
1 Headphone-out, 1 Microphone-in port
Cable docking connector

Dimensions 26.39 cm (L) x 35.78 cm (W) x 3.50 cm - 4.40 cm (H)
Weight 2.98 kg (6.6 lbs)
Power 65 W AC Power Adapter
6-cell Lithium-Ion (Li-Ion) battery







As you can see it has ATI RADEON® XPRESS 200M IGP graphics with 128 MB of shared video memory.

I won't be using my laptop for any graphically intensive programs (such as games or video editing...etc...) However, I will be watching lots of DVD's and videos (divx, xvid... mpgs, real player movies... etc....) And I will be using my laptop to view pictures, browse the internet, word processing...etc..


Anyways, a friend of mine advised me to go to the bios and reduce the amound of video memory to 32 MB so that I will have more free momory for my system. I went to the bios and the options were: 32MB, 64 MB and 128 MB (for video memory). I chose 32 MB. When going back to windows I notice that I had about 96 MB extra RAM available (which I'm happy about

Anyways, my question is the following (please excuse my ignorance but I don't know that much about computers)

Would decreasing the video memory as I described, cause any problems? I mean, is the graphics card only made to operate with 128 MB? Or is it fine to decrease the video memory? Will the performance of the graphics card suffer in any way? Also, my friend told me that I don't need much video memory to do the things I mentioned above.. (he said that 8 MB or 16 MB would be enough)... Is he correct? Would I see ANY sort of decrease in performance while watching DVD's or xvid/divx movies (such as choppiness or decreased resolution/clarity) due to decreasing the video memory from 128MB to 32 MB?

If 32 MB is enough for watching DVD's and movies and doing all the other things I mentioned above, then what type of progam/task might need more than 32 MB? In other words, in what type of scenario might I want to increase the video memory (make it more than 32 MB)?

Please keep in mind that I DO want the MAXIMUM performace when watching DVD's and videos and doing all the other things I mentioned above. However, I don't want to waste precious memory (by allocating it to the video card) if I don't have to.

I would really appreciate any info. Thank you very much!!!

 

[maguszxz]

Would this happen to be a Compaq because I think my lady friend has a computer like that.

 

[Code_D]

Your friend is absolutely correct. The graphics card is meant to operate at any setting available in the BIOS. As far as watching DVDs and videos, you should notice a difference as far as I know. I haven't used onboard video in a while, but I believe that video decoding is mostly processor intensive.

And as to the question about which program would need more than 32MB, mostly 3D gaming and video rendering fall into that category.

 

[farh81]

It is an HP Pavillion

 

[farh81]

Code_D , thanks for your reply But there is just one think I didn't understand.. In your reply you said:

"As far as watching DVDs and videos, you should notice a difference as far as I know. I haven't used onboard video in a while, but I believe that video decoding is mostly processor intensive"


When you said: "you should notice a difference" did you mean to say "you shouldn't notice a difference"? I'm asking that because I expected to hear that 32 MB is more than enough for watching DVD and that 32MB would be just as good as 64MB or 128MB for that purpose... A few days ago I was at a friends and he has a 6 year old computer with only 8MB of Video ram and he watches DVDs on his laptop and the quality is exellent!!! So it seems to me that 32 MB would be more than enough and I don't see how increasing the video memory would make any difference..

Anyways, thanks again for your reply I would really appreciate any input on the matter...

 

[Code_D]

Sorry, had a typo. I did mean to say you should NOT notice a difference. Glad I could help

 

[uwisuwerme7]

I have pretty much the same HP laptop with the 2800+.
Unless you're playing a game or doing some graphical editing taking the ram down to 32 on the video isnt going to hurt.
Mine came with 256 and I added a gig stick to it and put the video back up.
No noticable video improvement in normal windows usage.

 

[hucklongfin]

You're display is 1280 X 800? That's 1 meg of pixels. At truecolor (4 bytes/pixel) that's only 4 meg. Anything more than 4 meg isn't needed so 32Meg is more than enough for watching any movies. Set it as low as you can go.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey