AVADirect’s X7200: The GeForce GTX 485M SLI Mobile Graphics Giant

Taking It To The Limit, One More Time

Gamers might be better served by Intel’s latest Sandy Bridge-based mobile processors, but Clevo’s LGA 1366-based X7200 remains the only chassis capable of supporting Nvidia’s hottest graphics modules in SLI. Capable of holding both Core i7 and Xeon processors with up to six physical cores, AVADirect equipped this workstation-class notebook with an enthusiast-class Core i7-980X Extreme.

Regular visitors will notice the recycled images. Nothing has changed about the X7200 since last year’s introduction, though AVADirect made the thoughtful move to include a second power supply with today’s configuration.

Remembering that each of these 300 W power units is larger and heavier than a traditional facing brick, we were happy to find that the second power adapter is only required under unrealistically-extreme use scenarios (such as using FurMark and eleven threads of Prime95 simultaneously).

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Desktop vs. Mobile GeForce Graphics
Row 0 - Cell 0 Desktop GeForce GTX 480Desktop GeForce GTX 560 TIGeForce GTX 485M
Transistors3 billion1.95 billion1.95 billion
Engine Clock700 MHz822 MHz575 MHz
Cuda Cores480384384
Texture Units606464
ROP Units403232
Compute Performance1345 GFLOPS1.26 TFLOPS883.2 GFLOPS
DRAM TypeGDDR5-3696GDDR5-4000GDDR5-3000
DRAM Interface384-bits256-bits256-bits
Memory Bandwidth177.4 GB/s128 GB/s96 GB/s
TDP250 W170 W100 W

We’ve even discussed how the GeForce GTX 485M’s specs resemble those of an underclocked GTX 560 Ti, though we’re told it uses the older GF104 core with power-optimized BIOS and software. This power-saving design compares favorably to AMD’s Barts-based Radeon HD 6970M, at least on a specifications sheet.

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Desktop vs. Mobility Radeon Graphics
Row 0 - Cell 0 Desktop Radeon HD 6970Desktop Radeon HD 6850Radeon HD 6970M
Transistors2.64 billion1.7 billion1.7 billion
Engine Clock880 MHz775 MHz680 MHz
Shader (ALUs)1536960960
Texture Units964848
ROP Units323232
Compute Performance2.7 TFLOPS1.49 TFLOPS1.3 TFLOPS
DRAM TypeGDDR5-5500GDDR5-4000GDDR5-3600
DRAM Interface256-bits256-bits256-bits
Memory Bandwidth176 GB/s128 GB/s115.2 GB/s
TDP250 W127 W100 W

With no new parts to show, let’s see how this new configuration of previously-reviewed components performs!

Thomas Soderstrom
Thomas Soderstrom is a Senior Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware US. He tests and reviews cases, cooling, memory and motherboards.
  • tacoslave
    these thing are ridiculously expensive. Besides it seems dual gpu's(at least in the mobile sector) scale HORRIBLY in most scenerios.
    Reply
  • alikum
    wonder who buy these things
    Reply
  • LuckyDucky7
    Those who really, really need the power, or just have lots of money to blow on stuff like this.

    Those who need to process large data sets on the go would likely see lots of use from a machine like this.
    Also, those who develop software and need a mobile machine to showcase their new products (especially if that software happens to be a game).

    Diminishing returns? Maybe with personal laptops < 1000 dollars. Not with this class of machine.
    Reply
  • Crashman
    tacoslavethese thing are ridiculously expensive. Besides it seems dual gpu's(at least in the mobile sector) scale HORRIBLY in most scenerios.If you look at the 1920x1080 highest detail results, it's somewhere around 60-80%. I wouldn't call that horrible. You do want to game at the panel's native resolution, no?
    Reply
  • Maziar
    Great review as always Crashman :)
    Judging from the specs,1 GTX 485M performance falls between a desktop GTX 460 and GTX 560Ti right ?
    Reply
  • Crashman
    MaziarGreat review as always Crashman Judging from the specs,1 GTX 485M performance falls between a desktop GTX 460 and GTX 560Ti right ?It looks that way on paper...I'm sure there's an X7200 review with a desktop card that you could use to make the conversions.
    Reply
  • Maziar
    Yep,right.
    http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/malibal-lotus-p150hm-geforce-gtx-485m-core-i7-2920xm,2855.html
    But I liked to see a desktop system in the comparison charts.
    Reply
  • silverblue
    Crysis 1280x720 is a bit of an abberation for the 6970 in Crossfire. Had it not misbehaved there, the result would have been closer, however now AMD have to drop their prices as NVIDIA have brought out a very good solution.
    Reply
  • americanbrian
    I kind of object to using all of the low resolution results on a configuration like this. It seems like all that it does is skew the results in favour of Nvidia, where in actual fact at the highest details and resolutions (i.e. the targeted area for a gaming laptop) the radeons conclusively win in performance.

    I understand that the value proposition is not very good still, but your conclusion is misleading in my opinion. People splashing out to be able to play the most modern games at highest res simply do not care how many excessive frames are pushed at the low end.
    Reply
  • Pointdexter
    Ok there's something I don't understand : on Eurocom's website an HD6970M costs 475$ LESS than an GTX 485M ... in fact the 6970M costs the same as an GTX 470M

    so how can an SLI'd GTX 485 could be cheaper than an Xfire'd GTX 485M ?
    Reply