Video / Graphics Cards (GPUs)

Intel and AMD processors (CPUs) with integrated graphics chips

Note that if your desktop PC’s motherboard provides integrated graphics from a chip and port on the motherboard or from graphics built into the processor, which also uses graphics port(s) on the motherboard, such as an AMD Ryzen processor with Radeon Vega Graphics, Windows Update updates the device driver for the integrated graphics even if you use a separate graphics card. Because integrated graphics uses system memory, it is ready to go and reserves RAM memory as if it was running the graphics. A solution might be to disable the integrated graphics in the UEFI BIOS .

If you use a graphics card and you also have integrated graphics enabled in the BIOS, disabling it in the BIOS can prevent problems with Windows Update working properly.

How To Avoid Potential Problems With Windows 10 Update If You Have A Discrete Graphics Card –

With AMD’s A-Series APU processors, which have an integrated graphics chip, it became possible to install an AMD Radeon graphics card, which runs in CrossFireX mode, in conjunction with the processor’s graphics chip to increase performance significantly. Nvidia’s equivalent dual-card mode is called Scalable Link Interface – SLI. Dedicated PC gamers prefer using a single powerful graphics card instead of these dual-card setups because they tend to be more problematic or glitchy.

The PC’s motherboard user manual, made available as a PDF download from its manufacturer’s website, provides information about which processors can be installed on a PC’s motherboard. If you want to upgrade the processor or graphics chip if the processor provides the graphics, you have to buy a processor that is supported by the motherboard. The motherboard’s BIOS or UEFI BIOS can be updated to support processors that were not available when the motherboard was installed in the PC. The motherboard manufacturer’s website will provided details of BIOS/UEFI updates for its motherboards.

Note that some of Intel’s first and later-generation Core i3, i5 and i7 processors for the desktop and laptop PC have an onboard graphics chip some of which Intel claims are good enough for high-level gaming . With Intel’s processors that provide onboard graphics, if you add a separate graphics card to beef-up the graphics power, you have to disable the graphics provided from the processor because it cannot be connected to a second monitor and so cannot provide graphics to the monitor at the same time as the graphics card. Here is the page on Intel’s website that provides information on its processors that provide an onboard graphics chip:

Intel Graphics – http://www.intel.com/support/graphics/sb/CS-033757.htm

In 2011, AMD released its A-series Fusion APU range of dual-core and quad-core processors to laptop manufacturers that provide onboard graphics. They had reached their sixth generation by 2015. The most interesting specification is the ability of the onboard graphics chip of the Fusion APU processors to work in tandem with an AMD Radeon graphics card in CrossFireX mode, increasing graphics performance.

There is no current information provided on the web comparing Intel’s and AMD’s integrated graphics, no doubt because Google no longer provides tech sites with free organic traffic and so it is not worthwhile because paying Google for ads that come in above the organic search results is not economic. The quality of information on the web has deteriorated a great deal due to this state of affairs. If you use the search query comparison of intel and amd integrated graphics, in any web search engine, you will only be able to find information that dates back to 2010/11.

AMD bought ATI, the only competitor to Nvidia in the graphics-chip market, several years ago and, therefore, the integrated graphics provided by its processors are likely to be superior to Intel’s for many years to come. Intel has never been a big player in the graphics-chip market.

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