FYI on the T400 with ATI 3470

It may be already known that the T400's ATI graphics chip has been undeclocked to half of it's manufacturer recomended capacity by Lenovo. But what's very sad, is that those who purchased this machine thinking they have something more powerful than an integrated graphics card, will find that the underclocked ATI 3470 performs worse than the integrated GMA 4500MHD. ( I used COD4 and Trackmania as the benching programs, and got and average of 2-6 fps lower when using the ATI 3470.)

My question is: Why? To save battery? Fine. But whats the point of even making this a 150 dollar option if the performance is hindered by the so-called "upgrade," and the better performing integrated GPU saves more battery anyway? Lenovo doesn't advertise an "Underclocked-to-half-capacity ATI3470." No one ever would buy that.

This is very disappointing. My other laptop, which has an NV 8400m GS, blows the ATI 3470 away, but if you check reveiws on the two GPU's, most point to the ATI 3470 as being the faster chip.

I have tried to edit the GPU bios, but have had no luck. It looks like those of us who are upset, are screwed with having our weak "Powerful Discrete" GPU's. LOL

 

Each brand model has its own specifications, sales pitches.

It is nice that you can dig up information regarding the hidden capabilities of the machine in question. This would help you in holding back your purchase until a better modified model comes into the market.

This practice of not selling a fully capable notebook using the installed devices is not limited to Lenovo alone.

I am moving this thread to Lenovo as you will get better answers in that forum.

 

this action is killing my will to get the T400 since at least i want better vga then the gma4500 for some intensive work
still like 3-4 months before i'm going to buy cross my finger that lenovo gonna make some update regarding to this matter

 

I truly hope so.... it's such a bummer that they would do this. I mean GMA4500M is great; for integrated. But it doesnt touch a moderate to low end-discrete GPU.

 

While the X4500 is a good step up from the X3100, it still gets pwn3d by the 9400M G and HD 3200.

 

If they have it underclocked to half capacity, cant you overclock it to full capacity and just watch the temperatures?

Can the 4500 even play COD 4

 

I have found my 3470 to be significantly faster than the Intel for my games. and not just 2-6 frames faster.

 

COD4 is pretty much unplayable. However, it was quite playable with a 8400m GS on lower settings. I have tried overclocking with software, but they just do not work. I have tried RivaTuner, ATITools, AMD GPU tools, etc. None work.

 

Hmmm, mine was 2-6 fps slower, and GPUZ only reports core speed of 337 and memory speed of of 396. There are other people on this forum who have the same issue.

Are you using a the ATI3470 on your T400 or do you have a different laptop?

 

I have a T400 (I really need to get my sig back with my specs...).

Benchies are sitting at home on my desktop, so I can't quote specific numbers right now. although I an going to see what GPU-z says.

 

That would be cool. Have you tried an overclocking on your GPU?

 

Before I post my screenshot, I would like to see a screenshot from you or someone else who has the issue (I'm just curious, thats all).

 

yes, cod unplayable:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/ATI-Mobility-Radeon-HD-3470.9594.0.html

 

well that's a bummer, really do hope there will be a better way to revert the card back to "normal" specs

 

Here are the non AC power and with AC power Sensor readings for my T400 ATI3470

CARD SPECS:


AC POWER:
[/IMG]

BATTERY POWER:


These readings DO NOT change depending on graphic intensity. They always stay the same.

 

the review puts the discrete about 3x faster than the intel

Lenovo T400 (2.80GHz Intel T9600, ATI Radeon 3470 256MB GDDR3) 2,575 3DMarks
Lenovo T400 (2.80GHz Intel T9600, Intel X4500) 809 3DMarks

 

I haven't done any benchmarks on my T400, but I disagree with the OP about the difference between the two cards.

Running original Counter-Strike (Not CS: Source) at 1400x900, the game is quite choppy with the Intel card. It runs nicely on the ATI.

I can get to the main screen of America's Army, but cannot load a game with the Intel card. With the ATI card, the game runs smoothly and without glitches.

That's not to say that the card isn't underclocked or anything, but I definitely see an improvement in performance with the ATI over the Intel.

 

I guess I am confused (showing my ignorance) -- does this url say that its all mobility radeon 3470s that are underclocked -- not just Lenovo's?

what about the mobility radeon 3650 in the T500 -- is it also underclocked?

 

No, no one has reported that issue, and my T500's GPU clocks are right on par.

Also, this issue (which was mentioned in several threads before) does not seem to affect the majority of users. Not sure why that would be though.

 

Is there any way to get the ATI up to manufacturer's capacity?

And this is odd, (probably Bios related) but when the computer comes out of sleep mode, it reports ATI's manufacturer capacity ( 600 core, 800 mem).

However, it never goes over 337 core/396 mem while playing games.

 

My understanding of the information on Notebookckeck.com is that the 3470 was never designed to handle current generation games (Crysis, COD4, GTA4, etc).

From the previous thread on this topic and my own testing compared to the benchmarks from various sights it seem that either GPU-Z is reporting the wrong speed or every manufacture is underclocking the chip. Some people may have defective parts, but overall the T400 seem to be fully utilizing the chip.

For what is worth, here's a summary of 3dMark06 results for the 3470:
2,535 - My T400, P8600 @ 2.4GHz
2,575 - Notebookreview, T400
2,598 - Notebookreview, Sony VAIO FW
2,065 - Notebookckeck, unknown w/ DDR2
1,840 - Notebookckeck, Asus M51Se
2,659 - Notebookjournal, Fujitsu Amilo Pa3553
1,959 - Notebookjournal, Toshiba P300D-12F w/ DDR2

 

It's a shame Lenovo no longer manufacture nice 14.1" laptops with CAD approved GPU's like on the T4x line, if you need then a laptop with those capabilities you need to get a 15" monster which is not what portability means.
A real shame Lenovo chose the 'home' designed route instead of the business features such as the 4:3 screens, I'm feeling extremely nostalgic concerning prior Lenovo-takeover Thinkpads.

 

Yup pretty much. Only reason I stay with Lenovo now is keyboard/track point... and after my T61p and seeing my friends T500 the keyboard quality seems to be dropping drastically on every iteration... while other manufacturers get better.

So it's down to track point for me. I may eventually just force myself to get used to external mouse/touch pad. Lenovo has really killed the Thinkpad brand for me.

 

Off topic, but that was not Lenovo's choice. LCD manufacturers have pretty much stopped making 4:3 laptop displays, because it is far more economical (for them) to produce 16:10 or 16:9 displays.

 

I always get a chuckle over people who try to game on a business-grade laptop...

Seriously, that's not what they are made for, if you want to game, get a different class of laptop.
Gees..

 

Chuckle away chuckles, but it's not like we're expecting to have a great, his-res, high-detail game. That's not even the issue. The issue is that the chip is under-clocked from the Lenovo factory and performs worse on games compared to similar chips that have been bench marked lower.

Gees...

 

I don't game (anymore) but lenovo's inclusion of a discrete graphics option creates the expectation that it render 3D faster than the onboard. Don't you agree?

 

Agreed. It should at least play games smoothly on low settings.

 

It's easy to be amused by conservative techies unable to see the technology trends. Lenovo's biggest Thinkpad customer is IBM, whose close to 400 000 employess all have a Thinkpad, the majority of them a T-series.

So it's no accident that Lenovo started providing reasonable graphics in their T-series Thinkpads -- IBM is betting heavily on internet turning 3d. The long term vision is every web site that you visit in 2d today you will visit with your avatar in 3d tomorrow.

Short term IBM is focusing virtual world conferencing, today providing intranet services of Second Life to their customers. Google on IBM and virtual worlds or Second Life to see what's going on -- here is just one example. When the IBM CEO Sam Palmisano's avatar is standing in front of a customer executive audience he isn't going to appreciate Lenovo providing him with a substandard GPU.

And Lenovo will know which side their bread is buttered on, next year the IBM - Lenovo 5 year partnership agreement is up and IBM is free to turn to any vendor to replace their employees' Thinkpads -- for all employees the policy is to renew after 3 years -- for customer facing personnel more often.

 

^ Great Points.

So does this mean that it's fine to provide a GPU and not advertise the under-clocked specs? GPU's are becoming more and more important in laptop systems, eventually (if not already) becoming just as important as CPU's. If you found out your 2.5ghz or what ever CPU (throttling a side) was under-clocked to half of it potential, would you find this acceptable? Most would say no.

My Point is, if Lenovo wants to underclock a GPU, fine. Just advertise it specs
so that people who think they are getting a 650mhz core/800mhz mem GPU(mobility 3470 manufacturer specs) are not let down when they find that their GPU is set at a 337/396 max.

 

Or to play HD content.

The problem is: they have never said that their GPU are at manufacturer specs. So there is no false advertising.

I think there is a reason why they did it: you don't underclock a GPU just for the sake of it. I'm pretty sure that they did because to keep the laptop cool.

 

False no, misleading yes. But hey, you live and you learn.

 

For the record, I got the following result in 3Dmark06:
Intel GMA4500HD: 687
Ati 3470: 2713

in 3Dmark05:
Ati 3470:5167

I only got results from the Ati 3470 in 3Dmark05 (with Intel GMA4500HD the program crashed).

My results seems to be comparable with the results from the review of the T400 here at notebookreview: http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=4569

Ati 3470 @ 3Dmark06: 2575
Intel GMA4500HD @ 3Dmark06: 809

My T400 has the following specifiaction:
T400 2765-D4G (C2D 2.4GHz 3MB cache)
4GB DDR3 RAM
Intel GMA4500HD
Ati 3470

Win7 Beta build 7057

I cannot come to the conclusion that the Ati 3470 should be slower on my computer than the Intel GMA4500HD according to the result listed above. My result are are what to be expected, considering that I've got a slower CPU than the one tested in the review (+ a different O/S).

/TM

 

^^^I had benched my lappy too. I did 05 and 06. I tested GMA4500 vs 8400m gs vs 3470MHD. The results were as expected. The ATI smoked the the 8400m gs by nearly 1000 on 3Dmark06. I guess I will just come to the conclusion that gpu-z sensor's readings are off; it only reads exactly half of the actual.

But still, why does my 8400m gs with 128mb play COD4 way smoother than my ATI 3470 w/ 256mb, if the ATI gets better marks?

Is it the way the game's engine utilizes a ATI 3470m?

 

There's a known issue with gpu-z misreporting clock speeds on the GPUs in the T400, T500 and W500 when drivers and apps are set up a certain way.

 

Nick, presumably you are running COD4 at the same resolution and detail levels on both systems. As such, the most likely answer is that the current 'stable' switchable graphics driver is using an old version of the ATI drivers and aren't performing well in COD4. There is a slightly newer beta driver that can be found through the Lenovo forums, and mention that they are working on a switchable driver based on the current ATI driver which may be available next month.

 

Did you get the readings from GPU-Z when the GPU was under load (log file)? Else, I guess that GPU-Z report wrong figures considering that our 3Dmark scores seem to be in parity with other 3470-equipped laptops.
One possible explanation to you experiencing less FPS in CoD 4 could be a better optimized codepath for Nvidia GPUs ("the way it was meant to...". Old unoptimized drivers could also explain your experience with CoD 4 on the 3470, verified drivers released for laptops are seldom as up to date as their desktop counterpart. Try modifying the latest Catalystdriver from Ati with Ati Mobility Modder http://www.driverheaven.net/modtool.php to get the latest optimizations.

/TM

 

That's what I am starting to believe. I did use gpuz under load. I think the sensors in gpuz are off for my setup. They only reason why I think this is because when I extract the bios to look at settings, and enact the possible performance schemes, I get exactly half clock speeds of every performance scheme variable. I will give the Beta a try...I am using modded drivers already.

Thanks for all the insight people!

 

The "current" Lenovo switchable graphics driver is based on ATI Catalyst 8.8 and doesn't work at all with games using OpenGL.

The "beta" driver is based on Catalyst 8.12 but has a lot of documented problems.

The next Lenovo production level driver is also Catalyst 8.12 based and will be available next week and is supposed to fix "most" of the problems in the beta driver.

In the meantime we are using the ATI drivers modified by the ATI mobility modder. The mobility modder however stopped working with Catalyst 9.2

So interim recommendation is to use mobility modder on ATI Catalyst 9.1 driver, for details see here. This still will support Open GL 3.0 which support was added in Catalyst 9.1. And the modded ATI driver worked in Windows 7 already in Catalyst 8.12 see here.

 

Sweet, well I can't wait for these drivers to mature.

 

Any news about the new drivers from Lenovo?

I guess modded drivers will not support switchable graphics?

Still curious if any of you guys managed to overclock this 3470, and what setup and tools you used.

 

The current Lenovo switchable graphics driver 8.563 shipped end of April.

It is working reasonably -- but does still have problems. The next Lenovo release is supposedly Catalyst 9.3 based, havn't heard an estimated ship date.

The ATI desktop drivers have started shipping switchable graphics with Catalyst 9.4. But modding those drivers have had limited success supporting Thinkpad switchable graphics. It seems to work on W500, it doesn't work on T500 and is a question mark for T400.

Personally I am now using the Lenovo switchable graphics driver living with the remaining hiccups.

 

This sounds like what Apple have reportedly done with the 9600m GTs in the entire Macbook Pro lineup... not fully confirmed, though, but there are reports.

 

I have gotten 9.4 to work (Love the switching when changing from batt to plugged in), but not 9.5 on my T400.

 

Yes, the ATI Catalyst Center 9.4 works with the Lenovo switchable graphics driver.

So if you want to get rid of the Thinkvantage Power Manager you can do a selective install of the (modded) ATI 9.4 Catalyst Center only keeping the Lenovo switchable graphics driver.

This will also allow you to in the Catalyst Center set the graphics to automatically switch when going to/from battery.

 

You guys do know that the ATI modder does work on the 9.6 drivers right? I'm using the 9.6 drivers on my T400 as we speak...

 

Are you talking about the beta version of that modder or released version? Also, what was your uninstall/install procedure to get 9.6 to work with your T400 and thanks.

Gary

 

No one brave that tried to overclock the 3470?

 

I was comparing the specs with Nick fentons and can someone please tell me if my video card is running slow? Everything is the same except for the Default Clock. Mine is alot slower.
I took this shot while on AC power on High Performance.

 

I just went to this site http://www.driverheaven.net/modtool.php downloaded it and then downloaded the latest Ati 9.6 off of AMD's website and modded the driver as usual and installed the driver rebooted no problems. I'm typing on the T400 with those drivers now...