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General discussion

Windows 7 exp index dropped after installing ext video card

Jul 17, 2010 4:42AM PDT

Just purchased a new HP p6510f desktop with internal ATI radeon 4200 video card (128mb) and upgraded to an external ATI HD Radeon 5450 with 1 gb of ram.
ran the windows experience index and found the desktop performance for windows aero dropped from 4.3 (internal) to 3.9 (external), whereas the memory index increased from 5.9 to 7.3 and the gaming graphics increased from 5.3 to 5.9. processor and primary HD indexes remained the same
question - why would the windows aero number drop with the "upgrade"????

Discussion is locked

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Re: experience index
Jul 17, 2010 4:44AM PDT

Good question. Let me ask another one: how did your own personal video experience change?

Kees

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Windows 7 exp index dropped after installing ext video card
Jul 17, 2010 6:32AM PDT

I thought it was faster with the installed external video card. That is why I am puzzled with the decrease of 0.4 for Windows Aero graphics

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Not sure, but
Jul 17, 2010 9:50PM PDT

I think it's because it is an external that is causing the reduction in the Experience rating.

Typically external components either take longer to read from or write to, or need more processing. That 'extra' may only be in micro-milliseconds, but that matters to processors nowadays.

Aero is processor intensive, and that may be why the rating dropped. If the internal graphics card was an onboard card with shared memory, then I can see that the memory index would rise, because none of the RAM is being set aside for the graphics card. Similarly with gaming graphics, as the new external card has more of it's own memory.

The experience index depends on the lowest rating of the group, so although other ratings have increased, the overall rating will be less because of the external card.

But then, I may be completely wrong.

If your own experience of graphics and performance is better, then you do not lose anything.

Mark

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WEI
Jul 18, 2010 10:35AM PDT

The aero test is a bandwidth test.

If everything else is equal the integrate wins.

The integrate is connected to the system bus.

The external is connected to the pcie bus.

The graphics test is the ability to grind up the data and do something with it.......here the external wins.

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Windows 7 exp index dropped after installing ext video card
Jul 18, 2010 12:52PM PDT

thanks for the feedback