Review-NVIDIA GTX 460M: Mainstream Mobile Gaming, Fermi Style

With the release of GeForce GTX 460M, NVIDIA extends the reach of their Fermi family of GPUs into the mainstream mobile graphics segment. The GTX 460 variants (768 MB and 1 GB versions) are known to be excellent, mainstream desktop performers. It would be interesting, therefore, to find out if their mobile version is equally good in terms of performance.

Our first sample of this GPU came in the form of MSI GT663R notebook. The notebook itself will be discussed in greater detail later on, but for now, we will narrow our scope on the little piece of silicon that sits inside it: the GeForce GTX 460M!

Specification

The GeForce GTX 460M GPU has a “GF106” designation, which is different compared to the desktop versions of GTX 460 with their GF104 codename. The screenshot from GPU-Z above explains why. GeForce GTX 460M has 192 Stream Processors (CUDA Cores), significantly fewer than GF104’s 336 Stream Processors. The desktop version of GeForce GTS 450 has the same GF106 codename and the same amount of Stream Processors. As such, specs wise, GTX 460M is identical with the GTS 450. This naming scheme is potentially confusing, but one thing is for sure: the GTX 460M should be closer to the GTS 450 than the GTX 460 in terms of performance.

The GeForce GTX 460M in MSI GT663R is equipped with 1,5 GB of GDDR5 memory (192-bit bandwidth). Core, shader, and memory frequencies are 675 MHz, 1350 MHz, and 2500 MHz respectively. We’re a bit curious to find out how it performs in DirectX 11 titles. But first, let’s take a look at the notebook!

MSI GT663R

This is the MSI GT663R, a gaming notebook armed with the GeForce GTX 460M. Expect a full review on this notebook later on.