"desktop" video chips when?

the cpus in the new sagers are desktop cpus ;-)

Well...my take is this:

P3 v. low voltage P3-M, the M is a better mobile chip by a significant amount (power/heat etc). P4 v. P4-M, the difference is much less. The P4-M is not a good cost/benefit equation for the power user whereas the P4 northwood is. Also, the .13 micron process makes a big difference as do other P4 features like clock throttling and what not for safety concerns.

A desktop graphics platform uses an incredible amount of power for the core, makes a load of heat, not to mention the need for ultra fast ram to make it shine. Plus, does anyone *need* anything more than a M9 now? My M7 lags a bit in UT2K3 but anything older than that it rips through without breaking a sweat.

Something else to consider: ~1% of all PC users actually care about bleeding edge gaming performance and only a small few of those can actually afford it. I'd venture a guess that about a 10th or less of that percentage wants/cares about/can afford a 'portable desktop' solution. Even the 56xx setup, as cost effective as it is, is large, hot and heavy and is short on battery life. Not what the average laptop buyer wants.

In short, I'd guess later rather than sooner. Who knows tho...someone may fire out a .09 micron core this year and use it for desktop and mobile...its always possible in this market.

We probably won't see desktop video chips in laptops due to their power consumption and heat however as time goes on we'll eventually find chips that are just as powerful. As long as they continue to make technological improvements and chip sizes continue to shrink, power consumption and heat will be less of an issue. Right now the mobile market is just a couple steps behind their desktop counterpart. Who would have thought would happen 2-3 years ago.

Yeah, at this point, mobile cards are really starting to hold their own against desktop counterparts. My friend has the Geforce4 ti4400 and I tear him up with the M9 in the 8886...