Vega 10 vs MX150 vs Intel UHD for 1080p timeline

I'm looking for an ultrabook for some basic editing of h.264 footage (1080p or 4k) from the new DJI Osmo Pocket camera.

I am wondering if it would be better to have a 2GB MX150, or a Vega 10 integrated GPU (which uses system RAM and may be limited to 4GB or to available system RAM, I haven't found a definitive answer).

The MX150 is faster than the Vega 10 and has faster memory, but the Vega 10 has more memory available to it.

The Resolve 15 configuration guide talks about the memory limitations of the GPU and says to get a "GPU with the most memory that is currently available", it also talks about 2GB & 4GB GPUs reaching their limits sooner. So it seems like the amount of memory is more important than speed?

The configuration guide also says that Intel HD Graphics will have limited performance but will be "operational with HD timelines", so if there is not going to be a benefit from such a low end GPU maybe I would be better off just having intel UHD integrated graphics?

The amount of memory will define if Resolve is running stable at all (4K is a no-go with such hardware), but the performance will define if you can play anything smoothly and how long final render will take.

The Resolve 15 configuration guide talks about ...

The configuration guide also says that ...

Hi.

You are looking for the wrong kind of hardware for Resolve. That is the reason you can't find the information you are looking for.

If you want to use MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 with Resolve it will require much stronger hardware. I will recommend a 6 core Intel mobile CPU and for 4K, a GPU with 8 GB of vRam. And normally will I recommend laptops in a medium to large size to get rid of the generated heat.

For your information will nVidea introduce new laptops with RTX mobile Graphics Cards on 6th January at CES 2019.

Regards Carsten.

You are looking for the wrong kind of hardware for Resolve. That is the reason you can't find the information you are looking for.

If you want to use MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 with Resolve it will require much stronger hardware. I will recommend a 6 core Intel mobile CPU and for 4K, a GPU with 8 GB of vRam.

I know what I'm looking at is not the recommended hardware and functionality will be limited, but a 6 core intel + 8GB GPU is just not an option in the size/weight restrictions that I have to work within.

I plan to use the Optimized Media functionality which will reduce the hardware requirements for h.264 because Resolve is actually converting the media to ProRes before working with it, it can also scale down the media resolution to help performance.

The amount of memory will define if Resolve is running stable at all (4K is a no-go with such hardware), but the performance will define if you can play anything smoothly and how long final render will take.

Ok, so if a 2GB card may just not be stable then it seems like the Vega 10 or intel UHD would be the better option.

I was looking at the passmark G3D scores for various GPUs:
GTX 1050 Ti : 5963
GTX 960 : 5806
GTX 1050 : 4627
MX150 : 2140
Vega 10 : 1646
Intel UHD 630 : 1173
Vega 3 : 1127
Intel UHD 620 : 1016
Intel HD 5000 : 599

I edit and grade 1080p RAW (BMMCC) on a 4 year old i7 desktop with a 4GB GTX 960, and everything runs smoothly, so I know that a 4GB 1050 Ti will do the job. At the other end of the scale I have a 2013 MacBook Air i7 with HD5000. I have tested some basic editing of H.264 footage on this and it runs smoothly until I add a LUT.

The Vega 10 has a better score than the Intel UHD, so I guess it would be the better option. Even the Vega 3 has around the same performance as the Intel UHD.

I'm actually using a i5 8250U (4 cores 8 threads) with UHD620 and 8GB of RAM as a field machine. for the studio version (that I had the possibility to test couple weeks ago) was having problems decoding H264 with hardware acceleration due to a bug on OpenGL memory allocation (intel and microsoft are aware on this and already releasing driver to try fixing it), but disabling it, going software decode like the free version, makes everything smooth and perfect until I add a LUT and a basic grade (then starts to drop frames here and there with some hang at the start of playback), but still for me is a perfectly usable machine as a FIELD machine. If I have to do something heavier you need proxies, I go with prores inside ffmpeg, it is a lightweight CPU-friendly codec so I can start to grade my 1080p clips or even edit a 4k timeline (but without grading it).

THE problem of this machines is that most of them have only one RAM slot (the other most of the time is not even soldered to the mobo), so no dual channel, and this is a HUGE problem, even more huge when you have to share the ram for your integrated gpu (Vega and UHD).

In conclusion it all comes down to two factors:

1) If this is your only machine that you got go for a 1050 Ti (ex. Dell XPS15, 1080p to save some money) or MX150.

2) If it's not and size and weight is a factor (as it was for me, I got a 14" 1.2kg) go for a Vega or UHD (the difference between the two is that amd cpu would be a tiny bit less powerful then intels one, so you trade cpu power for gpu power and viceversa, but with the fact I use a ton ffmpeg and Resolve use quite alot of cpu I choose to go intel).

Hope I was helpful in someway!

UPDATE: After some trials and error I was able to install the new intel igpu driver (v25) and now I can even edit and grade (light) 4k realtime, WOW!

I ran some tests today with actual 1080p H.264 footage from the DJI Osmo Pocket and discovered that basic editing and adding a 3D LUT works smoothly in Resolve 15 on my 2013 MacBook Air i7 with HD5000 graphics and only 8GB of system RAM.

In resolve 15 (Free version on OSX) there is a "Decode H.264/HEVC using hardware acceleration" option in Preferences -> Decode Options which is selected by default, if I turn this off then things don't run smoothly anymore. So it looks like a more powerful CPU or GPU is no longer required to decode H.264.

UPDATE: After some trials and error I was able to install the new intel igpu driver (v25) and now I can even edit and grade (light) 4k realtime, WOW!

That's fantastic news, thanks for sharing. It seems like for what I need pretty much any current 4 core machine is going to work.

On macos hardware decode for the free version is an option, and it works 100% for integrated gpus, so it's always a good thing keeping it ticked, this is the only way to keep using my early 2013 macbook pro, otherwise it was end time for it. Imo the sweetspot right now is a 4 core (with hyperthreading, so 8 threads) with a UHD 620 and ram in dual channel as a charry on the cake, but as I said even without dual channel as I have in my system is duable (stuttering may occur we finishing the project due to ram bottleneck), but luckily we got the magic button on the top right to disable all the effects