HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) vs GeForce GTX 860M

VS

Aggregate performance score

We've compared GeForce GTX 860M and HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge), covering specs and all relevant benchmarks.

GTX 860M
2014
4 GB GDDR5, 75 Watt
7.90
+2224%

GTX 860M outperforms HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) by a whopping 2224% based on our aggregate benchmark results.

Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the ranking5181294
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
Power efficiency7.35no data
ArchitectureMaxwell (2014−2017)Gen. 6 Sandy Bridge (2011)
GPU code nameGM107Sandy Bridge
Market segmentLaptopLaptop
Release date13 January 2014 (10 years ago)1 May 2011 (13 years ago)

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores1152 or 6406
Core clock speed797 MHz350 MHz
Boost clock speed1085 MHz1100 MHz
Number of transistors1,870 millionno data
Manufacturing process technology28 nm32 nm
Power consumption (TDP)75 Wattno data
Texture fill rate43.40no data
Floating-point processing power1.389 TFLOPSno data
ROPs16no data
TMUs40no data

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Laptop sizemedium sizedno data
Bus supportPCI Express 2.0, PCI Express 3.0no data
InterfaceMXM-B (3.0)no data
Supplementary power connectorsNoneno data
SLI options+-

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory typeGDDR5no data
Maximum RAM amount4 GBno data
Standard memory configurationGDDR5no data
Memory bus width128 Bit64/128 Bit
Memory clock speedUp to 2500 MHzno data
Memory bandwidth80.0 GB/sno data
Shared memory-+

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display ConnectorsNo outputsno data
eDP 1.2 signal supportUp to 3840x2160no data
LVDS signal supportUp to 1920x1200no data
VGA аnalog display supportUp to 2048x1536no data
DisplayPort Multimode (DP++) supportUp to 3840x2160no data
HDMI+-
HDCP content protection+-
7.1 channel HD audio on HDMI+-
TrueHD and DTS-HD audio bitstreaming+-

Supported technologies

Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

H.264, VC1, MPEG2 1080p video decoder+-
Optimus+-
Ansel+-

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX12 (11_0)10.1
Shader Model5.1no data
OpenGL4.5no data
OpenCL1.1no data
Vulkan1.1.126-
CUDA+-

Synthetic benchmark performance

Non-gaming benchmark results comparison. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.


Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark score. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

GTX 860M 7.90
+2224%
HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) 0.34

3DMark Vantage Performance

3DMark Vantage is an outdated DirectX 10 benchmark using 1280x1024 screen resolution. It taxes the graphics card with two scenes, one depicting a girl escaping some militarized base located within a sea cave, the other displaying a space fleet attack on a defenseless planet. It was discontinued in April 2017, and Time Spy benchmark is now recommended to be used instead.

GTX 860M 19216
+1869%
HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) 976

3DMark Cloud Gate GPU

Cloud Gate is an outdated DirectX 11 feature level 10 benchmark that was used for home PCs and basic notebooks. It displays a few scenes of some weird space teleportation device launching spaceships into unknown, using fixed resolution of 1280x720. Just like Ice Storm benchmark, it has been discontinued in January 2020 and replaced by 3DMark Night Raid.

GTX 860M 27961
+1891%
HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) 1405

Gaming performance

Let's see how good the compared graphics cards are for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in FPS.

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular games across different resolutions:

900p91
+2933%
3−4
−2933%
Full HD36
+414%
7
−414%
4K130−1

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Low Preset

Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
+500%
2−3
−500%

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 18−20
+533%
3−4
−533%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 10−12 0−1
Battlefield 5 21−24 0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 16−18
+700%
2−3
−700%
Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
+500%
2−3
−500%
Far Cry 5 18−20 0−1
Far Cry New Dawn 21−24 0−1
Forza Horizon 4 50−55
+2500%
2−3
−2500%
Hitman 3 14−16
+275%
4−5
−275%
Horizon Zero Dawn 45−50
+463%
8−9
−463%
Metro Exodus 21−24 0−1
Red Dead Redemption 2 21−24 0−1
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 24−27
+550%
4−5
−550%
Watch Dogs: Legion 55−60
+100%
27−30
−100%

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 18−20
+533%
3−4
−533%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 10−12 0−1
Battlefield 5 21−24 0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 16−18
+700%
2−3
−700%
Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
+500%
2−3
−500%
Far Cry 5 18−20 0−1
Far Cry New Dawn 21−24 0−1
Forza Horizon 4 50−55
+2500%
2−3
−2500%
Hitman 3 14−16
+275%
4−5
−275%
Horizon Zero Dawn 45−50
+463%
8−9
−463%
Metro Exodus 21−24 0−1
Red Dead Redemption 2 21−24 0−1
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 24−27
+550%
4−5
−550%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 60
+567%
9−10
−567%
Watch Dogs: Legion 55−60
+100%
27−30
−100%

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 18−20
+533%
3−4
−533%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 10−12 0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 16−18
+700%
2−3
−700%
Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
+500%
2−3
−500%
Far Cry 5 18−20 0−1
Forza Horizon 4 50−55
+2500%
2−3
−2500%
Hitman 3 14−16
+275%
4−5
−275%
Horizon Zero Dawn 45−50
+463%
8−9
−463%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 24−27
+550%
4−5
−550%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 12
+33.3%
9−10
−33.3%
Watch Dogs: Legion 55−60
+100%
27−30
−100%

Full HD
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 21−24 0−1

1440p
High Preset

Battlefield 5 14−16 0−1
Far Cry New Dawn 12−14 0−1

1440p
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 8−9 0−1
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 3−4 0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 8−9 0−1
Cyberpunk 2077 4−5 0−1
Far Cry 5 9−10 0−1
Forza Horizon 4 30−33
+2900%
1−2
−2900%
Hitman 3 10−12
+83.3%
6−7
−83.3%
Horizon Zero Dawn 16−18
+750%
2−3
−750%
Metro Exodus 10−11 0−1
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 7−8 0−1
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 7−8 0−1
Watch Dogs: Legion 50−55
+2400%
2−3
−2400%

1440p
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 12−14
+550%
2−3
−550%

4K
High Preset

Battlefield 5 7−8 0−1
Far Cry New Dawn 5−6 0−1
Hitman 3 4−5 0−1
Horizon Zero Dawn 27−30
+2700%
1−2
−2700%
Metro Exodus 5−6 0−1
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 5−6 0−1

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 5−6
+400%
1−2
−400%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 3−4 0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3−4 0−1
Cyberpunk 2077 1−2 0−1
Far Cry 5 4−5 0−1
Forza Horizon 4 9−10 0−1
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 3−4 0−1
Watch Dogs: Legion 3−4 0−1

4K
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 8−9
+300%
2−3
−300%

This is how GTX 860M and HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) compete in popular games:

  • GTX 860M is 2933% faster in 900p
  • GTX 860M is 414% faster in 1080p

Here's the range of performance differences observed across popular games:

  • in Horizon Zero Dawn, with 1440p resolution and the Ultra Preset, the GTX 860M is 750% faster.

All in all, in popular games:

  • Without exception, GTX 860M surpassed HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) in all 29 of our tests.

Pros & cons summary


Performance score 7.90 0.34
Recency 13 January 2014 1 May 2011
Chip lithography 28 nm 32 nm

GTX 860M has a 2223.5% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 2 years, and a 14.3% more advanced lithography process.

The GeForce GTX 860M is our recommended choice as it beats the HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge) in performance tests.


Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

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NVIDIA GeForce GTX 860M
GeForce GTX 860M
Intel HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge)
HD Graphics (Sandy Bridge)

Comparisons with similar GPUs

We selected several comparisons of graphics cards with performance close to those reviewed, providing you with more options to consider.

Community ratings

Here you can see the user ratings of the compared graphics cards, as well as rate them yourself.


3.7 448 votes

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Questions & comments

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