What is Graphic card

What is a Graphic Card or GPU ? 

Have you ever wondered how did your PC/laptop/mobile ran your favourite movies, youtube or games like Call Of Duty, Assassin's Creed, Gta 5 etc. ??? 

In some PC/Laptop games like GTA 5 run in High or even Ultra settings whereas in some, they run in Low settings and if settings are changed, the game lags. These variations are due to change in quality of Graphics Processing Unit or simply called Graphics Card. 

Graphic card is a component of pc or laptop which is essential for video processing, rendering, gaming etc. In other words it is device essential for running any graphics related programs on pc or laptop. Its also called GPU        (Graphics Processing Unit) of the system.

The term GPU was coined by Sony in reference to the PlayStation console .Toshiba designed Sony GPU in 1994. The term was popularised by Nvidia in 1999 ,who marketed the GeForce 256 the world first GPU. 

What about mobile phones ? 

Smart phones also contain GPU with their respective processors E.g. One with Snapdragon has Adreno as GPU and Mediatek has ARM Mali GPU. More about Smartphone component in detail will be covered in my another blog. 

Types of graphics card

There are mainly two types of gpu. 

Integrated GPU:- They are present inside the processor chip set. They use a portion of RAM of the computer for example Intel chipset has its own integrated GPU which is named as Intel HD and UHD graphics , iris etc. Similarly AMD also has its own integrated GPU called Vega series. But only some of the AMD processor contain integrated GPU for example ryzen 5 contains Vega 8 GPU but ryzen 7 does not contain any integrated GPU. You have to buy a separate graphic card for running in graphics related programs in your PC. Integrated GPU are for the basic requirements and are not for high end gaming or for game developing. 

Dedicated  GPU:- These are the GPU which are present inside a PC or laptop other than the integrated one present inside the chipset. In PC we can buy a graphic card and install it but in laptop it may be already present. Dedicated graphic card can be of two types one which is used for game developing for example Nvidia Quadro series and other for playing high end video game for example Nvidia GTX series or AMD Radeon series. Dedicated graphic card has its own Ram called V-Ram. They also have their own cooling fans and thermal plates which are essential to reduce the The Heat dissipated from the graphic card.

Technologies such as SLI and NVLink by Nvidia and CrossFire by AMD allow multiple GPUs to draw images simultaneously for a single screen, increasing the processing power available for graphics. These technologies, however, are increasingly uncommon, as most games do not fully utilize multiple GPUs, as most users cannot afford them.

Usage specific GPU

Most GPUs are designed for a specific usage, real-time 3D graphics or other mass calculations:

   1. Gaming

• GeForce GTX, RTX

• Nvidia Titan

• Radeon HD, R5, R7, Navi

  2. Cloud Gaming

• Nvidia grid

• AMD Radeon Sky

 

 3. workstation (video editing, encoding,             decoding, transcoding) , 3d rendering, vfx,     motion graphics ect. 

• Nvidia Quadro

• AMD Fire Pro

• AMD Radeon Pro

  4. Cloud workstation

• Nvidia Tesla

• AMD Firestream

 

 5. Artificial intelligence training and cloud

• Nvidia Tesla
  
  
• AMD Radeon Instinct

  6. Automated/Driverless car

• Nvidia drive PX

 Which companies manufacture   dedicated graphic card ? 

Many people open have a question that why does Nvidia or AMD graphic cards are sold by companies such as Asus, MSI, Gigabyte etc. 

You must know that AMD and Nvidia only manufacture chipsets for the graphic card. Companies like Asus, MSI, Gigabyte are the one who manufacture  design and  cooling system and uses this chipset inside the graphic card made by them. 

What would happen if there is no GPU ? ? ? 

First of all there is no chance that your PC /Laptop will not have GPU unless either  you are the one who built PC by ordering computer components from online or the GPU stops working. In Either case you don't have to worry as your PC will not stop working but its performance will decrease. If your PC has Intel Processor and dedicated GPU stops working then switch to Intel Integrated GPU (Intel HD Graphics). In case of AMD, only some of its series have integrated GPU, so your PC may start but you will not be able to watch movies, YouTube, games etc.