Memory Benchmarks
The ThinkPad T470 supports DDR4 RAM. Some of the other machines use the older DDR3 technology (see the final page of this article for specifications of all the machines).
The most significant differences between DDR3 and DDR4 RAM is higher module density and lower voltage requirements combined with higher data rate transfer speeds. Current generation DDR4 modules start at 2133MHz, with official support for up to DDR4-3200. Modules can be overclocked. DDR5 modules are available although very expensive with currently little performance improvement.
While the ThinkPad T470 is a dual-channel memory capable laptop, our machine has a single 8GB RAM stick. One upgrade option is to add another RAM stick which will maximise memory performance.
RAMspeed tests the system memory (RAM) performance.
$ phoronix-test-suite benchmark ramspeed
Given the ThinkPad T470 only has 1 8GB DDR4 fitted, performance is in line with expectations compared to single-channel memory capable systems. The i5-4590T machine with dual-channel memory beats the T470 even though it relies on DDR3 RAM.
You might be wondering why the i5-12400F MB/s is so low. While it has the fastest memory of any machine in the test, we’re only using 1 RAM stick. At least it helps you compare the performance of the ThinkPad T470’s memory.
$ phoronix-test-suite benchmark ramspeed
Again, this benchmark tests the system memory (RAM) performance.
Graphics Benchmarks
The ThinkPad T470 has an integrated graphics unit called HD Graphics 520. This is the GT2 version of the Skylate GPU. It has 24 Execution Units clocked at 300-1000MHz. Performance is similar to the dedicated GeForce 820M.
As it doesn’t have any dedicated graphics memory, it accesses the main memory via the processor.
We’re only going to run a single test, as it should be obvious that onboard graphics are not going to achieve high frame rates on many of the latest games at ultra graphics settings.
The test calculates the average frame-rate within the Valley demo for the Unigine engine. Unigine Valley relies upon an OpenGL 3 core profile context.
$ phoronix-test-suite benchmark unigine-valley
While the frames per second score for all machines are very low (particularly given that only 800×600 resolution is tested), that’s common with most Intel integrated graphics. But there are many games you can play on Intel integrated graphics. We will cover some of our favourites in a later article, and see how they fare on the ThinkPad T470.
You’ll have noticed that the i5-12400F wins the test by a country mile. The F indicates the processor requires an external graphics card. We paired the CPU with an Asus NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti. As a mid-end dedicated graphics card, it romps home.
In Manjaro we recommend installing the intel-gpu-tools package as this provides intel_gpu_top, a utility that displays a top-like summary of Intel GPU usage. It’s a simple way to monitor GPU usage. Install the package with the command:
$ sudo pacman -S intel-gpu-tools
Next page: Page 4 – Disk / Specifications
Pages in this article:
Page 1 – Introduction / System
Page 2 – Processor
Page 3 – Memory / Graphics
Page 4 – Disk / Specifications
Complete list of articles in this series:
| Lenovo ThinkPad T470 Ultrabook | |
|---|---|
| Part 1 | We spotlight the condition of our refurbished T470 laptop |
| Part 2 | Specifications of the T470 laptop using the inxi utility to interrogate the system |
| Part 3 | Installing the Manjaro distribution |
| Part 4 | We run a series of benchmarks on the T470 and compare to other machines |
| Part 5 | Multimedia performance including power management |