Intel UHD is perhaps the most widely used series of integrated graphics cards for laptops. Used in 10th generation Intel processors from Celeron to Core i9. Intel UHD video cards are built on the Gen 9.5 architecture, so they are good friends with games even on old-school DirectX 9 engines and older. They are not picky about the number of RAM channels: two RAM modules give an increase in frame rate of only up to 20%. The younger UHD 600 and UHD 605 are part of the Celeron N and Pentium Silver integrated processors. Medium UHD 610 and UHD 620 operate at a higher frequency and are built into Pentium Gold and Core i3-i7 processors with the U index (15 W TDP). Finally, the oldest and highest frequency UHD 630 is used in Core processors with the H index, that is, an unlocked 35W power limit. Equipped with an Intel UHD Quick Sync media encoder that plays 4K movies smoothly and speeds up amateur video editing.

Intel Iris Xe - integrated graphics cards of Core 11, 12 and 13 generation processors. Approximately twice as powerful as Intel UHD in games on the new DirectX 11 and Vulcan engines. But in the old DX9, they lose up to half of their performance, since they do not support it in hardware, but only emulate it in software. And after all, many popular multiplayer games are built on it (League of Legends, Rocket League, StarCraft 2), not to mention the single-player games of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 eras. Iris Xe gets a significant boost from dual-channel memory - up to 40%. The Quick Sync co-processor has also evolved: in addition to H264, H265 and VP9, support for the latest AV1 video codec has been added, including ultra-high resolution 8K and an extended HDR color gamut. Iris Xe also performs well in photo processing, for example, when enhancing the clarity of photos using Topaz artificial intelligence.


Radeon Vega - if the younger Vega 3 model from AMD Athlon processors is approximately in the middle between Intel UHD and Iris Xe in terms of performance, then the older Vega 7 from Ryzen competes on equal terms with the initial discrete GeForce MX video cards. Simply put, Radeon Vega is able to run almost any modern game at least at low graphics settings at 720p resolution. And many games will run even on medium settings at 1080p. AMD video cards are equally good friends with all APIs from DX9 to Vulcan, thanks to the support of asynchronous shaders (analogous to Hyper-Threading parallelization in processors). Only the extremely demanding Cyberpunk 2077, Assassin's Creed Valhalla and Red Dead Redemption 2 can become a problem.

AMD RDNA is the next step in the evolution of Radeon mobile graphics cards. Approximately one and a half to two times faster than Vega and already imposes competition on the younger GTX laptop discs: 1050 and 1650 Max-Q. Represented by two architectures - RDNA 2 and RDNA 3, the first is used in the Ryzen 6000 processors, and the second in the Ryzen 7000. RDNA iGPUs can automatically overclock to 3 GHz. They are combined with DDR5 and LPDDR5 RAM: the first has a wider bus, but the second has a higher frequency with better energy efficiency. Of course, all branded AMD game enhancers are supported. For example, FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) boosts frame rates in compatible games with only minimal loss in image clarity. The fallback is Radeon Image Sharpening (RIS), which does the same at the driver level on top of any game. Finally, Radeon Anti-Lag reduces input lag in esports games.

Mali and Adreno, integrated video cards of MediaTek and Qualcomm processors, widely used in smartphones, are gradually moving into laptops. The first signs were Chromebook and Windows for ARM. Old versions of DirectX are not supported at all, new DX are emulated, but Vulcan works natively. No wonder this engine is used in an increasing number of new games. If the gaming potential of Mali and Adreno is still in question, then their NEON and Hexagon media encoders are in no way inferior to their counterparts from Intel and AMD. An indisputable plus is passive fanless, that is, completely silent cooling.

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Thomson NEO 14 

Thomson Neo 14.1 is one of the most affordable laptops in domestic retail. And this is not a 10 or 11-inch netbook, but a full-fledged laptop with a large 14-inch screen. The matrix is used by TN with a resolution of 1366x768 pixels and a frequency of 60 Hz, but this is the norm for low-cost laptops. The processor is installed Celeron N4020 with two Gemini Lake architecture cores and an integrated Intel UHD 600 graphics accelerator. Its main advantage is the power consumption of only 6 W, so the laptop does not need a fan at all. Despite the declared base frequency of the processor 1.1 GHz, most of the time it works in Turbo-mode 2.8 GHz. 4GB RAM and 128GB SSD. However, this is enough for the lightweight Windows 11S operating system. The keyboard has a Ukrainian layout, and the touchpad doubles as a calculator. A useful bonus is an annual subscription to MS Office 365.

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Thomson NEO N15 (UA-N15C8SL512) 

Thomson Neo N15 15.6 is a balanced laptop with licensed Windows 11 for study, office work and multimedia entertainment from the French brand. The most popular screen diagonal is 15.6 inches, while it weighs only 1.8 kg, the charger is also light and compact. The processor is a Celeron N5100 with four cores and a more advanced Jasper Lake architecture. The integrated graphics card is exactly the same Intel UHD 600. But thanks to the dual-channel RAM, part of which the iGPU uses as video memory, gaming performance is slightly higher. Enough for example for League of Legends and World of Tanks. The volume of RAM 8 GB will be enough even for those who like to open a dozen or two tabs in a web browser. And a large collection of movies and series will fit on a 512 GB SSD drive. You can watch and listen to them either directly on your laptop through the built-in stereo speakers, or by connecting to your TV via HDMI.

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Thomson NEO V2 (UA-N15V2I58BK512) 

Thomson Neo V2 15.6 is a laptop with Windows 11 preinstalled and a very powerful Core i5-10300H processor. The suffix H means an increased power limit from 15 to 35 watts. Such processors are used, among other things, in heavy-duty gaming laptops. There are four physical cores, eight virtual threads, auto-overclocking on one core can reach 4.5 GHz. If low-frequency UHD 620 graphics are built into processors with the U index, then high-frequency UHD 630 graphics are used here. Together with dual-channel RAM, it can even handle CSGO and GTA 5. The Quick Sync media encoder allows you to view FullHD movies, especially since the laptop screen resolution is already 1920x1080 pixels . All three USB ports are high-speed: two USB Type-A 3.0 and one newfangled Type-C 3.1. The latter can be used to connect a second external monitor and fast charge a laptop, including from a power bank. The amount of RAM is 8 GB, and the capacity of the SSD is 512 GB.