Nvidia Optimus reduces gaming performance

Which in the end will lower the manufacturers / OEM and resellers earnings. Not in favor of them. Why should they bother with what the consumers want?

 

Does this happen with Turing only?

 

Optimus had a small FPS impact in previous GPU generations as well, but to nowhere near this degree.

 

I actually commented on the YT video explaining the performance differentials, but I'll chuck it in here:

TL;DR Optimus has 2 different bottlenecks, one is CPU utilization (CPU-Capped games) and the other is PCIE bus utilization (high framerates).

If you happen to trigger both of these conditions you'll see a massive difference like in CS:GO. If you trigger neither of them, then performance will be almost the same like in Witcher 3.

 

Whats worse is that eGPUs have a X4/x2 PCH link, not direct CPU link. Hoping a manufacturer comes up with a x16 link like the GS30 or Thunderbolt 4 is a x8 3.0 or x4 4.0 connection, and maybe depending on vendor, through the CPU

 

The Thunderbolt 3 standard has been released and will likely be integrated fully into the USB4.0 spec. It will presumably be merged with PCIE 4.0.

The key difference will be how it's linked. As you say, current laptops are all linked via PCH which is an Intel limitation (Intel mobile CPUs only allow direct PCIE connections for graphics devices). Some desktop boards have add-in cards which allow Thunderbolt 3 to be connected directly to the CPU and the bottlenecking is significantly reduced. However, TB3 for eGPU applications is entirely pointless on desktop hardware.

Ryzen based mobile CPUs could theoretically be connected in that manner as they have 1x8 for the GPU and 1x4 for NVME. You could take the NVME lanes and connect them to a Titan Ridge controller.

 

I doubt any vendor would implement a Ryzen CPU and a Intel TB controller, unless like you said, its somehow integrated into PCIE 4/USB 4

 

This has always been the case since Optimus was first introduced. Optimus was always rubbish for a workstation or gaming laptop.

Don't buy BGA equipped workstation/gaming laptops, simple.

 

Even gangsters like me find this ludicrous

 

The best compromise is a MUX chip as used in ASUS and Clevo units. Having the choice is always better.

The fact is the Nvidia GPU idle power consumption is still far too high to be competitive and there is a real market for business/gaming hybrid laptops. I'd certainly use an Optimus laptop and deal with some performance deficit than be stuck with Intel iGPU only.

AFAIK part of the release of the Thunderbolt 3 standard to USB-IF means that third parties could begin manufacturing their own Thunderbolt 3 controllers.
The main thing stopping AMD+TB3 integration was due to Intel requiring any device carrying Thunderbolt 3 to be certified through Intel. Theoretically that restriction has also been lifted so in the short term we could see Ryzen + Titan Ridge pairings until said third parties come to the table with their own implementations.