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AMD FirePro W6150M

AMD FirePro W6150M: A Professional Tool in the World of Graphics

April 2025

1. Architecture and Key Features

Architecture: The AMD FirePro W6150M graphics card is built on the Graphics Core Next (GCN) 3.0 microarchitecture, which delivers high parallel performance for professional tasks. Although GCN has already been superseded by more modern RDNA and CDNA architectures for consumer and enterprise solutions, its optimization for workloads remains relevant.

Manufacturing Technology: The card is produced using a 28nm process, which is considered outdated by 2025. However, this technology provides a balance between energy efficiency and stability, critical for professional systems.

Unique Features:

- Support for OpenCL 2.0 and DirectX 12 for parallel computing.

- AMD PowerTune technologies for dynamic power management.

- Integration with FidelityFX (through driver updates) for improved image quality in applications, though hardware support is lacking.

- No hardware Ray Tracing (RTX) or DLSS — these features are available only in modern AMD RDNA 3/4 and NVIDIA Ampere/Ada Lovelace GPUs.

2. Memory

Type and Size: The FirePro W6150M is equipped with 4GB GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus. For professional tasks in 2025, this may be insufficient, especially when working with large 3D models or rendering in 8K.

Bandwidth: The memory provides 160GB/s, which is below modern standards (for example, GDDR6X offers up to 1000GB/s). This limits performance in tasks that require rapid data access.

Impact on Performance: In video editing and 3D rendering, the memory size is adequate for moderately complex projects, but when working with neural network algorithms or simulations, delays may occur due to insufficient memory.

3. Gaming Performance

Average FPS (1080p, Medium Settings):

- CS2: 60-70 FPS.

- Fortnite: 45-55 FPS.

- Cyberpunk 2077: 20-25 FPS (without ray tracing).

Resolution Support:

- 1080p — comfortable performance in non-demanding games.

- 1440p and 4K — not recommended due to lack of computational power.

Ray Tracing: No hardware support. Software methods (e.g., through FidelityFX Super Resolution) reduce FPS by 30-40%, making RTX effects impractical.

4. Professional Tasks

Video Editing: Support for H.264/H.265 via AMD VCE speeds up export in Premiere Pro, but for encoding 8K or working with RAW formats, a more modern card is needed.

3D Modeling: In Autodesk Maya and Blender, the W6150M shows stability, but rendering complex scenes takes 2-3 times longer than on the NVIDIA Quadro RTX 4000.

Scientific Calculations: Thanks to OpenCL, the card handles physical simulations (e.g., in ANSYS), but falls short compared to solutions with CUDA support (NVIDIA) or CDNA (AMD Instinct).

5. Power Consumption and Heat Dissipation

TDP: 100W — a moderate figure for a mobile professional card.

Cooling: It is recommended to be used in systems with efficient ventilation (workstations or premium gaming laptops). A desktop setup requires a case with 2-3 fans.

Compatible Platforms: Works best in conjunction with AMD Ryzen Pro processors or Intel Xeon (to minimize bottlenecks).

6. Comparison with Competitors

- NVIDIA Quadro M2200 (4GB GDDR5): Similar performance in OpenGL, but Quadro wins with CUDA for machine learning.

- AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (8GB GDDR6): A newer RDNA architecture, PCIe 4.0 support, and higher rendering speed.

- NVIDIA RTX A2000 (12GB GDDR6): Hardware Ray Tracing, DLSS, and double the memory bandwidth.

Price: As of April 2025, the FirePro W6150M is available for $550-600 (new units), making it less attractive compared to modern alternatives.

7. Practical Tips

- Power Supply: Minimum 450W with an 80+ Bronze certification.

- Compatibility: Check your motherboard for PCIe 3.0 x16 support.

- Drivers: Use AMD Pro Edition drivers for stability in professional applications. Gaming drivers may cause conflicts.

8. Pros and Cons

Pros:

- Reliability and long lifespan.

- Optimization for workstations.

- Support for multi-monitor configurations (up to 6 displays).

Cons:

- Outdated architecture.

- Low gaming performance.

- Limited memory size.

9. Final Verdict

Who is the FirePro W6150M suitable for?

- Professionals: Engineers, architects, or video editors working with outdated software where stability is more critical than speed.

- Budget Workstations: For office tasks and light 3D visualization.

Why not for gamers? Even in 2025, the card won't handle modern projects at high settings. It's better to consider the Radeon RX 7600 or NVIDIA RTX 4060.

Conclusion: The FirePro W6150M is a niche solution for those who need compatibility with older hardware and software. For modern tasks, it's best to choose more up-to-date models.

Prices and specifications are current as of April 2025.

Basic

Label Name

AMD

Platform

Mobile

Launch Date

November 2015

Model Name

FirePro W6150M

Generation

FirePro Mobile

Bus Interface

MXM-B (3.0)

Transistors

2,080 million

Compute Units

TMUs

Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) serve as components of the GPU, which are capable of rotating, scaling, and distorting binary images, and then placing them as textures onto any plane of a given 3D model. This process is called texture mapping.

Foundry

TSMC

Process Size

28 nm

Architecture

GCN 2.0

Memory Specifications

Memory Size

4GB

Memory Type

GDDR5

Memory Bus

The memory bus width refers to the number of bits of data that the video memory can transfer within a single clock cycle. The larger the bus width, the greater the amount of data that can be transmitted instantaneously, making it one of the crucial parameters of video memory. The memory bandwidth is calculated as: Memory Bandwidth = Memory Frequency x Memory Bus Width / 8. Therefore, when the memory frequencies are similar, the memory bus width will determine the size of the memory bandwidth.

128bit

Memory Clock

1375MHz

Bandwidth

Memory bandwidth refers to the data transfer rate between the graphics chip and the video memory. It is measured in bytes per second, and the formula to calculate it is: memory bandwidth = working frequency × memory bus width / 8 bits.

88.00 GB/s

Theoretical Performance

Pixel Rate

Pixel fill rate refers to the number of pixels a graphics processing unit (GPU) can render per second, measured in MPixels/s (million pixels per second) or GPixels/s (billion pixels per second). It is the most commonly used metric to evaluate the pixel processing performance of a graphics card.

17.20 GPixel/s

Texture Rate

Texture fill rate refers to the number of texture map elements (texels) that a GPU can map to pixels in a single second.

51.60 GTexel/s

FP64 (double)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy, while single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.

103.2 GFLOPS

FP32 (float)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.

1.618 TFLOPS

Miscellaneous

Shading Units

The most fundamental processing unit is the Streaming Processor (SP), where specific instructions and tasks are executed. GPUs perform parallel computing, which means multiple SPs work simultaneously to process tasks.

768

L1 Cache

16 KB (per CU)

L2 Cache

256KB

TDP

Unknown

Vulkan Version

Vulkan is a cross-platform graphics and compute API by Khronos Group, offering high performance and low CPU overhead. It lets developers control the GPU directly, reduces rendering overhead, and supports multi-threading and multi-core processors.

1.2.170

OpenCL Version

2.1

OpenGL

4.6

DirectX

12 (12_0)

Power Connectors

None

Shader Model

6.5

ROPs

The Raster Operations Pipeline (ROPs) is primarily responsible for handling lighting and reflection calculations in games, as well as managing effects like anti-aliasing (AA), high resolution, smoke, and fire. The more demanding the anti-aliasing and lighting effects in a game, the higher the performance requirements for the ROPs; otherwise, it may result in a sharp drop in frame rate.

Benchmarks

FP32 (float)

Score

1.618 TFLOPS

Compared to Other GPU

FP32 (float) / TFLOPS

Radeon Vega 7

1.736 +7.3%

Steam Deck GPU

1.671 +3.3%

FirePro W6150M

1.618

Radeon HD 6990M

1.57 -3%

Quadro P620 Mobile

1.508 -6.8%