ATI FirePro M5800

The ATI FirePro M5800 is a mobile workstation graphics processor from AMD, built on the TeraScale 2 architecture using a 40 nm process at TSMC. It features 400 shading units, 20 texture mapping units, and 8 ROPs, with a transistor count of 627 million on a 104 mm² die. The GPU operates with a memory clock of 800 MHz, yielding 3.2 Gbps effective, and is paired with 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus, delivering 51.20 GB/s of bandwidth. Its compute capabilities include 520.0 GFLOPS of FP32 performance, a pixel rate of 5.200 GPixel/s, and a texture rate of 13.00 GTexel/s, all within a 26 W TDP. Released on 2010-02-28, the FirePro M5800 is now end-of-life, succeeding the Mobility FireGL line and preceding the FirePro Mobile series. It connects via PCIe 2.0 x16 and supports DirectX 11.2 (11_0) and OpenGL 4.4, with no Vulkan support. The benchmark database places this GPU at the 50th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 0, indicating it represents a mid-point baseline in historical performance rankings.

Benchmark Performance

The FirePro M5800’s benchmark positioning is defined by its percentile rank of 50, which situates it exactly at the median of all GPUs ever tested in the database. This is a notable achievement for a mobile chip from its era, suggesting that while it is not a high-end performer by modern standards, it holds its own against a broad spectrum of hardware, including many desktop parts. The average benchmark score of 0 provides no absolute performance reference point, so the percentile is the primary quantitative anchor: half of all GPUs in the database score higher, and half score lower. This places the M5800 in a neutral performance tier, neither a standout nor a laggard.

Given the lack of specific benchmark scores or nearest rival entries in the data, the analysis must rely on the architectural specifications to infer relative performance. The 400 shading units, operating at the memory clock-derived frequency, produce 520.0 GFLOPS of FP32 throughput. This figure, when considered against the 50th percentile ranking, suggests that the M5800 was competitive with mid-range desktop GPUs of its generation, albeit in a power-constrained mobile form factor. The 13.00 GTexel/s texture rate and 5.200 GPixel/s pixel rate further indicate a balanced design, where neither texturing nor pixel fill is a bottleneck for typical workstation workloads of the period.

The absence of any benchmark entries means that direct score comparisons are impossible. However, the percentile data implies that the M5800’s real-world performance aligns with a broad middle tier. For compute tasks, the 520.0 GFLOPS is a modest figure by today’s standards, but for the era of its release, it would have handled professional applications like CAD and 3D modeling with reasonable efficiency. The 50th percentile rank is a statistical statement of central tendency: the M5800 is not exceptional, but it is also not deficient, making it a dependable baseline for mobile workstation tasks that do not demand extreme compute throughput.

Ray Tracing and Feature Set

The FirePro M5800 predates the introduction of dedicated ray tracing and tensor core hardware, and the data confirms this: the rtCores and tensorCores fields are both null. This means the GPU has no hardware acceleration for real-time ray tracing or AI-based tensor operations, which are features found in much later architectures. Instead, the M5800 relies on its TeraScale 2 architecture, which was designed for traditional rasterization and compute workloads, not for the hybrid rendering pipelines that would emerge years later.

The API support is a key aspect of the feature set. The M5800 supports DirectX 11.2 (11_0), which is a feature level that enables tessellation and other DirectX 11 capabilities, but it does not support DirectX 12 or Vulkan, as the vulkan field is null. OpenGL 4.4 is supported, which provides a solid foundation for professional OpenGL applications common in workstation environments. The lack of Vulkan is significant for modern gaming or compute use cases, but for the M5800’s intended workstation role, OpenGL 4.4 and DirectX 11.2 were adequate for the software ecosystem available at its release.

The absence of ray tracing and tensor cores means that any workload involving these technologies would have to be handled entirely by the 400 shading units, which are not optimized for such tasks. The pixel rate of 5.200 GPixel/s and texture rate of 13.00 GTexel/s are the relevant throughput metrics for traditional rendering, and they indicate a GPU that can handle moderate resolutions and detail settings without dedicated acceleration for newer effects. The feature set is thus firmly rooted in its 2010-era design, with no forward-looking hardware provisions.

Memory Subsystem

The memory subsystem of the FirePro M5800 is configured with 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory, which was a standard capacity for mobile workstation GPUs of its time. The 128-bit memory bus width is relatively narrow, but the GDDR5 type compensates with a high effective data rate of 3.2 Gbps, resulting in a total bandwidth of 51.20 GB/s. This bandwidth figure is a critical determinant of performance at higher resolutions, where the GPU must fetch and process larger amounts of texture and geometry data.

For a GPU with 520.0 GFLOPS of compute power, a 51.20 GB/s bandwidth provides a reasonable balance. The ratio of bandwidth to compute suggests that the M5800 is not severely memory-bound for its intended workloads, but the 128-bit bus does impose limits. At resolutions above 1080p, the 1024 MB VRAM capacity could become a constraint, particularly in applications that use large textures or high-detail models. The 51.20 GB/s bandwidth, while adequate for 720p and 1080p gaming or professional rendering, would struggle to maintain performance at 4K, where the demand on memory bandwidth and capacity scales significantly.

The memory clock of 800 MHz, yielding 3.2 Gbps effective, is a fixed specification that cannot be adjusted in the data. This means the memory subsystem’s performance is static, and any bottleneck would manifest consistently across workloads. For professional applications like CAD or 3D modeling, 1024 MB is often sufficient for moderate scenes, but for larger assemblies or higher-resolution textures, the capacity could be a limiting factor. The 51.20 GB/s bandwidth is more than sufficient for the pixel rate of 5.200 GPixel/s, ensuring that the ROPs are not starved for data, but it is not a high-bandwidth design by any means.

How It Compares

The nearestRivals field is empty, so there are no direct competitor entries to compare against. This absence is itself informative: the M5800 occupies a unique position in the database, with no close performance neighbors listed. This could be due to the GPU’s specific workstation-oriented design, which may not align neatly with consumer gaming GPUs that typically populate benchmark databases. The 50th percentile rank, however, provides a global comparison point, indicating that the M5800 sits at the median of all GPUs, which includes both professional and consumer parts.

Without rival names, scores, or deltaPct values, any comparison must be inferred from the percentile. A GPU at the 50th percentile is, by definition, outperformed by the top 50% of all GPUs and outperforms the bottom 50%. This places the M5800 in a broad middle tier where it would compete with entry-level desktop GPUs and mid-range mobile GPUs from its era. The 520.0 GFLOPS of FP32 performance and 51.20 GB/s bandwidth are specifications that align with such a positioning, suggesting that the M5800 would be comparable to other 2010-era mobile GPUs with similar shader counts and memory configurations.

The lack of nearest rivals also implies that the database does not have sufficient data to establish statistical deltas. This is common for older or niche professional GPUs, which are less frequently benchmarked than consumer parts. The M5800’s end-of-life status and its role as a mobile workstation GPU contribute to this scarcity of comparative data. As such, the only defensible comparison is via the percentile rank, which places it in the exact middle of the performance distribution.

Who Should Consider It

The ATI FirePro M5800 is a GPU that, based on its 50th percentile rank, is suitable for users with modest performance requirements. The 520.0 GFLOPS of FP32 compute and 51.20 GB/s of memory bandwidth indicate that it can handle 720p and 1080p resolutions with medium to high settings in games from its era, and it is adequate for professional applications like CAD and 2D/3D design that do not demand extreme compute throughput. The 1024 MB of VRAM is sufficient for these tasks, provided that texture sizes and scene complexity are kept within reasonable limits.

For high-resolution workloads, particularly at 4K, the M5800 is not recommended. The 128-bit memory bus and 51.20 GB/s bandwidth would create a significant bottleneck, and the 1024 MB VRAM capacity would likely be exceeded by modern high-detail textures. The lack of Vulkan support further limits its utility in modern applications, which increasingly rely on this API for efficient multi-threaded rendering. The DirectX 11.2 support is a positive for older titles, but it cannot compensate for the hardware limitations at higher resolutions.

The GPU is a viable option for users who require a mobile workstation GPU for legacy applications or for tasks that are not graphics-intensive. Its 26 W TDP makes it a power-efficient choice for laptops, and the OpenGL 4.4 support ensures compatibility with many professional tools. However, given its end-of-life status and the absence of ray tracing or tensor cores, it is not a forward-looking investment. For users with workloads that fit within its 720p/1080p comfort zone, the M5800 offers a balanced, if unremarkable, performance profile. For anything more demanding, the data clearly indicates that newer GPUs would be a better fit.