NVIDIA GeForce 830M

The NVIDIA GeForce 830M is a modest entry-level mobile GPU from the Maxwell generation, built for basic computing and light gaming rather than high-end performance. Its benchmark data places it in the 23rd percentile of all GPUs, indicating that it trails a significant majority of the market, but it remains competitive with a specific cluster of older mobile and entry-level workstation parts.

Power and Cooling

The GeForce 830M carries a thermal design power (TDP) of only 33 W, a figure that positions it as a highly efficient part suitable for thin and light laptops. This low power draw means the chip generates minimal heat, allowing it to be cooled effectively by a simple, passive or low-speed fan solution; the data shows no dedicated power connector is required, and the slot width is listed as IGP, indicating it is a permanently integrated mobile chip rather than a removable card. Because the suggested PSU field is empty and no power connectors are specified, system builders and users do not need to worry about external power delivery — the motherboard's standard supply is sufficient. The 28 nm process node from TSMC, combined with a 1,020 million transistor count on a compact 77 mm² die, contributes to this low power envelope. The transistor density of 13.2M per mm² is modest by modern standards, but for its era, this design prioritized energy efficiency over raw compute, which is consistent with the 33 W TDP. Users should expect that any laptop housing this GPU will have a correspondingly modest cooling solution, and battery life in non-gaming workloads should be respectable given the low power ceiling.

How It Compares

The benchmark data places the GeForce 830M in a tight cluster of rivals, with all deltas within a narrow 1.2 percentage-point band. Against the NVIDIA Quadro K3000M, the 830M scores 1.8% lower on average, a negligible difference that effectively makes them performance equals in compute tasks. The AMD Radeon Vega 3 sits slightly ahead, with the 830M trailing by 2.4%; this integrated part from a newer generation offers comparable compute throughput, suggesting that the 830M's age is showing but not severely handicapping it. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460M, an older high-end mobile part, edges out the 830M by 2.5%, meaning the 830M's efficiency gains do not translate into a clear performance win over a much older, higher-power discrete GPU. Finally, the AMD FirePro W2100, a workstation-oriented card, is 3% ahead of the 830M, indicating that even entry-level professional parts from the same era maintain a slight compute advantage. None of these deltas exceed 3%, so the 830M is effectively in a dead heat with all four rivals, with no single competitor holding a decisive lead.

Ray Tracing and Feature Set

The GeForce 830M does not include dedicated ray tracing or tensor cores; these fields are null in the data, confirming that this GPU relies entirely on traditional rasterization hardware. Its shading units number 256, paired with 16 texture mapping units and 8 render output units, which dictate its fillrate capabilities. The architecture is Maxwell, which supports DirectX 12 (11_0) — a partial implementation of the API — along with OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4. This makes the GPU broadly compatible with modern operating systems and drivers, but the lack of hardware-accelerated ray tracing means any such workload is unsupported or must fall back to software emulation, which is impractical at this performance level. The API support is adequate for running older DirectX 11 titles and many Vulkan-based games, but the feature set is firmly rooted in the pre-ray-tracing era. Users should not expect to enable high-end graphical effects like real-time global illumination or ray-traced reflections, as the hardware simply lacks the specialized units for those tasks. The pixel rate of 9.200 GPixel/s and texture rate of 18.40 GTexel/s further confirm that this is a fillrate-limited part, appropriate for 1080p at low settings or 720p at medium settings in older games.

FAQ

Q: Does the GeForce 830M support hardware ray tracing?

A: No. The data shows no RT cores are present, and the GPU relies on traditional shading units for rendering.

Q: What is the maximum API level supported by this GPU?

A: The GPU supports DirectX 12 (11_0), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, as listed in the specifications.

Q: How much VRAM does the GeForce 830M have, and what type?

A: It comes with 2 GB of DDR3 memory on a 64-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 14.40 GB/s.

Q: Is this GPU suitable for modern gaming at high settings?

A: No. With an average benchmark score of 4166 and a 23rd percentile ranking, it is only suitable for lightweight or older titles at low settings.

Q: What power connector does the GeForce 830M require?

A: None. The specifications list "None" for power connectors, and the TDP is only 33 W.

Q: How does the GeForce 830M compare to the AMD Radeon Vega 3?

A: The 830M scores 2.4% lower than the Vega 3 in average benchmarks, making the AMD integrated part slightly faster.

Benchmark Performance

The GeForce 830M achieves an average benchmark score of 4166, derived from its Geekbench OpenCL score of 4254 and Geekbench Vulkan score of 4078. This places it in the 23rd percentile of all GPUs, meaning roughly three-quarters of the hardware in the database outperforms it. The gap between its OpenCL and Vulkan scores is 176 points, indicating a modest variance depending on the compute API used; the OpenCL result is 2.1% higher than the Vulkan result. Against its nearest rivals, the data shows a remarkably tight grouping. The NVIDIA Quadro K3000M leads the cluster with an average score of 4241, and the 830M falls 1.8% short of that mark. The AMD Radeon Vega 3 scores 4268, a 2.4% advantage over the 830M. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460M posts 4275, putting the 830M 2.5% behind. The AMD FirePro W2100 tops the group at 4295, with the 830M trailing by 3%. These deltas are small enough to be within run-to-run variance, so the 830M is effectively tied with all four rivals in raw compute throughput. However, the 830M's advantage lies in its power efficiency — a 33 W TDP versus the likely higher draw of the older discrete GPUs — but benchmark data does not capture that trade-off. In practical terms, a user moving from any of these rivals to the 830M would see no meaningful performance change in compute-heavy tasks.

Who Should Consider It

Given its 23rd percentile ranking and the benchmark scores, the GeForce 830M is strictly a legacy or entry-level option. For users running 720p resolution with low graphical settings, the GPU can handle esports titles and older games from the early 2010s, where the 588.8 GFLOPS of FP32 compute is sufficient. At 1080p, the data suggests the GPU will struggle with modern releases, as the fillrate of 9.200 GPixel/s and texture rate of 18.40 GTexel/s become bottlenecks. The 2 GB of DDR3 memory, while adequate for low-resolution textures, will limit high-resolution texture packs. This GPU is not for gamers seeking playable framerates in 2024-era titles; instead, it suits users who need basic 3D acceleration for office productivity, video playback, or light photo editing. The Vulkan 1.4 support means some newer indie games with low system requirements may run, but the lack of RT cores and the low compute throughput cap expectations. Users with a laptop containing this GPU should target eSports titles at 720p with medium presets, or older 3D titles at 1080p with reduced settings. It is also a candidate for retro gaming, where the hardware is more than adequate for titles from the PlayStation 3 / Xbox 360 era.

Memory Subsystem

The GeForce 830M is equipped with 2 GB of DDR3 memory, a configuration that was common for entry-level GPUs in its generation but is now dated. The memory interface is a narrow 64-bit bus, which severely restricts memory bandwidth to just 14.40 GB/s. This is a critical limitation for high-resolution gaming, as modern titles often require bandwidth in the hundreds of GB/s to stream textures efficiently. The memory clock runs at 900 MHz, with an effective data rate of 1800 Mbps, but the narrow bus negates any benefit from the clock speed. For 1080p gaming, the 14.40 GB/s bandwidth will cause frame stuttering in texture-heavy scenes, as the GPU cannot fetch data fast enough from VRAM. At 720p, the situation improves, but the 2 GB capacity is still a ceiling for texture quality — many modern games exceed 2 GB at medium settings. The 64-bit bus also means the GPU has a peak theoretical bandwidth that is roughly one-tenth of what contemporary entry-level GPUs offer, highlighting the 830M's age. The 8 ROPs further bottleneck pixel throughput, so even when memory bandwidth is sufficient, the GPU's ability to write final pixels to the framebuffer is limited. Users should treat this memory subsystem as sufficient for light workloads only, and any task that demands high resolutions or large textures will expose the 14.40 GB/s bottleneck.