CPU Comparison Please

[fernakis]

I've been in the market for a notebook computer, and while I profess to have moderate technical knowledge, I find myself hopelessly confused regarding the blinding array of CPU options. Since I tend to do some CPU intensive work, I find that I must ask you knowledgable folks to perhaps clue me in.

So there are three laptops, all with different CPU's.

(Mobile) Intels at 3.06ghz
Centrinos at 1.6, 1.7ghz
AMD 64M at 3ghz, but really 1.8ghz

How do these compare with eachother. Are the centrinos really that much slower (1/2 speed) than regular or mobile pentium chips? Or are there hidden factors?

That was my first impression, but reading articles that doesn't seem to be the case. Especially since the AMD 3ghz is being compared with the centrinos?

Can anyone shed some light on how I can compare CPU's to determine which yields the best performance (putting HD's, memory, etc aside)

Thank you very very much.

Mike.

 

[Viper96720]

AMd 64 probably most powerful at least equal to the Intel 3.06. Centrino best battery life out of the 3.

 

[Matthias99]

The Centrino chips (ironically, much like the Athlon and Athlon64 chips that AMD has been making for years) use a shorter pipeline and run more instructions per clock (IPC). This lowers the clock speed and power requirements, but makes it faster (compared to a standard Pentium) than its raw clock speed would indicate. I believe the Centrino 1.6Ghz is roughly equivalent to a Pentium 4 at 2.2-2.4Ghz, but don't quote me on that.

 

[JBT]

Centrino's also use 1 meg of cache

 

[Derango]

By the way, The Centrino is a combinaton of 3 things, the Pentium-M processor, a specific chipset and a intel wireless card. So you're talking about the Pentium-M, not the "centrino chip"

 

[WackyDan]

Here here...

Centrino is not the proc but the branding of the combination Derango mentions above. Pentium M is the proc.

So... What's the real difference in performance between a P4 and a Pentium M? ( I can't speak to the mobile AMD )

First.... make sure that you are comparing a mobile P4 and not a Notebook with a Desktop variety P4 in it.

Rule of thumb is that a 1.5 Pentium M = a P4 2.- to 2.2

A 1.6 = a 2.2 to possibly a 2.4.

Note--those are rough comparisons and these comparisons ONLY apply in Office types applications/generic internet use. ie; running outlook, Lotus Notes, IE, Opera, MS OFFice, etc.

Where you run into the performance gap with the Pentium M VS the P4 Mobile is in numeric intensive applications. ie; Sound editing, video editing/rendering - ENCRYPTION is one area I've seen that suffers under the Pentium M. The P4 is just way better suited to these high end use apps than the M is..... No amount of cache will help the M catch up in this case as Numeric intensive apps are not so dependant on Cache like office apps/general productivity apps are, but on raw processor power like the P4 has.

I've run encryption on a P4 1.8 mobile and a 1.5 Pentium M.... There was a noticeable delay on the M vs the P4. Enough to be annoying.

I wouldn't let the fact that if you encode MP3's and home hobbiest/use stuff like that dictate you into a P4 mobile. The difference in that aspect isn't that big of a deal. If you were say on a PIII mobile or early P4 mobile laptop, a pentium M would still be a significant performance upgrade.

Most of all, battery life with a Pentium M is not to be dismissed. I went from a P4 Mobile running 2 1/3 -3/4 hrs to a Pentium M running in excess of 6hrs now. That offered more value than being a dew seconds quicker here and there, and for the most part my notebook gets used for the simple stuff anyway.

 

[fernakis]

Thanks for the info everyone!!!

I've done some additional searching of my own, and there are no direct comparisons. I've tried to compile results from the same tests from different sites and locations and here's some of the info I managed to get. You are welcome to comment on whether it's correct/incorrect. Obviously some of this information is conflicting.

The net story I'm getting here is that the P4 is the best chip if you don't care at all about power consumption, the AMD 64M is a close second and has decent power specs, the Pentium-M is really only a good choice if you're focussed on mobility. At that same time, being geared towards mobility, one must think really hard on whether the extra speed of a real P4 is truly worth it versus the Pentium-M.

CPUMARK
P4 3.06 199
P4 3.2 219
AMD 64 3.2 254
PM 1.3 148
P 2.4 149
AMD 64M ?
------------------------------
PentiumM 1.5 is roughly equivalent to P4M 2.06ghz
1.7 2.4ghz (according to mobilemark scores)
-----------------------------
On Sandra Arithmetic scores....
PM 1.7 : Arithmetic 5664/2268/3352 Mult 11K/9.5K MemBandwidth 2.2K
AMD 64M : 6779/2674/3749 11k/10k 2.5K
----------------------------

 

[JBT]

oh BTW welcome to Anandtech

 

[WackyDan]

So.... I was right.