This laptop or that laptop.

[David75]

Battery life is a combo of hardware choices, Os tuning and customer mind control

For the later, I refer to the fact that macs can bu tunned down regarding performance, as software and uses are fairly different from PCs, and customers do not buy macs for performances. Moreover, it's hard comparing macs and PCs thanks to the OS... eventhough you can boot windows now.

For a laptop?
I'd go with a cheap one and slam a good SSD in it. Problem is that you clearly eat most of the budget with the SSD alone.
The only quality that laptop would have is silence and temperature control.

[DB_Hunter]

Ok I'm looking to buy a laptop for a friend, but I havn't bought a computer for a while and I'm REALLY out of touch with the technology. Last thing I knew processors were going multi-core, and that was that.

So I have been reading up on the different multi core Intel processors and I know that the i3, i5 and i7 series are the latest ones. I understand that the way their bus systems are make them faster than the old Core 2 Duo series. What I don't understand, and this may seem rather simple to some, is that when someone states the clock speed for one of these processors are they talking about the total clock speed of all of the cores of just the speed at which one core runs? E.g. 2.4GHz i3 dual core processor... does that mean a total processing power of 4.8Ghz or that each core runs at 1.2GHz?

[David75]

Ok I'm looking to buy a laptop for a friend, but I havn't bought a computer for a while and I'm REALLY out of touch with the technology. Last thing I knew processors were going multi-core, and that was that.

So I have been reading up on the different multi core Intel processors and I know that the i3, i5 and i7 series are the latest ones. I understand that the way their bus systems are make them faster than the old Core 2 Duo series. What I don't understand, and this may seem rather simple to some, is that when someone states the clock speed for one of these processors are they talking about the total clock speed of all of the cores of just the speed at which one core runs? E.g. 2.4GHz i3 dual core processor... does that mean a total processing power of 4.8Ghz or that each core runs at 1.2GHz?

Clock is shared, so each core clocks the specified frequency.

[DB_Hunter]

Clock is shared, so each core clocks the specified frequency.

So that means each clock is running at the specific frequency, giving a 'total' speed of cores x clock speed if all cores are utilised?

[Buffalobiian]

So that means each clock is running at the specific frequency, giving a 'total' speed of cores x clock speed if all cores are utilised?

If I tell you this i5 is rated for 2.8GHz, it means that each of its four cores run at 2.8GHz. If you would like a "total", then that would be 2.8*4 = 11.2GHz.

Processors these days have underclocking and (the term used by Intel's processors is) Turboboosting. The i5 760 is rated at 2.8GHz, but will underclock to 1.2GHz to save power and heat when not demanded, and can Turboboost (dynamic overclocking pretty much) up to 3.3GHz given that it has the thermal headroom and other resources available.

In other words, the i5 760 (2.8GHz) is guaranteed to run between 1.2-2.8GHz. If it's not overheating, it can turboboost up to 3.33GHz (though this performance is subjective to operating conditions - heat and threads).

The newest gen of i3s/i5s have even more amazing turboboost capabilities. AMD has something similar too.

[DB_Hunter]

If I tell you this i5 is rated for 2.8GHz, it means that each of its four cores run at 2.8GHz. If you would like a "total", then that would be 2.8*4 = 11.2GHz.

Processors these days have underclocking and (the term used by Intel's processors is) Turboboosting. The i5 760 is rated at 2.8GHz, but will underclock to 1.2GHz to save power and heat when not demanded, and can Turboboost (dynamic overclocking pretty much) up to 3.3GHz given that it has the thermal headroom and other resources available.

In other words, the i5 760 (2.8GHz) is garunteed to run between 1.2-2.8GHz. If it's not overheating, it can turboboost up to 3.33GHz (though this performance is subjective to operating conditions - heat and threads).

The newest gen of i3s/i5s have even more amazing turboboost capabilities. AMD has something similar too.

Thanks, that clears up a lot of stuff.

I'm looking to get a laptop for a friend who just wants it for normal word processing, e-mail/Outlook, internet browsing and occasional use of Adobe Illustraitor. His basic request is that if he has a few windows/apss open like those mentioned above that his machine doesn't start grinding to a halt. His other request is to make the machine as 'future proof' as possible, given that he has a budget of about £400-450 max. I was originally just going to get him a Core 2 Duo machine for half the price but I'm wondering if I should get him an i3? Would it be worth going double the cost from say £200-215 to £400-450 just to get an i3 and possibly an i5?

[David75]

Thanks, that clears up a lot of stuff.

I'm looking to get a laptop for a friend who just wants it for normal word processing, e-mail/Outlook, internet browsing and occasional use of Adobe Illustraitor. His basic request is that if he has a few windows/apss open like those mentioned above that his machine doesn't start grinding to a halt. His other request is to make the machine as 'future proof' as possible, given that he has a budget of about £400-450 max. I was originally just going to get him a Core 2 Duo machine for half the price but I'm wondering if I should get him an i3? Would it be worth going double the cost from say £200-215 to £400-450 just to get an i3 and possibly an i5?

It is only possible with a SSD (assuming the system has 4Gb RAM already) because these symtoms are the sign of a HDD not able to cope with multiple random small write/reads happening at the same time.
Thing is, a SSD is expensive. So in the mentionned budget, only a 60GB or so SSD will do. Meaning you either need to find a dual HDD bay laptop, or sacrifice the optical drive bay and add an adapter, or deal with an external USB/e-sata HDD
And believe me, a good SSD is the best upgrade you can think of.
A vertex 2, a C300 or even an Intel will do the trick around US$ 100 I guess. I know this is a lot of $ for a very small storage capacity, but it really transforms a comp. Just that for a low budget you have to manage your data differently. But you can also think lower in terms of processing power. Of course in the end, the future proofness will be hard to cope with on a very tight budget, or even be impossible for gaming (hell, gaming on a laptop is already madness...)

[Kraco]

I think David invested a sizable sum in some SSD manufacturer's stocks.

[Buffalobiian]

@David: I can have multiple things open without the PC/laptop grinding to a halt. To me having enough ram for the stuff you're doing is arguably more important so that you're not constantly swapping stuff between the RAM and the HDD. Having an SSD will offset this I suppose, but more RAM does seem to be a cheaper option. Manufacturers these days don't seem to mind sticking in 4GB of ram as a tag line.

[David75]

I think David invested a sizable sum in some SSD manufacturer's stocks.

Nope, but I did finally buy a SSD

@David: I can have multiple things open without the PC/laptop grinding to a halt. To me having enough ram for the stuff you're doing is arguably more important so that you're not constantly swapping stuff between the RAM and the HDD. Having an SSD will offset this I suppose, but more RAM does seem to be a cheaper option. Manufacturers these days don't seem to mind sticking in 4GB of ram as a tag line.

I was thinking about illustrator and its hoggish behavior, even with 4GB of ram. You agree with me that 4GB is the limit for a budget laptop, as 2*4GB sticks would be too expensive as most (if not all) laptops have only 2 ram slots available.
Then I adapt the strategy to a smaller SSD and find a way to store data, be it in a bay adapter, dual bay laptop, or external HDD.

As of yet, I see no other alternatives, thing is trying the solution costs. Oh and unfortunately, SSDs go with Win7 for optimal data management reasons (trim for example) or linux... but since we're talking about illustrator it is a M$ environnement.

[darkshadow]

Even with 3GB ram and 80 processes running which amongst are 3dsMAX and Photoshop my pc doesn't grind to a halt....why? Because most programs aren't continuesly writing/reading from the HDD, even those 2. Illustrator doesn't either.
Once the programs are loaded up in the ram, it doesn't really matter whether you are running notepad or Final Cut pro, the performance of the program will mostly depend on the overall performance of the system ( cpu/ram/gpu/vram), the HDD is only really important when actually reading/writing is occuring.

[Kraco]

It would also seem a bit dubious to me to get the cheapest Acer around to be able to fit an SSD into a tight budget like that.

[DB_Hunter]

Clearly RAM is important but the message I seem to be getting here that the CPU is not as important as the RAM...? I mean my thoughts are revolving around whether or not I should go for an i3/i5 or just a Core 2 Duo for half the price?