Dual Core Notebooks

http://www.hypersonic-pc.com/FX7/



here ya go mate

Wow that things a monster...

anyways, from what I understand the Pentium M dual cores are coming in 2006, the Athlon dual cores you can already get. Problem is that you won't be able to find the dual core Athlons in many machines, and when the Pentium ones come out, they will probably be very expensive.

Dual core is just coming out, right now the performance difference is neglegable. The dual core is much more future proof though, especially once Vista comes out. My thoughts are that you should either get something now or wait till holiday 2006/early 2007

I've noticed in various Yonah-related threads throughout the forum the suggestion that Vista is well-suited to dual-core setups.

To my knowledge there is nothing particular about Vista that would make it more suited to dual-core and/or multi-processor setups than XP, or even Win2K for that matter.

Multi-core processors benefit from multi-threaded applications and OS's - eg. WinNT, WinXP, Vista, OSX, Photoshop, 3DStudio Max, Maya, etc. - for the most part "Workstation-class" applications.

One of the major manufacturer will be shipping their dual-core laptop by the end of Dec with 15.4" WSXGA+, 1GB, 100GB, 256MB X1600, DVD-DL-RW, 6.6lbs with a stated 6 hours of battery life (so figure 4:30+ in real term) for about $2200.

vista doesnt have any dualcore stuff in it. its just windows xp with a facelift really.

anyway, the dualcores coming out in january will be priced to replace the current cpu's, so they should not cost significantly more. But the main reason to get a dualcore in january is so that you can update it to the new cpu, merom coming out in late 06/ early 07. this will have 4mb cache, higher clockspeeds, much better battery life and will be 64bit. AFAIK, amd will also have dualcore 64bit turions coming out in march 06, so you might wanna look out for those.

Edit: damn you wiz, i was all excited till i got to the dollar sign. anyway, i want an nvidia card cause ati sucks in linux. however, do you happen to know how "castrated" the x1600 will be compared to the desktop version?

Edit2: one more thing, if you really want to take advantage of dual core/64bit, then you should use linux.

I'm trying to get the 3dmark05 number from my contact but no luck yet as the engineering sample have not made it to the U.S. and is still in Taiwan. I think the price is very reasonable as that's the pricing for their current lineup.

Well, since I mostly play game on my PC and do my serious work on a Mac ;-). 64bit mean nothing for me as even the x1600 will be obsolete by the time we see games going to 64 bit.

Honestly, I wish people would stop with this kind of mis-information.

When it comes to multi-processor support, there are multiple levels of support.

There is the OS support - if the OS doesn't support it, it'll be pretty hard for the application to gain access to it. For example, Windows 9x (95, 98, Me) did not support multiple processors; so no matter how many processors you threw at it, it'll only see one processor. Windows NT-based OS's and beyond (NT, 2000, XP, 2003, Vista) do support multiple processors in the core. Of course, XP Home is a bit, err, limited - but it should still see multiple cores within a single processor (see recent licensing changes).

Then there is kernel support. Just because you can see and use multiple processors, doesn't mean you use them. Windows NT-based OS's do use them. They have a smart enough thread scheduling algorithm to try to spread the load between the available processors. This obviously applies to multi-core as well, since it is (at the logical view) an extension on multiple processors.

You also need application support. If you write a single threaded program, then no matter how badly the OS wants to split your program onto multiple processors, it probably isn't going to happen. However, that doesn't mean multiple processors won't help. If you run multiple single threaded programs, there's a good chance that Windows will split them over multiple processors, giving each a bit of a performance boost over running them on a single processor/single core system.

As for the comment that Vista is just Windows XP with a facelift, well, we'll see at the end of the day. If people keep comparing beta quality software to released software, then there's really nothing I can say.

I hate how big laptops are getting. What's the point? WHen two CPU's fit in a areally small laptop, then I'll get excited.

I'd say it's more accurately "Windows XP with a facelift that requires an extra 256MB of RAM."

Dual Core (Venice.. i think) Turions will be out in Q1 06 as well. Those and Yonah should be popping up in laptops early 06. IMO they will both kickass. (Both are mobile dual core chips, what a combo!)

i know how dual core in windows works. my point was that vista wont have anything in it for dual core that windows xp pro doesnt already have. AFAIK, none of the apps that come with windows are multithreaded, and paint wont get that huge performance boost weve all been waiting for

as for the rest of vista, you probably know more than i do, but i just dont see it as being a worthwhile update. they have less than a year(assuming they want to ship in october, not really sure, they keep changing it) to finish it up, and the only major feature they need to put in is the sidebar(assuming they do plan on putting it back). the rest of it is just polishing it up. other than the sidebar, the interface is almost exactly the same. and the windows search thing(is it still called winfs?) is pretty cool, but it is already available in windows xp, osx and linux(msn desktop search/spotlight/beagle). same with the sidebar. we already have something similair in all 3 OS's out right now(konfobulator/dashboard/superkaramba).

they will fit in a really small laptop. they are not dual cpus, they are dual cores. that means they put both cpu cores a silicon the same size as current single core cpus. the only difference is that they will use more power/create more heat when under heavy loads.

Where are you getting your information from?

z

Windows or any other modern OS is capable of multitasking mulitple processes and/or threads. The OS is "dual core" ready from the get go. But for most users a 3Ghz single core will feel to be faster than a 2Ghz dual core. Most users simply do not run enough concurrent processes to keep each core humming. Shoot, when running day to day work applications my laptop clocks higher than 800Mhz only 10% of the time, unless I force it to full speed.

But, I am lusting after low power consumption dual/quad core P-Ms and Athlons for my server room. More processers per sq foot of raised floor. More processors per power pull to each rack.

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