Intel's Core Duo Launch - Notebook Performance Revealed
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 5, 2006 8:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
Final Words
It’s tough to argue with the numbers - at worst, Intel’s Centrino Duo platform offers the same battery life as the previous generation Centrino, while outperforming it. But at best, Centrino Duo can not only offer better performance than last year’s notebooks, but also longer battery life.
You really can’t get say anything else - you get better performance, longer battery life and all of this at the same price as last year’s notebooks; Centrino Duo is a no-brainer and it is quite possibly the strongest step into a new year that we have seen from Intel in a very long time.
One thing that is very important to keep in mind is that with the Centrino Duo we finally have all of the benefits of a multiprocessor system now in a notebook. That means all of the performance benefits in multithreaded applications as well as the definite reduction in system response time while multitasking are now available to notebook users. While we were very convinced of the move to dual core on the desktop, it may even make more of an impact on the mobile side. The impact on response time, especially when multitasking, is tremendous and quite perceivable. Notebooks are still quite disk limited, but the impact of going to dual core is big enough to be very noticeable.
Honestly our only complaint is about availability. The launch does not seem to be as well put together as previous Centrino launches, with availability varying dramatically depending on which manufacturer you talk to. The fact that the only production quality notebooks we were able to secure were from ASUS and not from HP, Gateway, Dell or Lenovo tells us that these things aren’t ready just yet. Intel’s Mooly Eden once told us that you should never launch a new microarchitecture along with a new manufacturing process, but with the Core Duo it seems that they may have done just that. We’d tend to believe that the fact that Intel’s 65nm process is just now ramping up is a large part of the reason why we don’t have many Centrino Duo notebooks in house today. However, just about all of the aforementioned manufacturers will be demonstrating their Core Duo notebooks at the show and we’ve already got a couple promised to us after the show, so it does look like you’ll be able to start getting your hands on these things in the relatively near future.
When all is said and done, we can chalk Centrino Duo up to another win for Intel’s Israel team, who is quickly racking up a serious track record over there. While we know that Intel’s next-generation desktop and server micro-architectures will be based off of the work that the Israel team has done with the Pentium M and Core Duo, we can’t help but think that Intel probably should’ve handed them the reins a little earlier.
While we would normally have finished our review on the previous page, we were given the opportunity to preview another Centrino Duo notebook - the IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad T60. The Thinkpad T series has long been a favorite among businesses, on the coming pages you’ll get an early look at the model that will be carrying the torch going forward.
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OvErHeAtInG - Saturday, January 7, 2006 - link
You hit the nail on the head. The increased power consumption would not be worth it. And IIRC was pointed out in the article, higher memory freq would provide a really minimal performance increase since the FSB is already lower bandwidth than that.psychobriggsy - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
Did anyone else notice the strange mention of three compaq laptops on page 13 IIRC of the review?Anyway, this looks like a good product from Intel which will keep them ahead in mobile areas for the foreseeable future. AMD may catch up of course, but we will see what they offer later this year. I'm sure that revision F will be good though, and DDR2 will reduce power consumption on AMD notebooks a bit more.
Stolichnaya - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
Looks like the 'i' is going to crash on it's left side any time...nserra - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
You are all dreaming here, thinking that amd can release a processor (platform) as good as this for the notebook area. The only extra is the 64 bit.They lack all the others, and primary ones:
-Good platform from one of their partners.
-Low power chipset to couple with the processor.
-Brand recognition....
nidomus - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
coughfanboycoughBrucmack - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
I'm normally not a spelling nazi, but this is the second time I've seen this on Anandtech, and it's really annoying...On page 5, the word you're looking for is "segue", not "segway".
Shark Tek - Thursday, January 5, 2006 - link
Great package but I don't have money for it :(http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1908402,00.as...">Dell Inspiron E1705
Type: Gaming, General Purpose, Media
Operating System: MS Windows XP Media Center
Processor Name: Intel Pentium M T2500
Processor Speed: 2 GHz
RAM: 1024 MB
Hard Drive Capacity: 80 GB
Graphics: nVidia GeForce Go 7800GTX
Primary Optical Drive: Dual-Layer DVD+/-RW
Wireless: 802.11a/g
Screen Size: 17 inches
Screen Size Type: widescreen
System Weight: 8.2 lbs
Calin - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
But that isn't a portable laptop, is a towable one :(Shark Tek - Thursday, January 5, 2006 - link
That power consumption will be equal or better than previous Pentium-M generation. Now lets wait for AMD what they have to offer when they launch the Turion64 X2.They wont be sufficient to compete with "Core Duo" the only real advantages over intel are 64 bit support and cheaper cpu prices, nothing else.
Intel will leap forward a few more years in the mobile market.
Viditor - Thursday, January 5, 2006 - link
Keep in mind that you're just making an "enthusiastic guess" here...
AMD has started a new process of strained silicon on their 90nm chips which is specifically targeted at reducing power and increasing effeciency.
These are released in new steppings rather than new architectures (remember Rev E cut power requirements in half compared to previous generations of 90nm chips).
Even more important is the platforms...remember that the Turion isn't even 1 year old, and the platform designs are still minimal at best. It would be foolish to discount AMD at this point.
That said, Intel deserves hearty congratulations on the duo and it's platform! 2006 is going to be an interesting year...!