Which CPU to get

Hi Guys,

I want to upgrade from my 720QM to a better CPU.

Which ones are a good upgrade and are they simple to install?

Would something like this be ok:
INTEL quad mobile i7 940XM 3.33GHZ PM55 king ! > 920XM | eBay

 

That 940XM is an excellent upgrade from a well regarded seller, but you can also get a 920XM from the same source for about $107 less. INTEL quad mobile i7 920XM 3.2GHZ 12M 1333Mhz KING! | eBay. The difference in performance is small under the best of circumstances and nearly indistinguishable in a M15x. Coupled with ThrottleStop, either CPU is a beast, capable of approximately twice the performance of a 720QM. Installation is easy, and there are detailed guides and videos available for guidance.

 

Ya as the rev said the 920xm and 940xm are great upgrades for the cpu, and really the only ones worth upgrading to. There are 3 reliable processor sellers on ebay from what I've heard from other users: shirleyfu1117, extremeprocessor, laptopmonkey. The latter 2 ebay users have the QS chips listed, while shirley has the ES chip listed. Price wise amongst the three its a difference of about 25-30 dollars (give or take a few). Happy hunting!

 

Thanks,

Are they simply unscrew paste, re screw and done?

Also what kind of heat can i expect from these bad boys?

 

Yes the CPU is plug and play. Temps should idle around the mid 50's Celsius, but there are a lot of variables that can effect temperature.

 

Yep, plug, paste and play.

Temps vary of course, depending on load and operating frequency. My 920XM typically idles at 39-43C. At stock clocks (24-23-17-17), temps following a 3dMark11 benchmark run are in the mid-60C's. Overclocked to 27-27-26-26 (with 5850M @ 930/1200), temps increase to 71-73C. Heavily overclocked in the more CPU-demanding Vantage benchmark, 920XM temps will increase to the low-to-mid 80C's at 25x across the board. All pretty civilized, but assuming reasonably good paste/pads and clean fans and vents.

 

does getting better CPU affects gaming performance ? Sorry for the non-related topic question

 

in some games yeah. most of the games you wont see a difference. games like starcraft i think there should be a boost. i saw a difference when playing dead island too. i got a major fps boost when i used throttlestop to get 26x across all cores with my 920xm as opposed to stock clocks.

 

can i ask the difference in fps between the two CPU ? is it a 10+ fps boost in those games ?

 

Ok sounds good.

I play wow and i'm getting some fps drops in busy area's, after checking my GPU load which was only 20% i can only assume it's the CPU bottlenecking my system.

I threw in an SSD to help with load times a while back which worked wonders.

 

I didnt see a difference when I switched to the 920 from the 720 except with load times. After that I got dead island and I played it on max 900p my native. I kept my gpu at stock clocks (I think), and I overclocked the cpu. And yeah I did get a 10+ fps boost. So far its the only game that I have seen to boost that much from this cpu. I don't play wow so idk how it would do but I would assume that you would either get more fps in it or it would be more stable with more people.

 

Hey can I upgrade my existing m15x with a 6 cell battery to a 920xm, presently have 720qm

 

yeah. i have the 6 cell battery too and it runs fine

 

Think i will wait on the idea of upgrading then

 

Thanks Fancysauce, i guess it's not that much of importance compared to buying better GPU instead for gaming.

 

Reckon a 920xm over a 620m (dual 2.66gz hyperthreading) would be a good improvements for games like starcraft2 and bf3? Both games are said prefer quad cores.

 

i think you will benefit from going from a dual core to a quadcore. also throttlestop would make the gap between them even greater. i know there will be improvements but i just don't know by how much