Intel Q9000 or T9600 on M17x?

I plan to buy the Alienware M17x with the following specs:

Intel Q9000(2.0GHz Quad) or T9600(2.8GHz Duo)
Single NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 260M, 1GB
17-inch WideUXGA 1920x1200 (1200p)
4GB Dual Channel DDR3 at 1066MHz or 1333MHz
500GB 7,200RPM w/ Free Fall Protection

I was wondering which processor would be better for gaming/school work/media production and also last me a fairly good 2-4 years without going that much out of date with gaming considering that some game manufacturers are making games utilize more than two cores. The clock rates are really messing with my head, and I just want some outsiders opinion on Quad vs Duo in relation with gaming and/or school related work. Also, the clock speed on a quad would be how much different on a duo?

Also just a off-topic question, I looked at the topic regarding the 1066MHz vs 1333MHz, but I still didn't find a "major" difference or any answer really to what the difference was between these two speeds. Can anyone clarify to me what the difference really is whether it is noticeable or not?

EDIT: Essentially, I'm trying to get a future proof laptop that also dominates in performance currently, considering the money I am putting into this laptop.

 

Dont mean to be mean but this has been asked thousands of times before. You need to do a search pal.

 

I would get the T9600. I prefer the overall speed versus the extra cores. 2.0Ghz and 3MB per core isn't going to go as far. Too bad there are more proc options for this system because there are a lot of good ones out there (P9700, T9800, T9900, x9100).

The difference between 1333 memory and 1066 memory is higher latency timings with the 1066 memory once you increase the speed over 1066. Is the difference noticeable? I haven't seen a difference yet but my best benchmarking scores have been with the 1333 memory.

Good luck!

 

I would go for the t9600, but more for dual 260's, if you want your nb to last long.

 

Thanks for answering the memory question, makes sense to me now.

Im still fairly confused with your answer (sorry). When you say 2.0GHz and 3MB per core, do you mean 3MB L2 Cache because the Q9000 has 6MB L2 Cache. Also, Although you prefer the speed, doesnt having more cores essentially increase the speed even though the clock speed is slower? Im sorry if these are "stupid" questions, just trying to make sure I dont make any mistake getting a processor that will be for the future and that will last long, especially for gaming.

I really want to but unfortunately, that will cause me to go over my budget, unless I can find a way to get two GTX 260M's, a very nice processor, at least 500GB of HD Space, and 1920x1200 screen under 2300.00.

 

Since a quad core is 2 dual cores, the 6mb of cache for the q9000 is 3MB of L2 cache per dual core.

The question regarding more cores vs overall speed can only be answered by taking the apps you use and running tests against them with each proc to see what performs better. I would take the quad core only if the speeds were equal or close to it. My advice is to find one or two of your most commonly used apps and search to see if there is a benchmark on it somewhere.

 

Quad, as more people take control of the multi thread technology available, itl last hell of alot longer in the long run, but then if your not really going to be hammering games and photoshop jobs, then the duo are still very powerfull today.

 

I went with the same setup (minus some hard drive) and took the Q9000. it works great, plus you get bragging rights, 4 is better than 2 . Its plays crysis great! i lowered the resolution a bit and play it on very high for most settings. doesnt bring Q9000 to 100% (at least not that i noticed) just remember to keep hybrid sli enabled, I didnt realized it was off one day and freaked out on the lag in games. It works great in multi tasking too. but tf2 rus the first core at 100%, Im trying to make it use the others more now. still runs great on mostly maxed out though, so not to big of a concern.

 

I went with a the processor you are considering; the 2.8 Duo. To me it also really comes down to the applications you will use. The Quad at 2.0 seems slow to me. The only way I would consider a Quad over a Duo is if it has at least a comparable speed per dual core.

Yes the Quad is future proof and all, but this particular Quad is at 2.0. It's not like the Q2000 or QX3000 that have higher speeds. Apps will definitely be using more and more multi-core programing in the future but if the Duo is fast enough it should perform very well on any app. Also, you might want to consider how well they overclock, if you plan on doing this of course.

 

I went for the Q9000 in my M17 and I haven't missed high clock speeds since. Only reason I ever overclock it is to run an emulator which doesn't have quad core support, and they love clock speed.

 

I see high clock speed as just more space to be honest, not really speed, ive been on duo cores beyond the power of 2.00ghz, and there just isnt any performance gain, and i certainly multi task more on the q9000, i think one significan item for a machine is HDD though, thats what will slow you down.

And i run power saving 70% of the time (1.5ghz * 4 ftw)

 

@OP

for the budget you mentioned, check out the M17x that microcenter offers, it is 2300 before tax and shipping but is VERY well featured for the price

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0314770

I think it is web order only right now. I have recommended this to many people on this forum now as it is simply an excellent value on this machine

 

I went with the q9000 and have it overclocked in the bios to 2.4... That has made a huge difference. i would personally get the quad, but it is preference. the quad is based off of two p7350's, just fyi. This is plenty for games etc. There is not a huge performance increse in games after 2.2 or so. there is an article on this google it. I would def get at least 2 260's as this is the hardest thing to upgrade down the road. also, hd is a huge bottleneck in this system. i have a 120 gb ssd on the way as we speak...

 

I know, right? I actually very rarely run high performance. I have my 'balanced' set so that it locks the CPU on a multiplier of 6.0x (1.6GHz) but puts the graphics into max performance.

I play both CoD4 and Lord of the Rings Online with that. I don't get any performance gain putting it into high performance, they both run perfectly on 1.6GHz.

My point is while very few programs will use the extra cores, at the same time very few programs will use the extra GHz in a Duo. I'd rather futureproof my system especially as more and more quad core support comes out.

I actually forgot about that. With the M17x's BIOS, you could easily push your quad to 2.4-2.5GHz, which should be more than enough for nearly everything out there.

 

After briefly owning a unit with the Q9000 in it, I would have to say it does the job. It was stable up to and a little above the 2.4 range and handled everything I threw at ti. If anything, don't skimp on the sli. You will be happy with either cpu as long as you have those two GPUs.

If you're good at taking laptops apart and plan to install the sli setup later, than no worries about the sli now.

 

Thats definitely what I was thinking of. As technology progresses, more and more people are taking advantage of the multi-thread technology, and I would think that on a multi-thread capable program, the Q9000 would outperform a T9600, but on non multi-thread capable program, the T9600 would outperform the Q9000. I dont think in either situations the outperformance is huge.

I do realize it comes down to the applications I use, which is mainly gaming (other school apps/media production apps don't need alot of CPU so its fine.), and like I said above, more and more gaming manufacturers are utilizing the multi-threading technology.

When you overclocked it, how hot was your M17x getting?

Yeah I plan to run on power saving alot of the time, just having the power stored back till its time to own

HDD is definately a big issue for me; the standard one that the M17x comes with is just WAY too small for me considering the amount of games/programs/music and other stuff I have on my current laptop. This is also the reason why im not getting a SSD drive; too expensive and not enough space for me even if there's two 128GB SSD drives.

Definately bookmarked. <3

I realized after these posts that to keep my system really well in the future, definitely need two 260Ms, so I will definitely be getting that. Im planning to OC the Q9000 so if I can clock it to 2.4GHz, then it should definitely be better than the T9600.

Again, definitely getting SLI now.

Thanks for all the responses, and since we've come on to the topic of HDD, another question from me; Whats the main diff between RAID 0 and RAID 1, and normal HDDs?

 

Don't buy quad with m17 it has shuttring issues.

 

Im talking about the M17x, not M17.

 

temps have not increased at all for me... you are not changing the voltage, and the p7350's use 25 watts i believe. this is less than the t series. i idle around 40 on cpu and gpu, i have the 280's though. I would say the microcenter deal is the best bang. Upgrade the hd down the road, and get a cryo lx for overclocking cpu and gpu's. you will not be disappointed...to address the raid 0 question. it is useless. I have had three drivers in raid 0 and no difference in perfomance...(other than synthetic benches) raid 0 is a joke, trust me on this. I will argue this point 100 times over.. raid 1 is a mirror config. It esentially is used for backup. I would not software raid anything, save for a decent ssd as stated earlier. this will dramatically increase performance...

 

RAID 0 mirrors data on both drives making it x2 as fast but if one drive dies you loose every thing


RAID 1 mirrors every thing so if your drive dies you don't loose anything

 

M17, not M17x. Considering in this that the M17x has much better cooling and this is with standard thermal crap, instead of proper thermal paste which most people reapply, all 4 of my cores stayed below 80C under intensive stress testing.

I've had very few issues with it in terms of stuttering, but I wouldn't buy the quad now anyway. This would be because in the EU now you can get the X9100 for just £100 over the Q9000. As much as I like quad cores, the idea of having an extreme inside would be too good to pass up.

 

raid 0 is 2x as fast is synthetic only. read the reviews from anandtech... moo can explain the performance difference with ssd as i believe he runs a vertex...i was waiting for the intel gen2 to re-release, but ran across a good deal on an agility... slightly slower than the vertex, but much cheaper... order of ssd if you are interested...

1. intel gen 2
2. intel gen 1
3. Ocz Vertex
4. Gskill titan
5. ocz agility
6. all the ssd's with the new samsung controller.

This is a prefernece/opinion and all of these listed are amazing...

 

your #6 is currently one of the best price/performance, and nearly the top performance period

it really goes like this
1)intel drives
2)indilink controllers
3)samsung controllers
4)
5)jmicron controllers

Added a gap because that is how big the performance difference is haha

 

nice on SCOOK

but actually the vertex beats the intel in some categories including price

btw i hate raid

 

I'd have to put the sammy and indilink at 2a and 2b because they are both neck and neck in performance.

 

that is true sleey0, but the indilink consistently comes out like 1% faster haha

I still have my heart set on the samsung based drives

 

I ordered mine through Microcenter yesterday, it's really an incredible deal. If I had the choice I would've gone with the 2.8GHz duo but the Mirocenter deal in general is going to give you so much more value with all the other features, 2 260s, Bluray.

 

and the screen and 500gb hdd

 

That new fw from indilinx looks promising.

I don't think you can beat the 256GB pb22-j from Dell Accessories. They have it for $479 but I am waiting for a decent coupon to bring the price near-$400

 

i have a 15% off coupon

 

that is exactly my game plan haha, it is so cheap, I was looking at the corsair P128 till I saw price on that 256 (same as the P256) and was sold haha

 

If either of you (sleey0 or scook) are planning to buy right away let me know.

 

no I got to wait a couple months, skating on thin ice following purchase of this beauty haha

 

Why is that, drake?

 

RAID0 mirrors nothing (0 = not redundant) but rather stripes data across 2 drives potentially increasing writes as much a 2x and does not loose space (ie. 2x500GB drives will be 1TB and faster than a single 1TB disk.)

RAID1 mirrors the drives completely. 2x read speed, but you loose half the space (2x 500GB drives = 500GB space.)

More Info on RAID: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

 

The t9600 is a really good price/value imo
above that its better to buy of ebay and you will have better for cheaper

 

I went with the T9600 and as you can see in my sig I've also overclocked it from 2.8 to 3.3 there are others who have the same processor getting 3.4 or 3.5 out of it. I'm really happy with my choice, its able to do more than what I need it for. Like others said if you can muster the cash get the dual 260s especially if you want to game at all. One is all right but two makes it smooth like butter

 

we think alike and if you want to upgrade to have the ultimate beast shirly @ ebay is your best choice

 

anyone looking for a q9200 lmk i have one left

 

i originally bought mine with the q9000, but really wasn't happy with it - even o/c'd to 2.4ghz, so i ended up buying a T9600 at a great price elsewhere, so much better for my needs, only o/c'd to 3ghz so far with no temperature difference