i9300 and XPS Gen 2 outdated in one year?

Hi,

How do you guys feel about dual core CPUs coming for laptops next year? I would love to buy either i9300 or XPS Gen 2 today, but they aren't cheap and seems like they will be outdated in 1 year when dual core CPUs come out for laptops. What are your thoughts on this?

Thanks,
-Yustas

 

My thoughts are that when the XPS3 and i9400 (hypothetically speaking) come out in one year with dual core processors, they'll be obsolete in one year after that because either quad core or some other processor innovation will be better. Never in the history of computing has there been a time where if you didn't wait one year you'd get something better. Don't play that game with your mind, buy for the now and what suits your needs.

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I agree with what you’re saying, but it seems that a change from a single to a dual core is a fundamental change. I think Intel and others pretty much said that this is where everything is going to go. So, that means, that OS, games, software will be made and is probably already is being made to support a new standard.

I’d love to get XPS Gen 2 today, but to pay $2500 or so and be out of the game so to say in about a year, because of new OS, new software and new games that will come out seems like a waist of money unless one doesn’t care about the money question.
I don’t know, maybe I have a wrong perspective, that is why I’m asking for all of you guys to express your thoughts on this.

Thanks,
-Yustas

 

look at it this way, Windows Longhorn will be out before the next round of Intel dual core processors are available for laptops. Windows OS lifetime is 4 - 5 years, it won't be written to optimize performance for dual core processors, so you know for at least 5 years your machine will be up to date with what the OS is configured to take advantage of. And when the dual cores do come out they'll be price way high, it'll be 2007 before they're mainstream. There's just no reason to wait.

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I thought I’ve read that Longhorn will be out in 2006 and will support dual core and laptop CPUs will be introduced in 2006 as well. Pentium M just recently came out do you think the price for dual core CPUs will be much different then what we see for M CPU today?

 

Buy an abacus. The current design is state of the art (at least as far as abaci go) and I understand there are no upgrades planned for the next couple of centuries. Slide rules are also a fairly safe bet against obsolesence. Both could use display improvements though.

 

Like Abaxter said, if you keep waiting something better and better will keep coming out. It's best just to buy what you need and be done with it for a few years.

Personally, if I were you I would not be concerned about dual core CPU's at this point. Why? Because in order for them to consume the same amount of energy and put off the same amount of heat as today's CPU's they will have to be slower in clock speed although combining the value of the two cores will add up to be higher. But presently CPU's such as AMD's and Centrino based ones push numbers at a much greater rate and run calculations quicker. All current games only feature a single thread running at a time so there's no benefit to haveing a dual core system except for multitasking. Now when Unreal Engine 3 comes out next year it'll support dual cores and dual threading but only to split up the game load of gameplay and physics. A single core higher speed CPU will still perform just as well as a dual core since it'll just run and run while the duals have to balance their load and do as the program specifies (one core physics, one core gameplay). Only in 2-4 years when dual core CPU's get higher in speed should you be concerned about them having massive performance advantages. That and the programs haven't caught up with technology yet. Remember there are people last year who bought their nice new P4 2.8GHz CPU's and hadn't waited for dual core or 64 bit. The PC market isn't just going to cut these people off completely so if the i9300 or XPS2 has it you're best off getting it.

By the time your laptop purchase now becomes unable to perform you'll be sick of it and wanting a new system anyway. You're looking at a good 2-4 years of solid gaming and productivity.