AMD Turion 64 bit compared to Core duo?

I have noticed most high end notebook's use AMD Turion 64 bit opposed to core duo? Is there a reason for this or is the Turion an overall better CPU?

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=45655
Good article there, should help you.

 

i think it's because AMD chips are tested over heating issues... the promising Core 2 Duo will be available on notebooks later this month (which some says has better performance over Turion x2)

...the demand of Turion x2 is growing and i read somewhere that AMD has now 15% of the market share...

 

The core duo has got better performance over the Turion x2, at least i was pretty sure that it did, it's deffinitely a lot faster per clock in synthetic benchmarks

 

Because most high end notebooks that ur lookin at are purely gaming machines, where it doesnt really matter if u got 1, 2 or 7 cores (yet). All that matters is cpu speed, and as of right now the single core turion is very powerful at 2.4GHz and quite cheap (compared to a similarily clocked core duo).

Also, u cant really compare a single core cpu to a dual core one, especially one thats a newer tech than the other.

 

So your basically saying that the Single turion is keeping up with the core duo? Im shure it's nothing compared to the newly released core 2 duo, but like everyone is saying the core 2 duo wont be in notebooks for some time.

 

No. Its not keeping up. Its a totally different market that it is pleasing.
The Single core processors, AMD or Intel can do fantastic if you get them and just play Doom3 or Quake all the time. What makes the core duo's so amazing is that that when you open up itunes and an antivirus search in the background, the core duo tears the single core's up.
If your only doing one thing, your not taking advantage of the core duo. It is made to be able to process multiple things at a time, but the higher clocked single core's can outstrip a lower clocked duo core in single software usage.

 

I believe you mean Turion X-2 as opposed to Core Duo. Correct me if I am wrong.

Turion 64 is a very capable single core chip, but it's almost an entry level chip price-wise.

The lightesstar had a good summary.

From what I have read Turion 64 X-2 is slightly slower than Core Duo, but costs less.

The reason you are probably seeing it in higher end machines is simply b/c it's the newest kid on the block.

 

So lightessstar your saying that the single AMD Turion Core is amazing at running one program without anything else running? And your basically saying the core duo is better if you want play a high tech game while running aniti virus and music in the background as such?
Well thats my main question but i find it very weird, for example take alienware they have there pure gamming machines with single AMD cores, but not everyone only plays pure games they have to multi-task at some point so is the AMD Turion 64 single still able to multi-task well?

 

Simply running an app in the background does not require a dual-core system.
Winamp takes 2-4% CPU on my system.
That means if it runs in the background while I'm playing a game, the game "only" gets 96-98% CPU time to itself.
On a dualcore system, it could get an entire 100%. So a whopping 2-4% extra performance...
Same goes for antivirus. Simply having an antivirus program active in the background eats no CPU, and so, it doesn't need a CPU core to itself.

But performing an antivirus scan on your HD does.
Doing the latter while gaming would be painful on a single-core system.

Dualcore only becomes interesting when the load is heavy enough to actually utilize both cores. And that doesn't happen just because you both run Firefox and ITunes at the same time.

Yes, a singlecore Turion can still multitask. It's just as fast at switching tasks as a dualcore CPU is. And it actually does that maybe 20-50 times per second, without affecting performance, and without you noticing.

The only place where it makes a difference is if more than one process actually makes serious use of the CPU. Playing a MP3 takes a few percent CPU time, which is no big deal. But some tasks require as much CPU time as they can get (games are a good example, but there are others). If you run more than one of the latter, a dualcore chip makes a big difference. (Because each can get close to 100% CPU time, instead of having to share the same core and only get 50%)

 

"Dualcore only becomes interesting when the load is heavy enough to actually utilize both cores." What Load is heavy enough where you would need duel core's?

Sorry about the "wannabe" quote i dont know how to use that function yet

 

What Load is heavy enough where you would need duel core's?

 

Well, what do you plan on using your system for? Might be easier to just tell you whether you'd benefit from dualcore for those tasks.

A few games and other CPU-heavy apps can use two cores all by themselves. But the general rule for games is that they're typically singlethreaded, so they can only use one core.

Which means you need *something* to fill up the other core before dualcore becomes really worthwhile. Anything that uses significant CPU time will do the trick. Such as.... uh... Honestly, I can't think of much that you'd commonly run while gaming.

Defragging or running antivirus scans might be examples, but that's not something you do all the time...
Or watching a movie, or stuff like Folding@Home/Seti@Home would benefit from dualcore systems. Or.... Uh, running two games simultaneously?

If I'm struggling a bit here, it's because, like I said, many everyday tasks, even when they involve multiple apps, don't actually need or benefit from, dualcore CPU's.

 

I'd think id be better if I told you what I would use it for Id use my system to play games, listen to music, surf the web(at high speed's i dont want slow internet) msn is a def

Im not a pure gammer, Id spend time just realxing talking to people on msn and listening to music, gamming is only my thing if im bored and i want somthing fun and exciting to do. (I do game alot though )

 

Okay - I can speak a little bit from experience here - maybe. (Although now that I think about it my results may be related to 512M memory rather than Turion vs. Dual Core).

My family owns two Turion 64 (not X-2) laptops.

For gaming you are likely to be fine, b/c you rarely run other tasks while you are playing a game.

I tried the laptop out and was impressed with how quickly it opened Word, or IE or other large apps. There was zero lag time before the program opened.

Then I tried to help my daughter with something on it and was amazed at how sluggish it seemed.

The difference: She had Word open, while she was streaming audio off the internet, and downloading a file to the HD, and playing around on Google Earth, and searching for something on the web, etc.

For most computer users, dual core will provide better performance, although I wouldn't say it was a necessity.

 

Yep, that definitely sounds like a RAM issue rather than CPU