Intel Core i72630QM vs. i72720QM - big difference??

Does anyone have any live experience with the 2630QM? I'm especially interested in how it stacks up with the 2720QM. I've been planning to get a a CTO laptop with the 2720 but I can get a nice looking and considerably cheaper -- not to mention readily available -- pre-config but it only has the 2630. How much of a performance hit will that mean, again in real-world terms?


OOTM

 

Unless you need the other features that the 2720QM offers, I doubt the speed difference will be noticeable.

 

Yes, I've noticed some of the differences on Intel's website between the two: bus-core ratio of the 27 is 22 vs 20 for the 26, max memory is 16 GB for the 27 vs 8 GB for the 26, max memory bandwidth is 25.6 GB/sec for the 27 vs 21.3 GB/sec for the 26, the 27 allows for DDR3 @ 1600, while the 26 only allows up to DDR3 @ 1333, and a few other things -- the 2630QM has less "stuff" it can do -- but what does all this "stuff" amount to in real-world terms??

 

Bus core ratio is how the speed is calculated, so that's not important as it's reflected when comparing clock speeds. As for the memory, unless you're gaming on integrated graphics, the bandwidth (memory speed) has no real world effect since it is never the bottleneck. I'm not sure how they would set the memory limits for the CPU, so you can ask other users if they have actually used more. Either way, 8GB is more than enough for majority of users.

 

What do you mean by "real-world terms"? The 2720QM will be 10-15% faster in applications that are CPU-bound. What applications will you be using it for?

 

Usual daily operations (surfing, e-mail) plus some video/sound recording and transferring, sound only recording and transferring. Some editing.

 

i7-2630qm can be paired with more than 8gb memory; it is possible. i guess it would depend on other factors and not just the cpu itself (ie. motherboard/chipset, manufacturer, etc.)

 

Thank you. +1

So, if the 2630QM's max boost is 2.9 GHz, it would be slower than a dual-core that ran up to 3.0 or higher boost -- as long as the CPU was working on 4 or fewer threads?

 

The 2630QM Quad will be slower than a faster corespeed dualcore if the quad is turbo boosting on 2 cores or less with slower speed than the dual.

To make it clear

X = a number

X.0 Ghz quad turbo boosting on 1 core < X.1 dual boosting on 1 core
X.0 Ghz quad turbo boosting on 2 cores < X.1 dual
X.0 Ghz quad > X.1 dual

 

Makes sense. Thank you much. +1

 

My Intel Core i7 2720QM can turbo all 8 cores to 2,6 GHz but i only done that with a CPU stresser.
In regular usage my cpu aint even working that hard.

 

The good rule of thumb for Mobile Quads is that their Dual Core Turbo will still be weaker than the dedicated Dual Core counterparts. However, their Quad Core performance will still significantly more powerful and their L3 Cache is often 2-4 MB more as well, giving them more flexibility in their processing.

In addition, the difference between the lower Dual Core Turbo rates in Quads gets negated a bit in real-life performance by the additional L3 Cache and most Quads can be still real-life quick with the lower turbos they got.

For the question between the 2630QM and the 2720QM it goes down to these:

1. Do you need hardware I/O VT? If so get the 2720QM.
2. Need 1600 DDR3 RAM support? If so get the 2720QM.
3. Need AES Encryption? If so get the 2720QM.
4. You need vPro or TXT? If so get the 2720QM.

Otherwise the 2630QM should be sufficient for what it is worth. The additional multipliers on the 2720QM is often not worth it if you aren't going to be using any of the additional features on the 2720QM over the 2630QM.

 

This is not true with Sandy Bridge. The 2720QM matches the dual-core Turbo of the 2620M, the most powerful of the dual-cores.

 

A good case for me getting the 2630QM. Thanks. +1

Btw, my first car was an Alfa (2nd hand Spider, 1300cc, dual overhead, twin carb, sweet ride), and four years later I bought my first new car, and Beemer 2002 (model, not year; year was ... well, it was a while ago )

 

By the way, the 2630QM apparently now has AES-NI:

Compare Intel® Products

 

Thanks for the correction. Didn't seem to notice that and I was just assuming out of a bad habit from comparing Clarksfield to Arrandale.

I live in the US, we don't have Alfas (I heard we will getting a revival in the next few years) but we got too many Beemers...

Good to know, thanks for that.