Quad-Core or Core Duo

I'm planning to buy a HP laptop, but a bit confused whether to go for i7-720QM or Core 2 Duo P7550. I'll be using my laptop for gaming(not hardcore but still high), programing and some entertainment(HD video and similar). Actually, my friend told me that considering quad for laptop is not a good decision as it produces a lot of heat and high battery consumption. He also told me that Quad is gonna be replaced bcoz of the same reason soon.

So, Which one you think will be better - 720QM or P7550?
And is Quad really gonna be replaced any soon?

P.S: I searched forums for this, but didn't got the answer I'm looking for.

 

Get the quadcore. Way better performance.

 

The i7 is great for gaming, but it may be an overkill for you. If your just going to game Id get the Core 2 Duo as it will also have better battery life, but if your going to run programs that will give the i7 a run for the money then go for it. VMs, encoding ect.

Gaming Laptops and long battery life can rarely co-exist, and yes the quad core will produce allot of heat. Dont forget to invest in a decent laptop cooler as well.

 

This.


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Go for the Core i7. What the hell are they going to replace quad-cores with? 8 cores? Not for a few years, anyway.

 

i7-720QM is far better than the P7550. And with more games using more than two threads these days, it's definitely worth it. It will be even more worth it in a couple of years.

Remember how the Pentium Dual Cores and Celerons are today's low end processor? Pretty soon, the Core 2 Duo is going to take that spot. You will find that in budget laptops.

 

quad core for 2 big reasons

1) kills the core 2 duo's in terms of performance

2) the core 2 duo is an older chip - they are being phased out right now by the quad cores.

the t9900 core 2 duo chip - which is a $625 option from HP - still falls behind (in terms of performance) the i7-720 which is a $400 option.

 

All performance comes at a disadvantage.

Price and battery life will suffer the most with an i7 Laptop. Don't expect decent battery life otherwise if battery life is an importance get a real gaming system (via desktop) and a laptop that uses battery life more efficiently.

I like how everyone jumps on the i7 bandwagon without analyzing what he asked.

 

The mobile Core i7 processors draw 45W. Most Core 2 Duo's draw 35, with some drawing 25 and some 45. And this is all at peak, so idle consumption is significantly less.

If you don't need 4+ hours, a mobile Core i7 will be just fine.

 

I would suggest buying it with a 12cell battery, the i7 notebook.
This will double your duration from 2 to 4 hours.

+ It lifts the laptop a little which improves air flow.. lets hot air escape.

 

fanbois chants of "way better" generally also means "more money"

 

There's much wisdom in this. Especially when it comes to gaming, you have to be future proof...

I see what $immond$ is saying, but honestly, Shadow is totally right. Gaming is heading multithreaded fast, and soon it will be taken for granted that if your gaming, you have a quad. Get the quad. Yes, more money spent now...less money spent later.

Also, (correct me if I'm wrong) i7 power management is very good. I bet that when your worried about battery, your not running anything too intense, and I believe that at these times consumtions on both CPUs wont be that far apart.

 

The only problem with that logic is, "will the GPU stay future proof?" We all know how "easy" it is to swap cards, and with i7 laptop it isn't clear that the GPU can be upgraded.

 

quad core i7 and 12 cell battery for future-proofing and FTW!!!

 

Fast? The first game that came out capable of supporting more than a single core was what, Quake 3 in 1999? Admittedly buggy as hell though. It's taken ten years, and many of the games on the market still aren't using quad cores. Dual core gaming wasn't exactly available till a few years ago, and most games up to last year didn't use quads. Earliest quad using game that worked well and benefited largely from multi core that I know of was Supreme Commander in 2007. Still not that many quad using games either.

Quads are definitely more future proof, but are they necessary?

 

If it was just a regular quad core, I'd agree, but since i7s are designed to shutdown unnecessary cores, the "quad-core" i7 can easily run as a dual, or even single core if the extra cores aren't required. Actually, due to the ability of i7 to actually shut down cores (which Core 2 cannot), the i7 might actually get even better battery life at idle. It's difficult to say for sure without real comparative numbers, though, and at full load, the i7 will definitely draw more power. Of course, theoretically, the i7 would be drawing that full power for less time than the C2D (because it "should" get done faster), but... again, that would require actual comparative testing.

 

That's a good point. I wasn't advocating the dual core so much as I was pointing out that saying that quad core is the future, and the future is now might be a tad quick. i7s are designed to work around that, so by all means, go for it. Best of two words, aside from the power draw.

 

The P series that the OP is contemplating consumes about 25W. That's way less than a Core i7 no matter which way you cut it.

I have to agree with $immond$ on this point. Even if you spend the extra money to future-proof your gaming laptop in terms of CPU power, it doesn't matter. More important components for gaming performance, such as the GPU, will become outdated far more quickly.

If anything the OP should invest in a laptop that has more money invested in the GPU, as games are most dependent on this component and it is almost never upgradable. The same can't be said for the CPU. Ultimately the Core i7 is an unnecessary investment as it doesn't fully address the OP's needs for an all-around future-proof computer.

If anything the question of whether a Core i7 is needed shouldn't even be necessary in itself because we don't know what kind of GPU the OP is considering.

 

the only question would be, does he want to process hd movie material, or only watch it? if he wants to process it, even an i7 is slow

my dad currently processes one hour of hd material in around 24h on his dualcore, so he definitely would benefit from an i7

 

Ah, the Quadcore v dual core debate.

While the i7 is a great processor, you have to realize how powerful today's dual cores already are. For gaming, programming and HD video a Core 2 Duo already provides more than sufficient processing power for any of these tasks. And they'll continue to provide sufficient power for the near future.

On the other hand, mobility and battery life doesn't seem like a large concern in your case. A quad core may provide more utility in this case.

 

That's how much heat it outputs at load... it may actually consume more power than that. But still, I'm not sure that a P series will automatically consume less than an i7. At full load, sure, I'm not arguing that, but at idle, the i7 may actually consume less, since the P will "need" 2 cores at idle, while the i7 can actually shut down 3 cores almost entirely (that's the new Power Gate transistors in the new architecture) and operate on just 1 core at idle.

Still, I agree that the i7 may be overkill for what the OP is looking for. I'm just pointing out that it may not have as many disadvantages as others are pointing out. Oh, and as for one of the original questions that never quite got answered... No, the i7 Quad will not be "replaced" anytime soon. There are i7 duals coming out, which may be better suited for your purposes, but the Clarksfields (quads) will still be produced for those that actually need their power (or want to brag about having it), at least until they come out with the next model.

 

Yes, I think we need a sticky about it.

 

nah, till the sticky get used much, we have a 6core vs. 4core debate. and 8core vs. 6core, soon, then, too..

 

agreed......

 

This is not about 4 vs 2 cores. Its weather a Quad core is future proof for a gaming laptop.

Finally someone who uses logic when considering "future proofing" a gaming laptop. It seems no one takes the GPU in consideration and GPUs get outdated allot faster than a CPU (as we've seen these last couple years) and in most cases cannot be upgraded. We aren't even sure if the i7 laptop has a MXM compliant video card or if the GPU can even be upgraded making it "truly futureproof". Most games relies heavily on the GPU and not so much the CPU, hence why you can have an i7 CPU and an Intel 4500 MD and your gaming experience is still going be horrible despite how fast the processor is.

The i7 seems to be the choice for processing speed, but we aren't sure of the build quality of the laptop, the speed/bandwidth of the video card, hard drive storage, screen size and price. We need more information on both laptops before coming to a successful conclusion.

 

I don't there is any debate about quadcores being in the future of gaming. Whether it will be in the near future is the issue.

Seriously, most games can't even figure out there is a second core atm. What makes us think quad cores are going to be in the near future.

OSes at the moment require developers to explicitly label the parts of their program that can be multi threaded. I don't see that changing in the near future. Not without massive kernel changes. Developers have a hard enough time just to make a game fun. I think worrying about multicore optimization is the last thing on their minds.

 

Hah future proofing.

 

Dont buy anything because tomorrow all of this will be old technology

The truth!

 

Not sure if the last sentence is a rhetorical question or not, but I'll answer anyway. The switch to multiple cores is necessary because present silicon chips have limitations in terms of clock speed. It can only go so high before you begin to encounter stability issues, and this is a presently impassable limitation to silicon CPUs. The solution that is presently being marketed as a great thing that every computer enthusiast should pay more money for is ironically a band-aid solution that not only complicates software development to exponential proportions, but it is simply a stepping stone towards the next means of processing data. It is interesting to wonder whether the increased computing power of multi-core CPUs actually saves more money when one considers the increased cost of developing applications that are multi-threaded.

IBM researchers have already found the next technology that is capable of handling larger amounts of data faster, cooler and for less energy input. The future is looking very promising indeed, but I don't think that multi-core CPUs are a very long-term technology. I think that in 10 years we may see the CPU "reinvented".

I agree that massive kernel changes in order to multi-thread an OS would be unrealistic, which is why I would expect evolution over time. Gradual changes allow for a smooth transition.

 

Yeah, $immond$ is a player. Didn't you know?

 

I agree with your posts, but the video card plays the most vital role for rendering 3d images not so much multi-core processors.

 

Correct, although I would point out that I did not say anythihg to the contrary.

 

I agree lol, just that nobody has mention the specs of the video card with this super duper i7 core laptop, most posters here seem to only point out the CPU as the most important factor in gaming, I did notice you did actually state how important the video card is. Nobody else seems capable of such. Your posts are logical and make sense.

 

Thanks, but you first pointed out that the GPU matters more.

Cheers!

 

This thread is closed, it's going nowhere.