Time to upgrade the T61p?

The T61P with NVIDIA Quadro FX 570M served me well. Held off on upgrade last year because the graphics improvement wasn't much. Is this year's graphics (T510/W510) significantly improved over the Nvidia Quadro?

 

W510 yes, the T510 is several step back.

 

With SATA-II T61p patch already done here and Penryn Thermal Sensor patch on the way, could consider a T8x00/T9300/T9500/X9000 cpu upgrade to give the T61p some more performance.

 

I went to the W510, and am very happy with the move. I considered a CPU upgrade and a SSD for the T61P, but opted for the the full on upgrade. My T61P is approaching 4 years of service, so I figured a full on upgrade was warranted.

 

Would the T410/510 be a step down even from the crippled 64-bit FX570M GPU that some T61p models have?

 

GPU wise yes, but not the CPU. i5 and i7 Dual core CPU can outperform the T9xxx CPU.

 

I suppose the answer is "cost", but why would the entire PC industry take a step backwards from the FX570M? The benchmarks don't indicate that the FX570 is a better GPU than the NVS3100m. The T410 scores around 4000+ on a 3DMark06 benchmark whereas the T61p with the 128MB FX570M only scores around 2300, indicating that the T410 should have twice the graphics performance of the T61p.

 

the 128 mb Fx 570M on the T61p 14.1 inch is a crippled card, the 128 bit bus is cut back to 64 bit, and the vram got halved.

The 256 mb FX 570M on the T61p with 15.4 inch uses 128 bit bus.

The NVS3100M also uses the 64 bit bus, i think you get the drift.

3DMark06 tests CPU as much as the GPU, the i5 or i7 CPU faster than a T7xxx CPU.

 

Is the CPU an easy swap? I'll check the CPU when I get home, but it may be a good route to take vs a full upgrade.

the high 1900x resolution is a must for me, so the Y series is out of the question though it has a better graphics card. The W510 is a good option but I'm not sure if $1.8k is worth the graphics upgrade.

 

Made the T61p->W510 upgrade, and the only thing I miss from my T61p are 120 px vertical resolution.
Performance-wise, it's not like day and night, but a decent and appropriate upgrade.

 

CPU swap isn't that bad if you are technically inclined. I had a t7500, so I thought about it hard as the later offerings would have provided significant benefit. I miss the vertical pixels but accept the wider screen in trade. All in all I am very happy. As for whether or not to upgrade it's a judgement call for you.

 

Checked the info and I have a T7300 (2G Memrom) right now. Do you guys think the upgrade to T9500 Penryn has enough performance boost to warrant the $200 price tag? I'm guessing it should also run cooler.

 

well there is no telling when the GPU would pack it in. So i don't know whether you want to invest so much money on your T61p.

 

I'm inclined to agree. If you want upgraded performance, sell the T61p (it's a 3 year old design....... Moore's law, etc) and get something newer.

 

what other laptops out there have 1920x1200 screens? I really need the real estate because I run multiple VMs, and RD into multiples machines at the same time.

 

Could look at a W500 or W700 in the outlet depending on what size you want.