P4 & M - What's the difference?

MichaelS wrote on 7/4/2005, 8:10 AM
Can someone explain, in layman's terms, the speed relationships between Pentium 4, M processors and Centrino Mobile Technology. I'm sure this topic has been addressed many times before, but this ol' man's still a bit confused.

I've got my eye on another laptop (after the 4th sales start tomorrow) and I just want to be sure that I understand what I may be purchasing. I trust your knowledge and opinions a lot more than the guy down at "the city".

Thanks!

Comments

GlennChan wrote on 7/4/2005, 4:54 PM
Quick, dirty rule for guestimating performance:
Add 50% to the Pentium-M's clock speed.
A 2.0ghz Pentium-M is about equal in performance to a Pentium 3.0ghz.

In the rendertest.veg benchmark, the 50% rule is about right. On many hardware review sites, the performance differences average to about 50%.

Centrino: I think this is just a name for a combination of technologies. Pentium-M processor, wireless networking, and I believe something else. I could be confused here.
MichaelS wrote on 7/4/2005, 7:44 PM
I went with a P4 2.8 HT. It should do the job!

Thanks!
db wrote on 7/14/2005, 7:09 AM
the so called add 50% rule is 1/2 of the full story ...
you will find that for the video editing/gaming and /or fastest laptops it is not the M that are destop replacements but P4's & AMD 64's ( not mobile versions) .. the M's will edit, run cooler and give you longer batt life ...
Spot|DSE wrote on 7/14/2005, 9:24 AM
AuContraire....I have a Sony A49GP sitting in front of me right now. It's a Pentium M 770 (2.13) proc 533 System bus, with 2 gig of RAM. If it were really 50% added, then this would be the equivalent of a 3.2Ghz, which is what my personal laptop is. My personal laptop can easily run CineForm HD files with 29.97 fps. The A49GP can't playback the CineForm files at full frame rate.
Further, I can do a fair amount of color correction, transitions, and even some minor level composites on my K37 without dropping frames with DV, while this A49 cannot. It immediately starts dropping frames, and I can't get any Quicktime files to playback in Vegas 6b on this machine, without dropping frames. I was really excited to try it for a few days because of the 1900 x 1200 display, perfect for HD....but it's not happening, and I'm sure it's because it's a Centrino.
Additionally, it is reputed to have 2 hours of batt life. After 4 charges and full discharges, I'm barely getting one hour of life with Vegas, and that's having the monitor turned to full dim at all times when on battery.
Other than that....It's an AWESOME laptop. If it only were an AMD, or had at least P4 proc in it, I'd buy it, even at nearly 4K USD.
Tattoo wrote on 7/14/2005, 8:59 PM
Spot-

I don't know how the performance, usability, or quality rates, but HP/Compaq has several notebooks with the Athlon 64 and the Turion 64 processor. Pretty nicely equiped for around $1500. Anyone have any thoughts?

http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/generic_category.do?catLevel=1&landing=notebooks&category=compaq_presario&storeName=computer_store

Brian