PC Tips World

Laptop and Desktop Comparison

admin — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 14:00:34 +0000

Several weeks ago I had a choice to change my own desktop to same-cost laptop. I have made my choice and I want to share gathered information with you. This is some sort of review. Several paragraphs were written on my PPC, when I was underground going home, so mistakes can be found. I hope this article will help your choice, like it helped me.

I must warn you - I have made some limits. Desktop’s or laptop’s price mustn’t be over $1000. Also I don’t consider Apple products such as Mac book, PowerBooks, etc. Desktop has installed Microsoft Windows. So laptop has. Nothing extra ordinal in configurations.

Overall

Here we are. Someone of your friend decided to rid off his notebook. Or maybe you have seen nice laptop with very low price, as I did. Strange thoughts start visiting your mind. Now you have to decide whether to change your lovely desktop. You must remember several points for helping to decide whether you need this switch:

processor
discrete graphics and integrated graphics
hard disk
miscellaneous

I’ll review each point theoretically. Miscellaneous has items that can be reviewed in several sentences. In the end of the article I’ll compare 2 computers presented on eshop.

Processor

In laptop’s market there are not holy wars, like in desktop’s one. Situation here is too obvious. But at first some theory.

Maybe you know, maybe not, but laptop processor differs a lot from its desktop brother. They have different priorities. Desktop processor must be powerful anyway, it doesn’t have any limits. It can warm up enormously, use much power. Laptop processor differs. Its main priority is to save power and be quite cold, that small cooler can cool it down. On the second place is performance. It’s ideal situation. In a real world engineers have performance on one hand and power sufficiency on another. They have to find balance between them. The only thing I can tell you is that Intel has developed own mobile technology better than AMD has done.

Intel with Pentium M has easily beaten AMD with Turion 64 processor. Intel’s processor has less frequency, but also needs less power. Pentium M doesn’t need big cooling system, so you can save more power. Turion is nice processor, but can be easily warmed up and needs lot of power (my friend has laptop with installed AMD Turion; he can’t hold it down on his knees even for half an hour). AMD Turion has higher frequency than Intel Pentium M does, but don’t be cheated. Pentium’s frequency doesn’t equal to its desktop cousin. M series has other, improved architecture. Pentium 1.6 Ghz is Pentium 2.2 Ghz (at least). Turion frequency is equal to desktop brother. There are laptops with desktop processors. It’s rather old model, or high-performance one. Not the best choice if your main criterion is mobility, due to enormous power usage. Desktop processors, which can be found in laptop, are Pentium, and Sempron. Core 2 Duo for laptops has other architecture and priorities comparing with desktop Core 2 Duo. On the whole it is similar brand, but in details significantly different processor.

Let’s summarize. Laptops processors are a bit slower. But would you need desktop’s performance? Would you use all of processor’s power? If you use desktop just for documents, watching divx video and web-surfing I bet you wouldn’t. If you use computer for encoding video, gaming, watching high-def video or 3d modeling you would need all computer’s power. Your best choice would be desktop.

Discrete graphics and integrated graphics

Now we’ll speak about graphics card. Usually desktops under $1000 have discrete graphics. Laptops under $1000 often have integrated one. Remember the main rule for laptop? Save power and place. Integrated graphics card matches both of them. If you use computer just for office documents you can skip this chapter, because integrated graphics cards are made for you.

If you still reading this then you have to choose video. Integrated graphics card has only the basic functions. Old models even don’t have 3d accelerator. But we consider only new models up to $1000. Basically all models are equipped with Intel chipset, 915 or 945. These chipsets have integrated graphics card. But don’t expect to play modern 3d shooters. The best you’ll get from them is strategies or 3 years old shooters. If you want to watch HD forget about laptop. Or find another $1000 to buy laptop, which supports high-def video. Also you can wait till external PCI-E or XG-Station will be available. But, again, it’s more than $1000, so we don’t consider these.

Now we talk about discrete graphics on desktops. With $1000 you can buy 7600GT with HD support and you can play modern games with medium quality. You gain more noise with discrete graphics, if it has active cooling system (with cooler). Of course you can choose graphics card with passive cooling system. Usually it’s mentioned in the name of graphics card. Asus adds “Silencer” to the name of graphics card. But with passive cooling system you can’t overclock your graphics card strong enough because it will overheat and you gain broken card.

Conclusions about graphics card - if you don’t play 3d games, don’t use computer for professional 3d usage you can surely take laptop. If you’re hardcore gamer or 3d modeler, who needs mobility take more $1000 and wait for XG-Station or external PCI-E. Others will stay on laptop.

Hard Disk

Hard disk is a device that keeps all your information. Desktop hard disk is 3.5 inches. Laptop disk is only 2.5 inches. The main property that determines drive’s capacity is consistency per one disk. As you know maximum for laptop HDD is 300 GB per disk. For desktop HDD this value is 750 GB. Seagate discovered new technology that allows producing 1 Tb desktop HDDs. Hard disk must be not only big, but fast, too. Speed depends on RPM. You would ask what RPM means. RPM - rotations per minute. It was some sort of speed rating. Yeah, WAS. Nowadays all new models have 7200 for desktops HDDs and 5400 for laptop ones. It’s like CD-ROM or DVD-ROM speed. Remember 32x, 52x, 16x? Laptop hard disk has only 4200 or 5400 rpm, desktop hard disk has 7200 rpm anyway. I didn’t see desktop hard disks with 5400 rpm for last several years. But like incase of CD-ROM, RPM is not the only thing, which influences on HDD speed. Cache is important for writing and reading rates for HDD. For desktop computers maximum is 16 Mb, but these models aren’t cheap. Mainstream HDDs have 8 Mb cache. On laptops computers you wouldn’t find more than 2 Mb cache for HDD, especially in segment less than $1000 for laptop. HDDs have many technologies for noise reduction and S.M.A.R.T. I won’t explain what they are, because desktop HDDs and laptop ones have similar technologies.

Laptop computer must reduce power usage, so HDDs have built-in technologies for power saving. These technologies don’t have much influence on performance. So if you need big and fast hard drive your choice will be desktop computer. If it’s not so important you can use laptop. But you can always increase you capacity, by installing another hard disk in external mobile rack, even desktop hard disk.

Miscellaneous

This chapter includes points that don’t differ a lot from each other. They are RAM, monitor, different controllers. I’ll try to show the main differences only.

Speaking about RAM. Desktop ram and laptop ram are similar in functions, but have a bit different construction. Desktop memory is called DIMM, laptop ram is SO-DIMM. There are DDR and DDR2 in both computers. SO-DIMM is a bit smaller and has other shape.

Monitors have same construction. Except for laptop LCD has different resolution, because it has different from desktop LCD physical sizes. You won’t notice it. Even in games there won’t be differences, except for several, unadopted for notebook, games. Also laptop LCD has several technologies for power saving and true picture, without any reflections from day light. Different brands - different names, but same meaning.

Now I tell you about what laptop computer has, but desktop doesn’t. One of laptop’s advantages is several wireless (Wi-Fi and Bluetooth) built-in controllers, card readers. Of course you can install it in desktop, but in laptop, you get them free. Laptop computer is equipped with PCMCIA slot. Farther laptop has different from desktop mouse. Really laptop doesn’t have mouse. Instead of mouse laptop has touchpad, sometimes trackball. But you can always plug in external mouse.

If I haven’t mentioned something it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It means that construction and functions are similar. Or I have just forgotten about it .

Practical Comparison

As a matter of fact desktop always has higher performance. Main plot of laptop, as you know, is your mobility. Laptop’s performance can be reduced, if it can increase uptime. Mobile processors have strongly decreased TDP. Discrete video will bring more performance.

I review only desktops & laptops under $1000. I have chosen one eshop to compare prices shopper.cnet.com. I took both price for laptop computer and desktop one. So specifications for both of them.

First is desktop computer. Under $1000 the best choice, as for me, is Velocity Micro Vector GX Campus Edition. You can see specifications clicking on the link above. Computer has installed Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 1 GB of memory, George 7600GS, 250 GB HDD, DVD-RW and other misc. I want to point out that it has card-reader and LCD monitor. Windows XP Home edition is installed. The price is $999, what is not so expensive for this computer. You can play modern games on it. This desktop computer is upgradeable, what is great advantage.

And now compare it with the best choice under $1000 for laptop. As a remark: my opinion is that Dell makes the best notebooks with competitive price and awesome specifications. So I was choosing from Dell only. It is called Dell Inspiring E1705. This laptop will have Core 2 Duo T2250 processor 1.73 GHz (do not compare it with desktop processor! remember why?), integrated graphics, 1 GB Ram, 80 GB HDD, 17 inch LCD. Not bad for a worker, but the worst choice for gamer. Integrated graphics, little HDD will not make you happy. You can not upgrade laptop computer, so your choice must be wise.

As a matter of fact you see that desktop computer is more powerful than laptop one. But do you need it? Will you use all of desktop abilities? Will you load processor full enough? Check it now, press CTRL+ALT+DEL and find out how many percents of CPU do you use now. If it is less than 30% and you do not like games you can sure enough switch your desktop to laptop. If not - stay with laptop and you will get the best performance.

In future I’m planning to write advices of choosing the best laptop for certain price. I hope you will enjoy it.

Related Website: Best Laptops Compare Laptops & price in Australia

AMD is almost ready to launch R600

mente — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 14:59:26 +0000

Do you remember Ruby’s comparison? Well, according to this post AMD has working model of “new” Ruby. But it’s not the main spot. AMD has working R600 video cards. It’s just working prototypes for manufacturers. If manufacturers are happy, customers will be happy too (I hope). AMD still needs time to make sellable video card. Also card is needed to be reduced in size. But I hope they’ll do it quick enough.
Thinking about R600? You must start saving money, if you want to be in the first flight. Because it launches at the beginning of March

China has own processors

mente — Sun, 28 Jan 2007 10:56:24 +0000

According to this article China has already manufactured own processor called Godson II. It has frequency 500 MHz and its performance is on Intel Pentium III level. Several days ago Chinese scientists introduced new processor called Loongson 2E. You can call it “improved version of Godson II”. It has 800 MHz frequency and improved architecture. Processor isn’t well spread because there are just several motherboards for them. But I hope Intel and AMD will get new competitors soon. Maybe in next 10 years.

In February 200 laptops with Loongson 2E will be presented. Half of them will be taken by engineers at Chinese Academy of Science. Other half will go to people related to this academy. Its like “test release”. Company, invented Godson II and Loongson 2E is called Sinomanic. If you’ll find official site of this company please comment it

Electric Protection May Cause Problems

admin — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 13:29:06 +0000

Last week my friends called me. He asked me to check his computer. “It doesn’t boot even”, - he said. Well, thanks god he lives in near house and I went. Took some beer and knock in door. He welcomed me and invited inside. His computer is rather old - Athlon XP 2000+ and GeForce 5200. Others components are rather newer. The PC was already screwed up, so I just looked inside. I must stop here and tell you what is main in troubleshooting:

Ask what has happened with subject.
Try to boot PC and check the symptoms of the victim (PC certainly).
Repeat second procedure several times and check whether it repeats.
Check contacts on motherboard, hard disk, CD-ROM.
Detect defect, which causes problems. Remember - there can be several defects. Defect is detected? Goto 8.
If you can’t detect defect unplug everything, which won’t influence on PC boot: sound cards, hard disks, CD-ROMs. Leave only one RAM installed.
If PC still doesn’t boot you have problem with main component of the PC (I will write about this in future).
Remove the defect.
Enjoy.

These rules are basic. Try to match them and I bet you will find at least defect. Advice - if you can, try to substitute broken component for some time. You can be wrong. In private case you can vary, but in general follow rules.
I have done almost similar these rules in my case. I tried to power on PC, but nothing happened. System didn’t start up, even coolers didn’t work. I thought it was motherboard or PSU. If the motherboard was broken it would at least powered on and coolers work. This didn’t happen. My thoughts was - PSU definitely. So I told my thoughts to my friend. Of course he was upset, but what we could do? He gave me money and I bought new PSU.

Imagine our surprise when we, after PSU was installed, powered on system. Guess what happened? Nothing! Similar symptoms. But this time cooler on PSU turned a little. So it had started and then stopped. At this moment I have realized my mistake. Electric defence on PSU didn’t let desktop working. Using my knowledge and sixth point I found out that it was hard disk. It was rather old as all system. Western Digital with 20 GB capacity (sorry, I don’t remember exact model). I apologized my friend and that time he gave me money for hard disk. Hard disk was bought and now my friend is happy with newly installed hard disk (Western Digital 80BB, not too far from old one).
Conclusions? I made several mistakes. I didn’t check my thoughts. I could change PSU and try one more time. But I was hurry and bought new component. The main conclusion, which I understood from this case - never speed! You never know what is real problem.

Video Sex Symbols

mente — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 12:48:24 +0000

No, I won’t speak about video consoles. I’m going to speak about ATI’s Ruby. Do you know her? The girl who loves red color and skin-tight clothes will be rebuilt in 2007. No, don’t worry; Ruby’s style will be saved. According to HEXUS Ruby will get more polygons and new technologies, such like shaders 4.0. On the picture you can compare Ruby’s lips 2006 and the same in 2007.

On the left you can see Ruby 2007. Compare it with Ruby 2006 on the left. When I first saw this picture I thought that on the left is a real woman, from who Ruby was designed. I was wrong.
ATI don’t have working model yet. Waiting for renew Ruby!

Processor wars: AMD vs. Intel

mente — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 22:02:41 +0000

Preamble. Several months ago AMD announced Fusion processor. It’s a multicore processor with integrated graphics core. It doesn’t mean that processor will be just dual-core or quad-core. It will be many-core. Every core will be specialized in its own task. Seems to me they want to integrate chipset and simple video in processor. Nice decision I tell you. The cost of the entire system will be lowered and the speed rises dramatically. Everything in one box, nothing outside. Of course if you want to have powerful videocard you always can buy it. It will be better than integrated.But all of this was just lyrics. The main plot why this post has been written - Intel’s answer. It’s called Visual Computing Group (VCG). But Intel’s aim differs from AMD’s. AMD tries to improve performance. Intel’s main aim is:

We are focused on developing discrete graphics products based on a many-core architecture targeting high-end client platforms.

It means Intel wants to integrate graphics. No special core for specialized tasks. No integrated chipset. Just integrated graphics. But further they will expand it for CPU specializations. That’s why they’re looking for good specialists. I think their VCG will be developed faster than AMD’s Fusion processor. Fusion is perspective future and VCG is realistic technology. But I believe in AMD. Don’t say I’m AMD fan. Intel can surprise us too.

Open Source Phone is coming

mente — Sat, 20 Jan 2007 23:12:49 +0000

I have found interesting video while I was browsing internet today. It’s an open source phone, called FIC Neo1973. It is based on Linux OS, has 2.8 inch TFT display with resolution 640×480, touchscreen. Phone has Samsung processor, built-in GPS system. Gadget has 128 mb SDRAm and 64 mb NAND flash memory. Interesting - will you lose all your data, when phone is low battery? Half-phone-PC is powered by 1200 mAh battery? Suppose it’s enough for this baby. I’m wondered why FIC doesn’t have Wi-Fi or at least Bluetooth. These standards are very popular now. But as you can see, it’s more similar with Pocket PCs than with phones. But developers decide to call it “smart phone”.

Now, OpenMoco is seeking for software developers for their gadget. I hope I have a free time, but I don’t think so. So - if anyone is interested to develop open source phone - welcome

Disaster?

admin — Fri, 19 Jan 2007 22:39:28 +0000

Time changes everything. IT market is changing frequently than others.But basic tendency stays the same - development and new achievements. Financial side of IT market was the same for last years. There were losers and winners, geniuses and idiots.

Even IT market had a stable time. When nothing revolutionary was invented or introduced. Just developing of existing achievements. This development has one big disadvantage - once it will stop. Now it happens with financial side of IT market. Resellers don’t know what to do. They don’t have anything new, extraordinal. The best they can offer is big sweet box, in which your new video card is (for example). No new functions, gadgets. How can you differ Sapphire from Gigabyte on the graphics card market? Except box there are no differences, I bet. Resellers exist just for financial purposes. The worst is that resellers can’t do anything. They depend on company-manufacturers. If company-manufacturer can’t invent anything else, what will you do? Several resellers decide to make new own products. For example, notebooks, like TheInquirer said. Bad tendency, but what can you do? If you won’t provide something new you are eaten by competitors. Cruel world, but it is real world

Snorting Valium Effects

R600 and PCI-Express 2.0

admin — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 10:25:09 +0000

And again about R600. As you, maybe have mentioned I’m ATI fan (now AMD). AMD demoes new chipset RD790 with PCI-Express 2.0 onboard. Massive production will start at the end of the year. But I’m interested in other. As you can see on the pictures there are Radeon HD 2900XT installed.

Any notice? If you haven’t mentioned - here is only one power cable connected. Why? Because PCI-Ex provides 150W. You won’t need so many cables in future.

PCI Express 2.0 Specifications

mente — Wed, 17 Jan 2007 15:54:32 +0000

On this week PCI-Sig has released PCI-Express 2.0 specifications. General improvements are:

Dynamic link speed management allows developers to control the speed at which the link is operating

Link bandwidth notification alerts platform software (operating system, device drivers, etc) of changes in link speed and width

Capability structure expansion increases control registers to better manage devices, slots and the interconnect

Access control services allows for optional controls to manage peer-to-peer transactions

Completion timeout control allows developers to define a required disable mechanism for transaction timeouts

Function-level reset provides an optional mechanism to reset functions within a multi-function device

Power limit redefinition enables slot power limit values to accommodate devices that consume higher power

But the main improvements are:

The interconnect bit rate is doubled from 2.5GT/s to 5GT/s to support high-bandwidth applications
Power source is doubled from 75W to 150W. Also 8-pin power-connector can provide additional 150W
The higher bandwidth will allow product designers to implement narrower interconnect links to achieve high performance while reducing cost

Reverse support of PCI-Express 1.x video cards and motherboards

I want to discuss the main improvements. The interconnect bit rate is doubled. But do you know that video cards don’t use all bandwidth of PCIe? They always enlarge bit rate for future purpose, but this future never comes. New PCIe specifications come faster. Improvement for power source has 2 sides. First side - video card can be more powerful and use more power (good side). Second side - we have new 8-pin power connector (bad side). You’ll have to buy it before video card (of course if video card uses more than 150W). And of course, reverse support. It’s great that you can connect your old PCIe 1.x video card to new motherboard with PCIe 2.0 support and reverse. Upgrade step-by-step, as I call it.

Summarize this new standard. All improvements are extensive. PCI Express is developed. And it has big future