[Pc_Support] AMD Turion x2 (Xpress 1100) v. Intel Core (945GM) ... surprising!

[Bryan J. Smith]

Although it's not entirely fair comparing the newer Turion x2 and
newer Xpress 1100 to the slightly aged Intel Core Duo with slightly
aged 945GM chipset, the Turion x2 on a Xpress 1100 or GeForce 61x0
(possibly even a 7200) is typically cheaper or no more expensive than
an Intel Core Duo on a measily Intel 945/950G solution today.  So it's
fair from a price standpoint.  I'd personally like to see the GeForce
61x0 (or 7200) mobile too, but I'll take these Xpress 1100 benchmarks
for now.

AMD surprises, despite the smaller L2 cache (remember, it has 4x the
L1 cache):
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/08/22/amd_dual_core_laptops_have_arrived/

Intel wins on power and select multi-tasking -- especially when
combining in DVD playback.  I don't know if that's an immaturity of
the drivers of the Xpress 1100 or Intel's power focus on the chipset
-- probably the latter as any chance of the former.  Intel's tight
integration is always going to be better in that regard, although with
AMD buying out ATI, it does signal AMD's focus to deliver an
integrated equivalent -- especially with more and more notebooks being
sold.

BTW, AnandTech _did_ find that even the new Core 2 Duo notebooks on a
newer Intel chipset doesn't do much over the Core Duo:
http://www.anandtech.com/mobile/showdoc.aspx?i=2663

Really all the Core 2 Duo for notebooks does is give you the Core Duo
at higher clocks, but at a little bit of a boost in price.  Although
Intel does seem to be bringing the prices down, and the CPUs for
notebooks should follow the desktop trends too.