Laptop cpu advice needed

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oneArtist

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Our tech person at work said he's heard the Dell Lattitude was good choice for a laptop. I found an i7 2.66 620m 250GB 7200rpm($855 with Windows 7 Pro) I assumed that all i7's were quad core but I discovered that the 620m is duo core. I asked if I could change the order but it had already shipped, he said I could refuse shipment and then I could change the order to an i7 1.6 720Qm quad core for about $330 more with Windows 7 Ultimate. He also said that even though the 620m is duo core, it is very fast and runs cool and will not drain the battery as fast as the 720Qm. I'm committed to buying from this very helpful supplier. Another option is to get a 620m with a SSD 128 GB. I was thinking that there may be some advantage in getting the SSD for recording.
Has anyone had experience with a 620m laptop or a 720Qm? Which would be best for audio? All suggestions welcome.
 
Possibly more fan noise from the quad core. Those things are like blast furnaces, draw a lot of power and need super duper cooling. Especially if it comes with 1 gig dedicated graphics. Personal global warming machine.
 
Thanks for the encouragement. I'm feeling better about the i7 2.66 all the time. One odd thing about the combination of components Dell put is that the same processor is in other computers but the PC Magazine testing comes out better for the Dell than say a Toshiba with the same processor. Plus, the reviewer said that it ran much cooler than most high end laptops. Is it ok to put a link to where I got it here?
 
breakdown of the i7s mobile cpus.

http://www.intel.com/products/processor/corei7/mobile/specifications.htm

Before the return period it over, confirm your 1394 controller (if you're using a firewire interface) is supported by your equipment's manufacturer. If it works, but not supported, you may have issues down the road.

Depending on your software settings (sample rate, etc.) a regular 7200 rpm drive should be fine. When I did the math 16ch at 44.1 32bit was under 10MB a sec (if I remember correctly.) My SSD does around 200MB a second R/W and sata 7200s do 40MB or 50MB a second.
 
volcof said:
Before the return period it over, confirm your 1394 controller
Click to expand...

I have an old RME Multiface I which uses a propreitary firewire cable that connects to a RME PCI card. From what I've read, firewire will be used less and less for audio in the future. PCIe and USB3 and eSATA will be used in the near future and Light Peak is expected to follow. The audio gurus at Samplitude say to avoid buying Firewire since it is on its way out.
Thanks for the links to i7 comparisons. Many reviews I've read about laptops with quad core i7's all say the computers run very hot.
This review mentions how cool this duo core i7 runs: http://www.laptopmag.com/review/laptops/dell-latitude-e6510.aspx?page=3 I liked seeing the $1800 configured price since I got an open box unit for $855: http://www.warehousepoint.com/merchant.mvc?Screen=SFNT&Store_Code=wpusa. There web site looks a little funky but there service and support is great. They said they have no problem with me sending the i7 2.66 back so I can upgrade to a i7 1.66 if I choose. The more I read, I think the i7 2.66 is the best choice for laptops. Maybe that's why the Mac Pro uses the i7 2.66.:)
 
The way intel classed their i3, i5, and i7 cpus makes it hard to pick one.

you might as well think of the higher end i7s as a completely different cpu. The lower ones seem to make more in common with the i5 series. you have to get the specs sheet I linked for all three and look at the differences.


The higher end ones have 4cores w/ hyper-threading so it shows up in task manager as 8 cores. It can use faster RAM and has more cache on the cpu. The more cache (memory) on the cpu the less often it has to pull data from the ram. It also, uses a dedicated graphics card if your planning on running apps that need a fast video card. Games obviously need it, but they are starting to give apps like adobe premiere the capability of using the graphics hardware to help out. I'm not sure, but dedicated graphics might be required if you want HDMI out or for high (1080p) resolutions on an external display.


I can't remember if I found this link on this site or another but it might be useful. Please read over the whole page before making any changes to your machine. And of course use, at your own risk. Just passing it along.

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/ts/detail.php?Index=31969
 

All the i7-latitudes come with 512MB NVIDIA® NVS 3100M the quad core is a special version of the same card.
Here is a list of the parts as ordered:
124653 DELL, LATITUDE E6510, INTEL CORE i7, 2.66GHZ, 4GB, 250GB, DVD/RW, 15.6", DELL 1520 802.11B/G/N WIRELESS CARD, WEBCAM WITH MIC, WIN 7 PROFESSIONAL, SLATE SILVER [click] $855.97 2

I'm going to keep it. It comes Friday.
Thanks for your help
 
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