centrino vs amd64 vs P4

[pappo]

hi everybody i'm looking for an audio laptop but i'm really concerned about which cpu to choose: I need LOT of power but a QUIET machine (strange indeed, isn't it?). I'll use lots of plugins for mix and record and samplers and soft synth for live performance.
I looked for tests on the internet and found that a centrino seems to be not as fast as i believed (look on Tom's Hardware and http://portatili.hwupgrade.it/articoli/1009/6.html non acer laptops are based on 1.5GHz Centrino).
So i'm looking at Athlon64 or newest centrino (Dothan)...
Does anyone have a real-world comparative test? How a 1.7 centrino performs against a P4 or AMD64? Are Athlon64 quiet?
i currently only tried a Sony vaio athlon XP-M 2200+ and seems to be really quiet but my new laptop should be a lot more powerful and maybe fans will be noisy.
thanks!!!

 

[christiaan]

A Centrino would be my no 1 choice.
Powerful yet very easy on energy consumption. Centrinos last a long time on one battery load. And since they don't consume much energy, they don't get all that hot -> quieter (cooling fans).

 

[manning1]

disagree completely. ive been putting test results of various processors together . if you want top range processing power either the intel top range processors 3ghz or the winner so far in raw process power is amd64.
from my understanding of his needs he needs really lots of power to run plug ins etc. the 64 will do that. another user on this bbs reported a amd mp2400+ result to me thats quite impresssive.
in summary if you want processing power you need a powerfull chip and the point being powerfull chips consume power.
or put another way you cant run a porsche on water.

 

[Polaris20]

disagree completely. ive been putting test results of various processors together . if you want top range processing power either the intel top range processors 3ghz or the winner so far in raw process power is amd64.
from my understanding of his needs he needs really lots of power to run plug ins etc. the 64 will do that. another user on this bbs reported a amd mp2400+ result to me thats quite impresssive.
in summary if you want processing power you need a powerfull chip and the point being powerfull chips consume power.
or put another way you cant run a porsche on water.

A mobile A64 with a 3000+ runs at 1.8Ghz, with 1MB L2 cache. The new Dothan Centrinos run between 1.7-2.0 with 1MB of L2 cache. Both run very similarly efficiency per clock cycle-wise.

Difference being that the dothans require less battery power and are quieter due to running cooler.

I love AMD, but I think I'd go CEntrino in this case.

 

[pappo]

thank you all!
i indeed need lot of power (i'll play soft synths with fx plugins live) and power consumption is the last of my thoughts.
I'll consider that centrino should be quiter but i need (and can't find) a comparative test for Athlon64 and centrino (Pentium-M).
Do you really believe that a 1.8GHz centrino can compete with a 3000+ Athlon64 or a 3GHz P4?

 

[manning1]

there is a very long thread on cakewalk.com forum showing the whole processing wars thing including charts. just search for scott reams i think did it.
youll learn a lot. including comments from folks that love their athlon 64's.
look carefully at the latency and other stats detailed.

 

[Polaris20]

I would be interested to see a comparison between a 2Ghz Dothan Centrino (which actually has 2MB of L2, not 1MB) and an Athlon 3000+ 64.

I couldn't find any on Anantech or Tom's though.

 

[christiaan]

disagree completely. ive been putting test results of various processors together . if you want top range processing power either the intel top range processors 3ghz or the winner so far in raw process power is amd64.
from my understanding of his needs he needs really lots of power to run plug ins etc. the 64 will do that. another user on this bbs reported a amd mp2400+ result to me thats quite impresssive.

Then we agree on disagreeing.

The Centrino is not a bad cpu because there *may* be faster cpu's available. On the contrary.

On a side note: Remember that you don't need the fastest computer around for recording and mixing. You need one that's fast enough.
The need for more cpu power doesn't necessarily increase as newer and faster cpu's are hitting the market.