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Is the i7-820QM worth an extra $250 ?

Post Date: 2010-05-12
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brd6644 View Drop Down
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Posts: 3 		  Quote brd6644 Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Topic: Is the i7-820QM worth an extra $250 ?
    Posted: 12 May 2010 at 6:19pm
The 820QM is $250 more expensive than the 720QM. Both are quad core, base clock speed is 1.6 GHz vs. 1.73 GHz, and the L3 cache is 6 MB vs 8 MB. Seems like Turbo mode makes the difference in clock speed mostly unimportant (i.e. both overclock very well when only 1 or 2 cores are being used). So the only major difference might come down to the L3 cache alone. What do you guys think? The laptop will be used primarily for software development (code compiling, execution, a fair amount of multi-tasking) and won't see much gaming.
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Herniter View Drop Down
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Posts: 133 		  Quote Herniter Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 13 May 2010 at 9:09pm
Here are some benchmarks.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/hardware-components-aftermarket-upgrades/442139-core-i7-720qm-vs-core-i7-820qm-benchmarks.html

Not really worth it IMO but it really boils down to how valuable your time is, the 820 shows anywhere from a 5-20% performance gain depending on the application you're running.  

If you could deal with a bit less battery life though I would recommend the following with a i7 920 or better:

http://www.digitalstormonline.com/laptoploadsaved.asp?id=402875

The i7-920(desktop processor in a notebook) is much much faster that the two processors you've mentioned(almost twice as fast.)


Edited by Herniter - 13 May 2010 at 9:14pm
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brd6644 View Drop Down
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Posts: 3 		  Quote brd6644 Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 15 May 2010 at 11:34am
Any idea what the trade-off in battery life might be? The price differential is about $300-400 but for that kind of performance boost it may well be worth it.
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