i7 laptops versus core duo 2 laptops

[gregbradley]

I am considering an i7 laptop for image processing to speed it up with 4gb RAM.

Does anyone use one of these and are they in fact much faster than a core duo 2?

I use a Proline 16803 camera and at full resolution the files are 32.4mb so with my core duo 2 laptop I can only process about 4 at a time and even then it can be a tad slow.

Greg.

[supernova1965]

Definately the i7 is the better and faster Processor make sure that your operating system is 64bit or you can not take full advantage of the 4gb and all your drivers will need to be digitally signed or they won't run as microsoft say it is a security feature to stop unsigned drivers from running

[Hagar]

I am also looking at an I7 processor in a Toshiba Laptop but research so far seems to indicate that only the 720 and 820 I7 processors are 64 bit. Intel seems to quote what appear to be much slower processors than the core2 or I5 processors. I would be very interested to hear the thoughts of others on this one.
Toshiba seem to only have this processor in 18" screened laptops which makes them a rather heavy unit at about 4.5 KG.

The only thing I haven't been able to run on the el cheapo 64 bit sempron in the observatory is FocusMax. I haven't had any problems with Microsoft rejecting unsigned drivers yet.

[Octane]

Greg,

On Warren's point regarding 64-bit software -- if you're going to get 4 GB of RAM, note that Windows XP only supports up to 3 GB. Now, I'm not sure if the 64-bit versions of XP support more than 3 GB. This would mean you'd need to get Vista or Windows7. This would mean that you'd have to double-check all your software to ensure it runs in Windows7, or at least in some kind of XP compatibility mode.

H

[supernova1965]

XP 64bit will support 4gb but you dont see XP in 64bit very often well I haven't anyway

[Hagar]

I am running windows7 64 bit in the obs with only 2 GB of ram and it seems to handle everything except FocusMax. Most software I have is still only 32 bit but it seems to run fine so far. I have a couple of 64 bit applications that I must try. This computer lives in the obs so doesn't get used for processing and as I said it was an el cheapo sempron system which was only purchased on price for capture use.

[Waxing_Gibbous]

You'll need W7 64Bit and native multi-thread software to get the most from an i7 core, but I have Laptops with both and for things like batch processing RAW images, the i7 just romps the Core Duo.

[AG Hybrid]

64 bit Operating Systems support upto 128 gb of RAM. Although its a laptop mentioned here, you'll struggle to get more then 4 gigs of ram in. IMO OP is better off with a Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T9600 instead of a laptop based i7 processor. This is due to that there are still many programs out there that can't handle 4 core processors. They also use less power but still provide excellent performance. Id also suggest a good GFX card, since its the GFX card that handles the graphics the most. A 1GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280m will make your image processing a piece of cake.

[mithrandir]

You mean my laptop lies when it says the CPU supports 40 bit addressing? That's 1TB.

Of course yo can only fit 8GB of DIMMs.

[AG Hybrid]

Well a 64 operating system supporting 128GB of RAM is a theoretical limit. It also depends on your version of operating system. Different versions of XP, Vista and Win7 have different RAM limits. Of course, as you mentioned, you can only fit 8 GB of SO-DIMM RAM in your laptop.

Actually, if you really want to go into the deep theoretical design stuff, Win XP 64 bit can support 32TB of RAM.

You can check your OS theoretical RAM Support here.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778%28VS.85%29.aspx

regards

[phranticsnr]

My 2 cents:

An i7 will definitely speed things up, even if you don't have the fancy multi-threaded applications. The reason for this is TurboBoost. i7 processors (and some others) can shut down unused cores and use the available resources (heat dissipation, voltage) to overclock the working cores (within some safety limits).

Whoever said only the i7 720 and 820 is 64bit: Nope, every modern processor is 64bit. The i7 6xx (which are more akin to an i5 than an i7) and the i7 920 (which isn't in a great deal of laptops, chiefly because Intel list its cost price as $1050USD...) are both 64bit. The importance of a 64bit OS is mostly (as pointed out by others) the ability to address more than 4gB of memory.

If you're buying a laptop new, you're almost definitely going to get Windows 7 Home Premium on it. Possibly Professional edition (which adds a largely-useless XP-mode and sometimes-useful Domain Join feature) or Ultimate (which is professional with 34 more languages and some over-hyped encryption - do not pay extra for this).

Pretty much all software is going to be FINE in Windows 7, unless it is particularly old or quirky.

TL;DR, gregbradley: Get the Core i7. Nothing to lose (except battery life).

[gregbradley]

Thanks for the valuable replies.

I also got a reply from another list and this guy did a test between a Core Duo 2 and an i7. The i7 took less than half the time to do deconvolution on an image.

There is also a version of CCDstack called CCDstack2 beta which takes advantage of the different cores otherwise I am told it won't make much difference using an i7 as the program does not make use of the extra cores.

More RAM is probably a key target as CCDstack uses sooo much memory that a limit of 5 32.4mb files at once is a real slow down. And even then it takes ages to do each step. Deconvolution takes it about 15 minutes!

Another issue with Win 7 I found is that I could not load Photoshop CS2 in (someone posted a fix for this - thanks). I also could not get XP mode to work as it depends on virtualisation technology being available on the chip you have. So I guess that is another thing to check - does the i7 chip you are looking at have virtualisation technology available?

I found with Vista I could not get my cameras, filter wheels virtually anything to work. Perhaps that was fixed later. I switched to back to XP then.

Greg.

[Tandum]

Also check the screen on a new laptop Greg. The new ones I've been getting for people have had an LED screen instead of LCD and they are giving bright, vibrant colours, viewable from almost any angle.

[phranticsnr]

greg: Yep, any intel chip from the Core2Duo onwards supports VT (virtualisation technology). To set up Win XP mode, you just need to download and install the addition - but it will only work with Win 7 Pro or Ultimate.

Photoshop CS2 is partially supported by Win 7 - not all software in the suite will work, but fortunately there is CS3 and 4, both of which work just fine!

LED Screens, as Tandum says, are worth getting as well. They're better on battery, thinner and brighter. Viewing angle is more about the quality of LCD panel, and the type of coating on it (glossy screens have wider viewing angles and better contrast than matt ones) than LED, but you're most likely going to get a glossy screen that is LED backlit - so there is some correlation there.

At the moment, the only companies that will guarantee you an LED screen as standard with any laptop are Apple and Dell. Most other companies have them though, but it's just a matter of checking before you purchase.

[leinad]

Anyone know if these i7 laptops have a normal power supply current draw of ~4A ?

Also any hot recommendations? Bedsides Mac and Dell ?

[Tandum]

This no longer appears to be true.
http://blogs.technet.com/windows_vpc lists a patch to get windows xp sp3 only, to go in xp mode, on a chip without HAV.
I hope to try this out later today on my crappy old lappy :)

[Tandum]

For those that are interested, this new patch works fine, I got xp mode installed and running on an old 2gig single core celeron lappy which does not have hardware virtualisation.

[phranticsnr]

Oh awesome. I actually sell computers for a living, so knowing things like that is handy. Not that I'd really recommend anyone with a laptop of pre-Core 2 Duo range to be virtualising an operating system, but my mantra is "all knowledge is worth having".

greg: Current draw of 4A?? Not sure about that. Surely it's best to measure the power draw in watts? Here is a link (http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection.aspx?familyId=434 02) that you may find handy. As you'd expect, the dual-core core i7s use a lot less power than the quads!

Anyway, my understanding is that processors run on very tiny voltages - less than 2V. So at 4A, you'd be looking for a max TDP of 8W? Only the slower U7000 series (http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection.aspx?series=28964 ), which are Core 2 Duos, approach this.

Can someone who knows microelectronics better than me confirm this?

[Tandum]

They ramp up power usage as you drive them harder.

[gregbradley]

Thanks for the link to that Microsoft patch. That may be very handy.

I also got Photoshop CS2 to load and run. Basically you need to change the address it saves it to to a 32bit address not the 64 bit address.

There is a link on an earlier thread on this. If anyone wants it let me know.

Without this change you'll get an error message when you try to run CS2 saying invalid serial number and the program will shut down.

I also found my 64 bit core duo 2 with 4gb RAM now does about 9 files of 32.4mb at the same time in CCDstack. Still slowish but less painful than it was.

Greg.