I've found XBit to be more biased towards Intel than biased towards AMD.

The fact that you write 'Turdion' shows that in fact, you are merely an Intel fanboi that doesn't like the fact that his favoured company's products aren't that amazing after all.

More biased towards Intel huh? This is example of how they would not run a benchmark against the clearly superior Pentium M. They have no problems running the Pentium 4 against the Athlon 64. The Athlon 64 is better, so they run them, the Turdion 64 is a piece of crap, so they don't.

In the Presler release, they used the slower Intel chipset in the comparison, instead of the Nvidia chipset that clearly runs faster. Now, this site was not as bad as the others; they used the slow chipset but at least they didn't use the slowest motherboard out there using it. Still, they could have used Nvidia chipsets for both, but didn't.

A recent editorial about the Conroe was so biased it was shocking. It concluded it was unfair to compare a mid-level Conroe with a ultra-high end Athlon 64 (which hasn't even been released) because the Athlon 64 could show improvement between now and the time the Conroe would be introduced. Hmmm, a pre-released processor never shows improvement in the months before it is released, huh? Plus, it will be available in much higher clock speeds, etc...

It's strange, but I'm noticing a lot of this stuff going on in the net now. I think the big American site is the most even (I don't like using names because it's not really fair to this site to advertise for their opponents), but then they used the dreadfully slow Intel BadAxe motherboard while reviewing the new Presler. So, I'm still trying to find a consistent
pattern.

As far as being a "fanboy", you have the tail wagging the dog. I like whichever company puts out the best products, and I don't like products because one company puts them out. The Turdion is a piece of junk and clearly inferior product. I have been equally hard on the awful Pentium 4.

The Merom/Conroe/Woodcrest, are in fact amazing. I think they have surprised everyone. The current stuff is not, although the Pentium M is a very good product line, and the Yonah specifically is a very good processor. It falls quite a bit short of amazing though.

100% with you.

There should have been one PentiumM vs the Turion, but not the core Duo.
And with the same hardware configuration: graphics card, ram, features, ... Acer have them, very easy too achieve.

The Intel chipset was used for review, like Intel used their one chipset to make the battle against FX62, it's OK because Intel does make chipsets, but maybe Intel could have used some Ati chipset with Conroe.
If they used same price point chipset/mobo to do the testing I don’t see nothing wrong with it, in fact do you remember when all sites used expansive motherboards with the Intel i850 with RDRAM VS the cheaper AMD ones with SDRAM/DDR, and the Intel P4 win reviews/benchmarks because the review used that specific chipset instead of for example Intel 845 with SDRAM or single channel DDR...

They could have used the Nvidia chipset, but to tell you the truth I don’t touch that, I would go all the way with Intel processor and Intel chipset (unless there is a nice price difference).

About the Merom/Conroe/Woodcrest, will be amazing?
I’m already disappointed that Woodcrest will be about the same performance than Opteron.
If Opteron = Athlon X2, then why Conroe so much faster than Athlon X2 and Woodcrest about the same performance/power consuming of Opteron?
Is the Opteron optimized for server applications? Or is the Conroe optimized for games?

Kaz,

I disagree entirely about using an Intel chipset. If they use an Intel chipset, why not force AMD to use an AMD chipset? Ooops, wait, AMD is not competent enough to sell chipsets, so we should penalize Intel because they are? What????

Use the best against the best, especially since the same company uses both. This is a processor comparison, and you're trying to measure processor performance. Since both are available platforms, and from the same company, it's a much better comparison. This is particularly so since a lot of the people buying this processor will know enough to buy the highest performing chipset. Certainly no one would buy an Intel motherboard for performance. Reliability, yes. But did they measure that? Well, no, so stick to best versus best and don't penalize Intel because they make a supporting product AMD doesn't.

The problem with using same cost is that it is very easy to skew results. There are plenty of motherboards out there that cost the same, that have widely varying performance. You can pick the worst versus the best for the competitor, and that will make a big difference in results. Just look at the BadAxe performance. They did a test on this motherboard on another site, and it got totally annihilated by the other motherboards. It was dead last in almost every test, and by a lot. So they then use this motherboard to test it against the Athlon 64. It's so obviously a bias, but no one notices it. Intel motherboards are not about performance, they are rock solid. They relax timings for that reason. So, you don't compare performance with them against AMD motherboards, you use comparable motherboards that are made to perform. It's not about price.

With regards to earlier benchmarks against AMD and Intel, I disagree with you. If Intel has a platform that supports better memory or whatever, than you use it. You test best against best. The reason being, if I am out there looking for a new computer or new parts, I can get these parts. I am not going to buy the slowest parts out there when I can get faster ones, so using slow parts in a comparison is kind of pointless, but I'll be choosing between the best for each platform. If I can't buy an AMD platform with, say, RDRAM then that is a liability to that platform that is relevant. I agree though, you have to mention price in the reviews. If the Intel platform costs $1500 and outperforms the AMD platform by 5%, both because of RDRAM, not too many people will find it to be worth it. So, yes, price is important, but in these high-end comparisons, I think they should show best versus best instead of trying to be cute and showing Intel on a sub-ideal platform.

Why wouldn't you touch Nvidia? Because they are the best performing chipset for Intel processors? Or because that is what was used for AMD? Or, is it because you forced AMD to use an AMD chipset, you should force Intel to use an Intel chipset? Which one?

I have no idea why you think the Woodcrest is the same performance as the Opteron. Everything I have seen shows it blowing it out of the water. The results they showed when compared to a Sun based Opteron represented an ugly pounding. However, as you go to more processor units, not cores, you would expect Intel to perform worse and worse because they still use a shared FSB and have one memory controller. So probably with 16 dual cores (meaning 32 processors), the Opteron would show advantages because of the way memory is accessed. Do not hold me to 16, I am just pulling a number out of my head, it may be less or more, but my point is, as you go higher you should see AMD solutions look better. It's got nothing to do with the architecture, but just with the way they each access memory.

I'm not sure this is a big deal for Intel though, since for big iron they have the Itanium 2. It's not really where they want to position x86.

OK,
For you is the best with the best, or better fastest against the fastest, even if that will mislead people in the end.

My point was that many people I know have gone after the P4 because they saw the P4 2.4 with I850 with RDRAM win the test/bench/review, but then they go out to the store an bought some ASUS with a SIS chipset with SDRAM or DDR (without dual channel capability) and think that their system was on par with the one they saw.

And about the NVIDIA I think their chipset sucks or their driver sucks (and ATI has the fame). I have run in a lot of problems with "their" mobos, memory incompatible problems and others.
I think the best chipset company out there is Uli or even Ati.
Because with VIA I have excellent success rate, but also some huge problems, they have very good chipsets, but very bad ones too.
SIS very stable, but lack drivers that help to improve the performance and of course features.

Too bad NVIDIA bought Uli, I only hope they don’t screw the company has they have done with 3DFX.

Kaz,

I don't agree it is misleading if you mention the motherboard. Ideally, you would have one of each.

To use your logic, if you test the P4 with the inferior memory, aren't you being equally misleading to the person who would go out and buy the RDRAM based solution? It's not like those solutions weren't out there for people to buy.

Whether Nvidia has driver problems or not, it is a level playing field in terms of performance. It's not really relevant for a review, but for buying, yes, it would be. I have not had problems with Nvidia chipsets at all, although their video cards gave me fits and I will not buy them anymore. I've had a lot of success with their chipsets, it's interesting that you have not. It'll make me think twice before getting another one.

From a TechReport review it appears that the Turion compares quite well with the Pentium-M 2.13GHz (IIRC). The Pentium-M may be superior to the P4 in terms of gaming, but it's poor floating performance means that it won't destroy the Turion.

A 2.5GHz Pentium-M Dothan competes quite well with an Athlon 64 4000+. So a single-channel Turion 2.0Ghz, about the level of a 3000+ S939, should be comparable to a 1.6-1.8GHz Pentium-M.

Rookie,

Who is talking about gaming? You think most people buy laptops so they can play games on them? I think that even a little thought would indicate that's not the case and the power envelope in a laptop would not allow even close to top quality video cards and very high processor clock speeds. Plus, memory, fast hard drives, etc...

There currently exist benchmarks that compared the two processors, and the Intel solution easily destroys it. But then, you would know this if they made an obvious comparison for their review. That's my complaint. Comparing an AMD based solution with an Intel based solution is kind of common, and expected, isn't it?

The only thing I could say in their defense is because they are not a big site, maybe they don't have the resources to test against a proper Intel solution. This is possible, but I think with some effort on their part, they have enough readers that they could get a laptop maker lend them a review machine. So, I think it is a deliberate bias so as not to show people what a piece of crap this processor is.

This is the article I saw.

http://techreport.com/reviews/2006q1/pentiumm-vs-turion64/in dex.x?pg=1

The reviewer puts the Turion 64 ML-44 on the same level as, if not higher than, the Pentium M 760.

Care to show your proofs as well?

And in addition, I doubt very many people would want to take such a notebooks on the go - those that do neet mobile notebooks would be buying slim models with ULV Pentium-Ms and integrated graphics. This notebook is clearly targeted towards the DTR market, the people that want desktop capabilities that still has some degree of mobility. The X700 on this notebooks shows that Acer intends its audience to play games on them, although probably not at maxed out graphic levels.

On the top quality video cards and processors...there are notebooks with FX-60 and 7800GTX SLI. Not what most people would call "mobile", but they ARE, for all intents and purposes, notebooks.

I agree, however, that it would have been a simple matter to get a comparable Pentium-M notebook; Acer themselves offer quite a few P-M + DDR2 system with X700 graphics that don't break the bank either. Perhaps Xbitlabs could add tests done with such a system to this review?

Please don't tell me that a notebook weighing less than 7 pounds is too heavy to easily carry. If it is, a month in the gym will fix that. I remember lugging around 25 pound behemoths with impunity. 7 pounds is a joke.

Desktop replacement, even if you were right, does not mean playing 3D games like a jackass kid all day. Most kids can't afford laptops and they don't use them anyway, they are generally for adults that use them for business, often times taking them to work and then bringing them home, or being able to work in bed. You don't make a laptop to run 3D games, and in any rate the problem is not the processor but the video with it. Most people wanting to buy a laptop are not going to want to dramatically lessen their battery life to shoot up aliens like a simple minded moron. The disparity between desktops and laptops in 3D performance is MUCH greater than the disparity in processing power, since 3D capability is needed only by a very small percentage of people that buy these machines. Everyone uses the processor.

For a mobile processor, floating point is not very important for most people. I am sure some engineers might use it for more important things than saving Earth from the evil Zargons, but by and large it is much less important than on the desktop. Certainly for playing 3D games it is irrelevant, but there are other uses. Engineers would use it, architects, developers for 3D games would use it, etc... But, that's small percentage, and in my opinion it's not worth the energy cost for most people.

Also keep in mind, what good is killing a space alien if his scream isn't very lifelike? I can't even imagine playing a game like that without good sound, so again, it's not a laptop thing. The new games still need the big iron and lots of power to use it.

You're joking, right? You compare a 2.4 GHz with a 2.0 GHz, and they are close, and this is a victory for AMD? Clearly even a 2.13 GHz part would beat the lowly Turdion at 2.4 GHz. How can you use this as proof? Did you also notice the memory timings were CAS of 4 for the Pentium M and 2 for the Turdion? Seems to me getting CAS of 3 would be pretty easy for the Pentium M.

That review was atrocious, it didn't even mention the power envelope, whic h is extremely important for notebook buyers.

So, you have a much more power hungry processor competing with a much lower clocked, much lower power processor, with memory slower than necessary, and they are close in performance with each winning some tests, and this is good for AMD? I am surprised a 2.0 GHz Pentium M with slow memory,was competitive in performance to a 2.4 GHz Turdion, I had no idea it was that lousy. The 2.13 would have probably beaten it, which is quite sad since it also uses a lot less power.

This is a processor for people that can't afford superior Intel technology. As I said, this is fine for the low and mid level notebooks, but for the high-end, it doesn't measure up. The price is nice though, so certainly it has a place, but for a high-end machine, it makes no sense. Intel will no doubt keep overcharging for the Pentium M, and luckily AMD is there to give people choices, but that doesn't make it a good processor. It just means Intel is ripping people off with their high prices.

"You're joking, right? You compare a 2.4 GHz with a 2.0 GHz, and they are close, and this is a victory for AMD? Clearly even a 2.13 GHz part would beat the lowly Turdion at 2.4 GHz. How can you use this as proof? Did you also notice the memory timings were CAS of 4 for the Pentium M and 2 for the Turdion? Seems to me getting CAS of 3 would be pretty easy for the Pentium M."
I'd have thought that you knew enough to discount clock rates.
Let's say that Intel now slashes the price of the Pentium XE 965 to, say, $300. It beats the Athlon 64 X2 3800+. Then Intel wins, period, and no one is going to care that the Intel processor is clocked nearly twice as high as the AMD one (except perhaps those who have high requirements on power consumption and heat).

On the latency issue it is true that a 2.5 vs 3 latency would have been a fairer comparison. It might make the Pentium M win out on drawn or close tests. But that would not have changed the fact that the Turion does, in fact, at least match the Pentium M on performance.

"That review was atrocious, it didn't even mention the power envelope, whic h is extremely important for notebook buyers. "
I'm not sure what you meant, because there is a page on power consumption.

"The 2.13 would have probably beaten it, which is quite sad since it also uses a lot less power."
I'm sorry, but I don't think that a 6.5% increase in performance is enough to make the difference between the 2.13GHz and the ML-44 a clean win. Not being able to find a price comparison table on Intel's website, I can't give an exact price for the 2.13GHz, but I do believe that it's priced higher than the ML-44.

As for the comment starting with "Please don't tell me that a notebook weighing less than 7 pounds is too heavy to easily carry..."

I'll say only this - we live in different environments, and we see different things; I guess I have a different definition of "desktop replacement" than you do, and a different view on video games and the people playing them, so I'm not going to argue any further on that point.

Rookie,

You make a terrible comparison when you mention the Pentium 4.

First, let's keep things straight so you don't try to change my argument, which is what you are trying to do.

I said Intel made the best product, I did not say they made the best product at the same price points. Actually, I said pretty much the reverse, that AMD could sell this junk because Intel was ripping people off and it was a better value. So, forget price, that's not part of my argument.

Why would I discount clock rate??? You are acting crazy. The AMD processor uses a Hell of a lot more power even than the 2.13 GHz, but they compared it to a 2.0 GHz. Hmmmm, that's certainly fair. It's nonsense, since power consumption is very important to a laptop. So, they made an absolutely idiotic comparison. A laptop that uses AMD's highest performing processor that uses tons of power, against Intel's mid-level processor even though the high-level one uses a heck of a lot less power than AMD's. They have totally different video in each one as well. It's an atrociously bad review. Go to MobilityGuru on Tom's Hardware and search for Turion and you'll see much more even reviews. The Turdion gets destroyed. It is the difference between a processor specifically made for a market, and one that is horseshoed in there because AMD can't afford to develop one independently. The irony is, Intel has come this way too, but not from the desktop part, but from the mobile part.

You missed the CAS latency. It was not set at 3. It was set at 4. Going from 4 to even 3 would have made a noticeable difference, going to 2.5 would have even been better. But, it was a rigged test and was only intended to fool people into showing the results they wanted to. The sad thing is, you probably were not alone in assuming they were being truthful and without an agenda. It's easy for you now, I assume, especially considering they would not mention power use, a very important characteristic.

Considering how close the comparison was, the 2.13 GHz would have been a clearly better processor. Performance would probably have been slightly better, but when you compare the power profiles it would be a clear winner. As I mentioned, that review was so bad it didn't even mention power use, whereas that is probably one of the most important things when comparing laptops.

Desktop replacement is different from high-end alien blaster replacement. Modern games love power, and push hardware more than most other applications. It has pretty much been that way all the time, with games pushing hardware. So, even if it is a desktop replacement, it's not going to be a 3D alien blaster replacement. It could be for a lot of other stuff though.

You may be right, but,

If I’m going to buy a reused notebook two years for now I go for a Turion machine, right?

Because exactly what you said, X86-64.

It will be the feature of the future, not Conroe, not Core Duo, not Athlon X2, but x86-64.

Of course today, is not only useless, but also pointless because is consuming power and isn’t used (5W~10W). But if Intel didn’t integrate SSE on their processors we weren’t using it yet, isn’t that right?

Kaz,

x86-64 is essentially useless on a notebook because they can not use more than the address space of the 386 anyway. So, you'll never get any real benefit from it. Generally speaking, so far most applications run slower in 64-bit mode, or if they run faster it is only in very limited instances. For a very, very small percentage of people, it may make sense, for the rest it is bad technology since it uses power and gives no benefit.

Now, if notebooks could use 16 GB then I would say it might have more use, since that is the primary advantage of extending the instruction set. But, since they can not, there is not much point at all in it.

Erm...aren't those USB ports on the right just to help you connect your mouse?

Last time I checked a plug in a USB port sticks out about 3cm and then the cable at least another centermetre. Isn't that realestate where the mouse sits? The last thing you want are cables to interfere with your happy mousing. But its not just one port there, there are a whole bunch of them. Maybe the mouse is supposed to float in the air?

Chainsaw,

While I understand your frustration with ergonomics, and completely agree, I'm unclear specifically on what bothers you.

You complain about the USB port location, because you want to put a mouse there. This is where you plug your mouse in, so I am not sure what is bothering you. It is because it is so close to where you actually want to use your mouse, the mouse cord gets in the way and becomes problematic? If so, have you considered looking for a short tail variety of mouse? They probably exist, and if they don't you can make one.

Where would you have put the ports? In the back of the computer? Is what bothers you, in a nutshell, that they put the ports on the side instead of the back where it would be less competitive with other uses for deskspace?

I think some of this is basic stupidity. They saw that people didn't like connecting and disconnecting from their computers in the back, so they applied it to laptops since it was more common to them. However, it is a completely different experience with a laptop, since it is so easy to maneuver, it makes almost difference in terms of difficulty to plug things in, whereas with a typical tower, moving the computer is not an efficient way to solve the problem.

Another thing to keep in mind is that a laptop on the desktop, and a laptop on the, ummm, laptop, have slightly conflicting requirements. For example, a DVD player that opened out the front would be fine for the desktop, but would be far less than ideal for someone on the road. The side door would be better. On the desktop, the side opening might conflict more with papers and the mouse, etc...

Actually the DVD opening out the side is the best location. Better still is to have it open to the right as that is most likely free desk space because its the most common location for the mouse. Afterall you very seldom need to open the DVD and manuver the mouse at the same time. As for the tangle of cables that that is inevetible for power users, definitely that should be hidden out the back keeping valuable desk space clear for other things.

Yes I can see how the clueless designers of recent notebooks applied a desktop mindset to a laptop. Its really pathetic! I for one won't be buying a new notebook until a manufacturer puts some thought into the ergonomic design.

Still this Acer notebook could be worse, I've seen many new models with the LAN port on the right front. Just try using a mouse with one of those and not cussing.

I am referring to page 3 of the article...

Might be time to test the aerodynamics of this puppy; throw it out a window.