Calling all Techies - Which is faster? 1.6gHz C2D or 2.0ghz CD

[filipelli]

Hello guys,

Thank goodness for forums - I know there are a lot of techies here.

I am about to upgrade/sidegrade? from a 1.6gHz Core 2 Duo to 2.0gHz Core Duo processor (going from my Asus to a Macbook)....I am still pretty unclear which of these two are faster, and also unclear of what the differences are between core duo and core 2 duo. Can someone enlighten me? Even wikipedia goes over my head on this one...

 

[fat pat]

core 2 has a faster front side bus, which is the link to all the other parts in the computer, and can have a reasonable effect on the way your compy performs. the c2d supports 64 bit computing, and has a revised architecture that makes it more efficient be it with battery life, heat output, and just overall speed.

get the core2, itll be better for you

 

[devin_mm]

In this case the 400MHz raw clock speed bump will be more noticable than the FSB increase.

 

[Wodgy]

There is no difference, practically speaking. Under the right conditions, the 2GHz CD will be faster. Under other conditions, the 1.6 C2D will be faster.

What will make a bigger tangible difference is RAM and hard disk speed.

 

[The_Duke_Of_Eli]

The C2D chipset is faster, but it all depends on the speed of your ram. If your CPU is running at 800 MHZ bus, and your ram is 667 MHZ (standard new ram), then your CPU will clock down to 667 MHZ. Th macbook itself is based on fairly old technology. You're looking at small, low hard drives, slow ram, slow processor, older 950 Intel graphics...etc... Now day-to-day if you're just using productvity then you're not going to see a diference. Although if you can hold off, I beleive we'll see an update hardware-wise to the Macbook (not Pro) lineup before Christmas time.

 

[craiglester]

And battery life and heat output too, but without specific Txxxx model numbers it's almost impossible to say for sure. Theres lots of variants at 2 ghz for example

Overall, if it's a laptop you probably wont notice a great deal of difference for almost all tasks.

 

[filipelli]

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Duke_Of_Eli /img/forum/go_quote.gif The C2D chipset is faster, but it all depends on the speed of your ram. If your CPU is running at 800 MHZ bus, and your ram is 667 MHZ (standard new ram), then your CPU will clock down to 667 MHZ. Th macbook itself is based on fairly old technology. You're looking at small, low hard drives, slow ram, slow processor, older 950 Intel graphics...etc... Now day-to-day if you're just using productvity then you're not going to see a diference. Although if you can hold off, I beleive we'll see an update hardware-wise to the Macbook (not Pro) lineup before Christmas time.

Hmm that is good information to know. I just bought a macbook from the forums for what I believe is a good deal.

2.0gHz Core Duo
160gb hdd
2gb ram -667mhz
superdrive
2 years of apple care left
for $950 total

I just pulled the trigger, but I also have another Asus laptop with Nvidia Geforce dedicated graphics, T5500, HD Burner, 1.5 gb ram, 120gb hdd and such...This will serve as my home based computer I guess. But hey thanks guys for the education. I am just a word processing type anyway...no real gaming or 3d rendering (med student).

 

[Quaddy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by fat pat /img/forum/go_quote.gif get the core2, itll be better for you

from what i can acertain, the core 2 is what he has at the moment,

with that in mind i guess you could take the view, that both options are approximately the same, and the fact that the 2.0ghz one is a macbook, which many would deem as an upgrade anyway.

 

[zyxwvutsr]

http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu_mobile.html

it doesn't have c2d 1.6ghz benchmarks, but some simple extrapolation would give you a good idea of how the 1.6ghz c2d compares with the 2.0ghz cd

 

[krmathis]

x2 on the Core 2 Duo.
Its considerable faster than the Core Duo. So much that the 1.6GHz might be faster than the 2.0GHz