Good computer laptop core i3 $400?

[z7enz]

http/www.staples.ca/ENG/Catalog/cat_sku.asp?CatIds=,4251&webid=933887&affixedcode=WW

I have a AMD A6-3420m processor laptop now and need another. Is this processor Intel Core I3-2370M more powerful? I need it for web surfing,youtube,netflix and maybe some video editing home videos. How is the Intel HD Graphics 3000 what games can it play?

Thanks

 

[dudewitbow]

http/www.staples.ca/ENG/Catalog/cat_sku.asp?CatIds=,4251&webid=933887&affixedcode=WW

I have a AMD A6-3420m processor laptop now and need another. Is this processor Intel Core I3-2370M more powerful? I need it for web surfing,youtube,netflix and maybe some video editing home videos. How is the Intel HD Graphics 3000 what games can it play?

Thanks

pay attention to the i3-2125(with the hd3000). thats the graphics power you should expect.

HD 3000 isnt very strong, and is designed for casual use.

 

[z7enz]

Ok its bad but i dont care much for that anywayz. Just want to know is it gonna be fast enough. And heard acers built quality is not so good.Is it that bad?Whats wrong with it?

 

[dudewitbow]

Ok its bad but i dont care much for that anywayz. Just want to know is it gonna be fast enough. And heard acers built quality is not so good.Whats wrong with it?

they are hot from what i hear. they put better hardware inside at a lower price, but cut on the chasis quality and overall build design to do so.

 

[jaguarskx]

The i3-2370m has a much more power CPU core than the A6-3420m. The Llano APUs are based off AMD's old Athlon II cores so it is less powerful than the Phenom II / FX core. Assuming the same clock frequency, the Core i3 is roughly 35% more powerful than AMD's A6 APU.

To put another spin on it. The Athlon II CPU core is less powerful than a Core 2 Quad. I did a test about 6 weeks ago with a 104 minute long video on my desktop Core 2 Quad Q9450 @ 3.0GHz and my laptop which has a Core i5-2410m @ 2.9GHz. The movie I encoded was roughly 832x464 resolution and I encoded it down to 416x232 resolution so that I can play it on my portable player; Cowon S9. I used VirtualDub and the XviD codec to do the encoding; XviD only uses one CPU core. Using the 2-pass method of encoding, the Q9450 was able to complete the encode in 55 minutes, the i5-2410m was able to finish it in 39 minutes. That's a reduction of 16 minutes. In other words, the i5-2410m was 29% faster.

 

[jaguarskx]

The Intel HD 3000 is less powerful than the A6-3420m's graphic core. Compared to desktop graphic cards, the Intel HD 3000 is comparable to the Radeon HD 5450, while the A6-3420m's graphic core is a bit slower than the Radeon HD 5550. I would say 10% - 15% less powerful. For a laptop that difference in performance is decent because laptops typically have low resolutions. On a desktop the difference is pathetic.

While my Lenovo Y470 laptop has a nVidia GT 550m, I have tested the Intel HD 3000 graphic core. Coming from Intel (which has not been focusing on graphic performance until recently), the HD 3000 is actually pretty decent in terms of performance.

I have tested it with Fallout 3 and can play the game with a mix of low and medium settings. I also played Mass Effect 3 from start to finish only using the Intel HD 3000 and I actually found the game to be very playable on a 1366x768 resolution screen. I'm sure if I installed Half Life 2 the game would be very playable.

Games that are not too graphically demanding should be playable at 1366x768 resolution. The Mass Effect trilogy uses the Unreal Engine 3. Below is a link to games that uses the Unreal Engine. Note some games will run better than others depending on what graphic effects are being used.

http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unreal_Engine_games

Half Life 2 uses the Source Engine so just about any game that uses that engine should be playable. Here's a list of games using Source Engine.

http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Source_engine_games

 

[jaguarskx]

Based on the following benchmark graph for Batman Arkham City the AMD A6-3420m would likely give you about 40FPS or 41FPS.

Overall, for the purposes of surfing, or watching movies either the i3 or the A6 will be fine. For games the A6 is the better choice. For anything that is CPU intensive like video encoding then you want the i3. Also since the i3 CPU provides about 35% more processing power at the same clockspeed, it will not "feel as slow" as the A6 in 2 or 3 years. That means you will not likely feel the urge to buy a new laptop if you had an Intel i3 CPU instead of an AMD A6 APU... unless you are into games.

 

[daship]

i3 all day for everything besides games.

 

[z7enz]

Best answer selected by z7enz.