RE: Intel Centrino Performance for 3D Design and RP

From: Blasch, Larry (LBlasch@OPW-FC.com)
Date: Thu May 15 2003 - 15:50:52 EEST


Jay,

Check your math... 3.06gh compared to 2.4gh is a 660mhz difference.
The DELL's clock speed is 25% faster than the generic, that sounds quite
substantial to me.

Sounds like an apples to oranges comparison, what about the front side bus
speed, RAM cache, and hard disk drives? All contribute to the performance of
the total package. Remember, a system is only as fast as it's slowest
component.

Also, did you install the OS yourself on both or did they come
pre-installed? There's a lot of tuning that you can do to eliminate
un-necessary, "performance degrading", drivers.

Larry Blasch
Design Engineer
CAE Systems Administrator
     
OPW Fueling Components
P.O. Box 405003
Cincinnati, OH 45240-5003 USA
Voice: (513) 870-3356
Fax: (513) 870-3338

-----Original Message-----
From: Jay Waldon [mailto:rwaldon@columbus.rr.com]
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2003 9:22 PM
To: Paul.Bates@reebok.com
Cc: 'Henry Sommer'; AHastbacka@aol.com; rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi
Subject: RE: Intel Centrino Performance for 3D Design and RP

        The Price range quoted in my earlier email was directly from
Dell.com
I configured an M50 notebook workstation via Dell's web site using the best
they had to offer. By dropping the ddr ram down to the default amount of
512mb you would save $1200 from the cost making the notebook around the
$4300 mark. Also dropping the processor to the default 2.0 GHz would save
you about and additional $800. This notebook I quoted was a workstation
notebook designed for this type of work, hence the word "workstation" it has
little on no entertainment value (to say) in it. It has hardware design for
specific tasks.

         A standard Laptop (as they are affectionately called) has what I
call entertainment value It is designed to run a vast array of programs,
play games, listen to MP3's and so on and they are not designed to be as
stable as a workstation. There are a number of good laptops and I am sure
that most will run what ever anyone would choose to run without many
problems, but in my many years of building computers I have found that a
workstation will always out perform any standard PC and will always cost you
more, so times a lot more.

        As an example of my ramblings here I purchased for our company a
standard HP pc 2.4GHz with 512mb memory. I purchased it right off the shelf
at our local computer store. About 2 months later I purchase a workstation I
designed through Dell a 3.06 GHz with a gig of ram, 15000 rpm SCSI drives
and so on. Both computers have the exact same software on them (Win XP Pro,
Office Xp...Etc) I loaded 3d light-year 1.3 with updates on both computers.
Mind you these are both new computers both have the same staples of
software. When running a 100MB file (the same file) this was the outcome.

Verifying the part. 2.4 GHz about 2 minutes
The 3.06 GHz about 20 seconds.

Generating supports the 2.4 was about 8 minutes the 3.06 was about 90
seconds.

Slicing the file the 2.4 started the slice and 67 layers into the routine
the computer froze after about 20 minutes it generated an error and rebooted
itself. On the 3.06 it completed the slice in just over 3 minutes.

        I can go on and on and on as to why it works better than the other
but I think you can see my point. You may say that this test was not a fare
comparison because one computer is "bigger" (per say) than the other, we are
only talking about 66mhz difference in speed and 512mb of memory that's not
much. It's the design of the computer that makes the difference. This is
just an opinion from a guy who has been building and working with computers
since they first came out with the TI99 and Vic 20 home computers many years
ago. I don't claim to know everything there is to know about computers, but
I will say I do know how to build a H*&l of a screamer.

Thanks for allowing me to ramble.

Jay Waldon

-----Original Message-----
From: Paul.Bates@reebok.com [mailto:Paul.Bates@reebok.com]
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2003 4:39 PM
To: rwaldon
Cc: 'Henry Sommer'; AHastbacka@aol.com; rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi
Subject: RE: Intel Centrino Performance for 3D Design and RP

We recently tested this Dell laptop for Unigraphics and it runs better than
any of our current desktop CAD workstations (time to upgrade?). If it
works as well with Solidworks as it does for Unigraphics NX, you will not
be disappointed. We ran it with 512 Mb ram and the 2.0 Ghz processor - so
I cannot confirm the price range quoted in Jay's mail.

Regards
Paul

"rwaldon" <rwaldon@columbus.rr.com>@rapid.lpt.fi on 05/10/2003 09:30:55 PM

Sent by: owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi

To: "'Henry Sommer'" <hsommer@mindspring.com>, <AHastbacka@aol.com>,
       <rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi>
cc:
Subject: RE: Intel Centrino Performance for 3D Design and RP

Al

            Henry Is Correct, though I would chose a laptop with the nVidia
geForce 4 video graphics. From my own experience and Solid works testing
Ati has problems displaying

Files correctly and there can be corruption when picking a point on the
part. Using 3d light-year and Solid view the ATI drivers have caused
invalid
page faults. Something they are trying to fix.

Most Pent. 4 chips 1.4 to 2.5 GHz provide support for up to 1GB of ram
whether the motherboard does or not is another story. 2.52, 2.6, 2.8, and
the 3.06 should support 2 GB or more of ram, but there again it's up to the
motherboard to also support that much ram.

You can get a Dell Precision M50 Notebook computer with:

2.5GHz proc.

2GB ddr Ram

nVidia Quadra 700 video (Great card)

40GB hard drive

Cd-burner

and so on for about $5,500.00

2GB of ram is the set back on this it runs about $1200.00 but it's worth it
if your handling large files.

Good luck with finding a model to suit your needs.

Jay Waldon

Laser Reproductions

System Administrator

950 Taylor Station Road

Gahanna, Oh. 43230

614-552-6905

jay@laserrepro.com

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi [mailto:owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi] On Behalf
Of Henry Sommer
Sent: Saturday, May 10, 2003 6:25 PM
To: AHastbacka@aol.com; rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi
Subject: RE: Intel Centrino Performance for 3D Design and RP

Al

            I am also interested in that. The bigger issue I have found is
in finding a system with a good video card. Laptops aren't like desktop
where you can add your own components. Please let me know what systems you
are looking at. The only ones I know of with 64 megs of video ram is an IBM
(ATI raedon 9000 go) and the Dell D800 (Nividia geforce4 4200 go ). One of
the nicest things about the Centrino is that it supports 2 gigs of system
ram. Not all of the Pentium 4-M systems do that. I wouldn't worry about not
having a cad card for solid works.

            There are laptops with the desktop Pentium 4 all the way up to
3.06 GHz. They would be the best performer but again I couldn't find on
with
a good graphics card.

Henry Sommer

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi [mailto:owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi]On Behalf
Of
AHastbacka@aol.com
Sent: Friday, May 09, 2003 6:30 AM
To: rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi
Subject: Intel Centrino Performance for 3D Design and RP

I am interested in knowing if anybody on the list has compared the
performance of the Intel Centrino processor against a more traditional
Pentium IV, when running software like Solidworks or other 3D design
software. If so, how much faster or slower did the Centrino perform?

Regards,
Al Hastbacka

(See attached file: C.htm)



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