AMD vs. Intel: Battery Life Investigated

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Which IS more relevent? Thats the question here. Intel is sacrificing gfx at their customers expense, and carrying the "but we last 20 minutes longer " banner. Good on them. Watch their market errode, and no, it probably wont be AMD, tho they could use the monies
 
Im not looking at this from a Intel vs AMD box. I do recognize the article was written in this way tho.
Im looking at it from outside the box, as to the customer base/market potential POV regardless of who wins.
Because the article doesnt approach this in this way, it cant possibly be done without a bias, as it ignore the facts Ive brought in. The customer.
Like I said, they just dont get it, and its a petty thing they cling to as well
 



I don't agree with your "GRAPHICS OR DIE, BE-OTCH" statements. It just seems to be a weak arguement to try to discredit any product with an Intel IGP. Yes, I do know current Intel IGPs suck, but they're obviously more than enough in many situations. My wife's computer uses and OLD Intel IGP, and it is more than sufficient for her surfing and Word Whomp marathons.

A power screw driver is superior to a normal screw driver, yet we still have normal screw drivers and use them. You get the right tool for the job, which isn't always the most powerful, especially in the laptop computer arena.


But that's not to say that I 100% agree with the article. Jenny and I would share the opinion that "apples to apples" is not accurate.

If JDJ's assertions were correct, laptops would be sold without batteries.
 
No, it doesnt matter whos is too weak, its TOO WEAK is TOO WEAK is all that matters, AMDs , Intels nVidias, whomevers.
Whats the best business quality?



Customer is always right.
They dont get it, and no excuses allowed
 


Yes, the Intel IGPs need to improve to appeal to a wider audience, but they are still more than sufficient for many people's needs. Now I wouldn't buy one for myself, but it would be ample for the wife. They'd also be more than ample for 90% of the users I support at work (once again, wouldn't be able to use Netbooks, need moar CPU power).
 
But, a power screwdriver works and is capable of doing what a regular one cant.
If the customer mass is want ing it, and you arent complying, you lose business....or you head in that direction, ala pine trail.
To minimize this is foolishness. Intel opened up this can o worms by creating the netbook path, and had been lucky their only competitor doesnt have all the resources it does to put competing products in their cpus in a timely manner, but to illustrate its the wrong strategy, and it was a biased article, Ive shown in a atom article, the replies were "need more gfx" even at the expense of power.
Also, Ive shown in that same response, they (the customer) dont care who it is, they want their gfx. They look forwards to ION and ARM based competiton, hoping for gfx.
AMDs coming out soon with their own solution, aint sayin its good or great, but this is jumping the gun. And at AMDs expense. And ignoring the No 1 thing the "customers" desire, and here we have people defending all this.
Im not a fanboy guys, and you seem to be stuck within a box.
 
We know intel's IGP's are sufficient for displaying stuff on the screen. The problem is, intel hasn't even bothered to improve it. Sure they get better, but they remain direly incapable of running any recent game at a reasonable framerate.

Intel sell chipsets, laptops...everything off the back of their superior cpu's - which are very rarely found in laptops btw. The AMD is by far the superior all-round choice. It is the choice that most people would be happier with. Take your wife for instance...would she be happier with the intel or the AMD? It's hard to imagine any real instance where the intel is noticably better, but if she'd bought the AMD she'd probably notice the extra $80 if nothing else?
 
OK, 90%. Is the pcs at work of this level? or better? If its better, then, theres the apples to apples pushed even farther out. Then obviously, the market for these particular lappys arent for your example, and possibly a wider usage on the cheap?
 



I'm not saying I wouldn't buy the AMD instead of the Intel, if I was forced to choose between the two laptops I would probably end up picking the AMD for the better IGP, but I'm just saying that sacrificing graphics processing power is acceptable to get longer battery life for some people, that's what the article is about.

I do agree with your original point that it's not apple-to-apples and they are not "nearly identical".


I just think we're disagreeing on a broader argument of whether or not the Intel IGPs have merit and a place, I think they do, you think they're garbage!


We'll just have to agree to disagree. Fun little debate though, I'm glad everyone kept it respectful for the most part!
 



Kinda my point that didn't come out very clearly. There are better products at Gateway (and on the overall market) at respective price points for comparison.

A 160Gb hard drive will generally draw the same wattage as a 320Gb hard drive. In the big scheme of things the difference between 2Gb of RAMs and 4Gb of RAMs is not going to be an overwhelming factor in power consumption.

I appreciate the effort AT made at 'apples to apples' but it simply ignores the industry practice which makes it nearly impossible to achieve such. Item A with Y stats versus Item B with Z stats. When they tried to 'generally' equalize the stats to examine the power consumption they lost sight of the price point (which they then had to explain away).

It's the price point which makes it arbitrary. If they choose Item A which costs $60-$70 more over Item B it starts to get a little 'iffy' (especially if Item B has a more efficient battery at the same price) OR for $60-$70 more than Item A has a more efficient graphics subsystem available on the market for comparison. AT had to draw the line (and that's what all the back in forth is about in this thread).

Intel and AMD do this on purpose. It's marketing 101.




(mumbling to self -never post in Intel-AMD threads)

 
Jennyh, although I mostly agree with you (and others howling "BIAS!!!"), I would suggest not attributing to malice what might adequately be explained by stupidity, or in this case, incompetence. I would also offer the possibility that some of the burden of competence falls on the reader (even if it shouldn't), to read the WHOLE article, including between the lines.

Never mind what their employees might want to do, or wish they could do, with their machines even on their own time; if a company is buying laptops for business use, they will almost certainly not care about graphics, but more about things like CPU power and battery life. AFAIK these days, that is going to mean Intel.

For the back to school crowd, some parents don't consider their kids disciplined enough to get them machines capable of gaming; netbooks or low-end laptops are sufficient, and battery life for a day of classes with maybe an hour here or there for charging is important. Once again, it looks like Intel is the better choice, whether a netbook is sufficient or a low-end laptop.

Many others, including those who buy business laptops for themselves, will want graphics good enough for [some] games. So, for example, they pick one or more arbitrary measurements (FPS in a favorite game, and enough battery life to play it on a 3-hour flight), and then look for a machine that can achieve it at lowest cost. Popping in an extra battery is an option. Sliding in a better GPU is not. For these people, who can probably sacrifice a little CPU power, an AMD solution will probably cost less.

The only value the Anand article had was as a snapshot of a couple of laptops, and implications for the current state of technology, i.e. the kind of machines that are out there in that price range. Otherwise, it was pretty useless, particularly as a comparative "review."
 


Heh, well I can find threads where customers state 5-hour battery life is an important feature (flying cross-country).

Anyway, I didn't say graphics was unimportant to customers, I said battery life on notebooks was probably more important. Here's a feature-list shopping guide for "all purpose" notebooks, which is the alleged "sweet spot". Note that it says "consider discrete graphics", not "recommend".
 


JDJ, it's not "Intel" selling these lappies, it's Gateway. I'm sure that Gateway also offers lappies using Intel processors and discrete GPUs. In other words, they're giving the customers a choice. For a business user, etc discrete graphics are probably not going to be very important, compared to other features such as size, weight, connectivity, and yes - battery life.

For back-to-school market, where the laptop may be the only computer available, then graphics will be important for gamers.
 
But, this is always the excuse. I ask for proofs. Is this low end segment actually sought out and used or bought by business owners, or is this all just smoke?
It seems to me, having these low end lappys with low end cpus etc, with low end everything else may not be the businessmens target area, and the excuses used dont apply, which then only leads to wider usage. And if it leads to wider usage, gfx plays a
huge role in the purchasing decision.
And, if thats the case, then take it from that POV and go forwards, as to what this article was after. Thats my point, and I see no proofs.
If it is individual purchases for doing business, then itll certainly be better than these, this much I do know. What I dont know is whether its being done on a larger scale.
Also, the assumption that it only applies to the business end is false as well, like I said, hang out in the gfx forum for awhile
Its similar in a way to nVidia naming their highend mobile gfx chip the same as their highend DT chip, only adding the m in the unit name.
Its not even the same gen of card, and wont give the same effects. Just like Intels igps
And yes, I know they do mention it, but theres the difference right there, and its totally being underplayed, by my proofs from the potential customers here at Toms, in reference to Pine Trail, and that the comments all were about lack of gfx, and a few about gfx outweighing battery life, so no, I didnt search far to find what I, and Intel already know, thus Oine Trail is coming, because without it, there goes their market
 


Actually you are correct 😀. I bought a couple of Dell XPS 17" gaming laptops a couple years back (first one using a Core Duo CPU and nVidia 7900GS discrete graphics, the 2nd Core2 Duo CPU & 7950 discrete graphics). Although weighing over 9 lbs, these were a lot easier to lug to LAN parties in a backpack than a minitower with handles/wheels :). I had to buy the 2nd one after my daughter took the first off to college.

But I already had a decent gaming desktop, plus my company provided me with a business laptop (another Dell, with an Intel IGP IIRC), so it made sense to me at the time. I wouldn't do it nowadays since Internet-hosted gaming is pretty decent now, although I still think LAN parties are more "in your face" fun with the personal aspects. But yeah future laptop purchases for me will have decent graphics. Not so with a netbook purchase, however - there ultraportability, instant-on, and long battery life would be most important.

What would be interesting here, are the relative sales figures from Gateway on these 2 laptops. I would bet the cheaper price for the AMD model would be the tie-breaker...
 


I agree, as does >50% of the market since that is Intel's marketshare for graphics.

As for the 'respectful' part - just give it some time 😀...
 


It would be interesting to find out exactly what the power consumption of the CPUs vs. graphics is, for the 2 systems. I haven't seen any actual numbers here - just some - wait for it - speculation! 😀
 
Heres an oldie but goodie, and still the excuses back then as well, regardless of what the potential buyers want
"How many people that get/have an IGP really expect it to run all that great anyway? I'm not saying that they should suck, but I think most people that have an IGP just surf the net, do some word processing, and do some excel type of work. I'm not trying to sound critical, but I wonder what people really expect from such a component. "
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/249740-28-nvidia-platforms-stomp-intel-platform-usage
And heres some old numbers too, tho jennyh may not like them, but it shows just how poor Intels igps are, in all aspects, sorry TC
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3288&p=4

 
Its simple really...

They are 'nearly identical' because both feature the best IGP that respective manufacturer currently produces. Turns out Intel's sucks little electricity. Big shock. Also turns out that the beefy IGP from AMD sucks more electricity. Who didn't see that coming?
 


Anandtech! They're AMD pumpers! jkjk
 
Its the cpus using less here tho, I think, as well asthe igps.
Thats what I dont get, they can beat em on DT but lose terribly in mobile.
AMD needs to get their crap together, at least until them or ARM starts making something incredible all the sudden heheh
 
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