Keyrock42 :
Hold up, did Intel change its naming scheme or did I have it wrong the whole time? I thought i7 = 4 cores hyperthreading, i5 = 4 cores, no hyperthreading, i3 = 2 cores hyperthreading.
Nah. The model branding/numbering between desktop and mobile has always been messed up like that. Even with desktop models those general descriptions go out the windows when you look at low-power T/S variants.You really cannot rely on model number or product line with Intel's "simpler" numbering scheme. The simplest way to compare models these days is to use tables.I find it ironic how Intel used to say the alphabet soup after the CPU architecture designation and clock speed as model numbers was "confusing" - seeing what they did to make things "simpler," the alphabet soup from the 386-P4 days seems like the simplest model numbering scheme Intel has ever had: pick a CPU family, pick a clock frequency, find the letters that correspond to the features you want, that's your model number now all you need to do is find the closest match.
here is another way of looking at the mobile chips.
pentium and celeron: slower, missing features, only useful for netbooks/chromebooks, ece.
i3: dual core, hyperthreaded, 3mb l3,
i5: same as the i3, but has turbo core.
i7: quad core, hyperthreaded, 4mb l3,
There are only 2 exceptions
there is always a single dual core core i7. these models are identical to the mobile i5, except they have 4mb l3 and are clocked 100MHz higher. this will be one digit lower than the lowest quad cores (ie, i7 4600m is dual core, 4700m is lowest quad).
the other exception is the ulv models. they are always dual core, never quad, and the y models are more efficient, but slower, than the u series.