How does Atom cpu compares to...

[khtse]

I haven't played with any of those netbooks, and I wonder how does the Atom CPU perform?

I know the Atom is not suppose to be a very powerful CPU, so how does an Atom compare to say, Pentium 3? Pentium 4? Pentium-M? Core? Core 2?

I am actually deciding what computer to get for my dad. He is using my old HP with a Pentium 1.5G running XP right now, but the laptop is 5 years old and starts showing some problem recently. I am consider getting a netbook for him since they are cheap and take very little space. All he does with the computer is email, read forum, ebay, and youtube.

Screen and keyboard sizes are not a problem since he has an external monitor and keyboard+mouse to connect to. Battery life is not a problem too... since the computer never left home.

[ajkula66]

From what I recall reading, even a strong P3M (1.13/1.2) leaves the poor Atom in the dust...let alone all the other CPUs that you've mentioned...

Why not get your Dad a a nicely preserved X31 or X40?

My $0.02...

[sparta.rising]

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup. ... 40+1.60GHz

Just a little better than the P3m 1.2GHz

[khtse]

Wow....that is really slow. Okay, forget about Atom.

May be I will get my dad some refurbished R or T series with core or core 2, on Lenovo outlet. There are some choices around the 500-600 price range.

[pxa270]

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup. ... 40+1.60GHz

Just a little better than the P3m 1.2GHz

Those rankings are pretty wonky. The P-M 1.1Ghz is listed as faster than the P-M 1.2Ghz, which is listed above the P-M 1.3Ghz.

Anyway, the Atom 1.6Ghz is comparable to a Dothan P-M at 0.8-1.2Ghz depending on the task, according to Anandtech.

[sparta.rising]

Those rankings are pretty wonky. The P-M 1.1Ghz is listed as faster than the P-M 1.2Ghz, which is listed above the P-M 1.3Ghz.

My guess is that the PM 1.3GHz was a Banias and the PM 1.1GHz was a Dothan ULV which had twice the cache. If you hover over the score bar, you'll see that the average clock frequency of the 1.2GHz is lower than the 1.1GHz, they probably had speed stepping disabled on the 1.1 and enabled on the 1.2.

[Stargate199]

Remember, these CPUs in netbooks are suppose to be cheap so they can sell them cheap. Pentium III power sounds about right in order to get them that cheap. I should point out that there will be dual core Atoms next year so we will have to see how well those preform.

[tylerwylie]

That seems awesome, P3 performance with ultra low power draw?

[Stargate199]

P3 power sounds awesome until you realize that all new software today assumes you have a Core 2 Duo.

Yes I know there are a lot of open source software that will run on a PII. A P3 has enough power for today's internet and most standard def video. Heck, a 1.26Ghz P3 powers my DVR. It has enough power to do run the software and record. The tuner card has built in MPEG2 encoding, but to convert it to any other format is almost too much for it. CPU is usually 50% while running the software and it does a good job.

[tylerwylie]

P3 power sounds awesome until you realize that all new software today assumes you have a Core 2 Duo.

Yes I know there are a lot of open source software that will run on a PII. A P3 has enough power for today's internet and most standard def video. Heck, a 1.26Ghz P3 powers my DVR. It has enough power to do run the software and record. The tuner card has built in MPEG2 encoding, but to convert it to any other format is almost too much for it. CPU is usually 50% while running the software and it does a good job.

Yea but these are based for small little netbooks. The result sounds perfect for the application. Especially since these netbooks will probably be using some form of Linux(Windows LOL) as it's very customizable for this.

Also if you're trying to run software that assumes you have a C2D on a netbook, then there's definitely a misunderstanding on the niche it's supposed to fill.