Big differences between T40 and T42 ? (both specs inside)

[frankiepankie]

Hi
I own a ThinkPad T40, and a friend owns a ThinkPad T42. I want to know the differences between our ThinkPads, but i don't see any big differences.

My T40 is a 2373-8CG

• P M 1.5GHz,
• 512MB RAM,
• 40GB 5400rpm HDD,
• 14.1 XGA(1024x768) TFT LCD,
• 32MB ATI Radeon 7500,
• 24x-8x DVD(slim),
• Modem(CDC),
• Ethernet(LOM),
• Wireless upgradeable(MPCI),
• Secure Chip,
• UltraNav,
• 6 cell battery,
• WinXP Pro

His T42 is a 2373-BX9

• P M 725(1.6GHz),
• 512MB RAM,
• 40GB 5400rpm HDD,
• 15in 1024x768 LCD,
• 32MB ATI Radeon 7500,
• 24x24x24x/8x CD-RW/DVD,
• Wireless upgradeable(MPCI),
• Modem(CDC),
• 1Gb Ethernet(LOM),
• UltraNav,
• Secure Chip,
• 6 cell Li-Ion batt,
• WinXP Pro

I found this differences:
T42 has:

• Faster processor
• Bigger screen (15", mine is 14", but both are XGA)
• Gigabit Ethernet
  
  But are there more differences? Or are these the only one?

[awolfe63]

The T42 has PC2700 memory, the T40 has PC2100. Also - the cooling fan is likey different.

Otherwise, most of the other differences were options. The T42 was available with better graphics, better wi-fi, fingerprint reader, bigger disks, faster CPUs, etc.

[pianowizard]

My T40 is a 2373-8CG

• P M 1.5GHz
  
  His T42 is a 2373-BX9
  • P M 725(1.6GHz)

The difference between these processors is bigger than the numbers suggest. Your T40 has a first-generation Pentium M processor ("Banias") whereas your friend's T42 has a second-generation one ("Dothan"). This chart shows that the 1.6GHz Dothan is about 35% faster than the 1.5GHz Banias.

Another difference between the T40 and the T42 is that the T42 has the Active protection System for the hard drive.

Also, the T42 has a faster memory, 333MHz versus 266MHz.

[awolfe63]

That doesn't make any sense. It is either a single-benchmark anomaly or just wrong.

The only real difference between Dothan and Banias is the L2 cache size. Across the board, that should only add 3-5% performance. The clock speed difference is less than 7 percent.

I would be shocked if the performance difference is more than 10% across benchmarks.

The chart you cited is a fraud. The author has tried to make it look real, but it is not based on actual data. He rates a Pentium M 755 at 2.0 GHz 14.2% faster than a Pentium M 745 overclocked to 2.0GHz. These are the same exact chip at the same exact clock speed.

[pianowizard]

My R50p's have 1.7GHz Banias and my T42 has 1.6GHz Dothan. I benchmarked them using PCMark2002 but don't have the results with me. I will look them up tomorrow when I'm back in Rhode Island. I vaguely recall the 1.6GHz Dothan scoring higher than the 1.7GHz Banias.

[underclocker]

I've seen that table before, and I'm sure it's wrong - very exaggerated.

The Dothan's extra MB of cache at equivalent clock speeds help with some applications, but not that dramtically. More importantly to laptop users, they run cooler and extend battery run time.

With equivalent speed CPU's, Dothan is better, but not that much better.

Regarding the original question, no there is not much differnece between a T40 and T42. In fact, some T40's were better spec'd than some T42's. T40's, T41's and T42's overlapped specifications, with the high end models providing more power and performance than the previous models. In fact many T43 models underperformed prior T4x's.

I'd go as far to say that some T60's run neck and neck with some T4x's. What's faster a dual core 1.66GHz or a Dothan 2.1GHz?

PC's are getting to be a little like cars, if there isn't a "new" model, people don't buy, it has to be reskinned or renamed.

[willpower101]

T43 underpreforming t42? Besides processor speed, which is a factor you can control when purchasing, , given the same processor speed the 533 mhz system sporting ddr 2 should easily outperform the 400mhz system.

And yes. A 1.66 core 2 will blow away a 2.1 dothan in a heartbeat. Although clock speeds really don't matter as much nowadays, a rough estimate of core 2 in terms of p4 is x1.5-x2.

[Mike1960]

"frankiepankie"

T41 and T42 - Active HDD protection.
T40 NO !!!
T40 - you can change CPU Banias to Dothan.


Mike

[SteveS]

willpower101 wrote:

And yes. A 1.66 core 2 will blow away a 2.1 dothan in a heartbeat. Although clock speeds really don't matter as much nowadays, a rough estimate of core 2 in terms of p4 is x1.5-x2.

Do you have any references to this for real applications running under Windows XP? I have read a couple of articles which tested this and found multi-core performance compared with Centrino to be disappointing. Apparently, Windows XP does not effectively share the task load amongst cores. The people who seem to really get the horsepower boost from multicore are the Linux community.

I have not read anything on how Vista does. Being developed when multicores first appeared, one would think it might efficiently support them. However reviews on Vista performance versus XP performance are not that flattering…

[ajkula66]

I've run T60p (2623-DDU) and T43p (2669-Q1U) both with 2Gb RAM and 7200 rpm drives side by side for a week, and I've noticed absolutely no difference in performance of normal tasks under XP and several Linux distros.

You will, however, see a difference in Vista. But I hate Vista anyway, so I haven't really gone far in testing that aspect.

I'm certain that theoretically a Core Duo machine should blow away even a very high-end Dothan like one in the aforementioned T43p.

But I'm also fairly certain that most people would not be able to tell the difference in performance on a daily-use basis.

Therefore, I've sold my T60p since it has really failed to impress me...but to each his/hers own.

[sjthinkpader]

T43 underpreforming t42? Besides processor speed, which is a factor you can control when purchasing, , given the same processor speed the 533 mhz system sporting ddr 2 should easily outperform the 400mhz system.
...

PC2700 is 333mhz not 400mhz.

PC2-4200 at 533mhz, CL4 is 7.5nSec first data out from CAS
PC2700 at 333mhz, CL3 is 9nSec first data out from CAS but at CL=2.5 is 7.5nSec first data out from CAS.

For comparison, T60/T61 use PC2-5300 at 667mhz, CL5 is 7.5nSec first data out from CAS.

So for highly random data, not much difference. Better performance on long page accesses.