Solved! Will 2 laptops with identical CPU, HDD and ram have same performance?

Bruno Vincent

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Mar 23, 2015
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Let's say there are 2 laptops.

A. Lenovo, i5 8250u, 4 gigs Ram, 1 terabite HDD
B. Dell, i5 8250u , 4 gigs ram, I terabite HDD

Will they necessarily perform the same on benchmarks and real life?

Intel says something about tdp high, low ect...

Do manufacturers throttle the CPU? Can I expect same performance from laptops with same specs but different brands?
 
Solution


The configurable TDP is set by the OEM and unfortunately is not mentioned in the specs... So for a user to find out what the configured TDP for a notebook is they will need to either A) find a review or B) Play the lottery and buy it.

The TDP the OEM will set will be based on the desired performance the the cooling system they...

JalYt_Justin

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Jun 12, 2017
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Theoretically if they have the same specs they will have the same performance. In real life, this isn't always the case, but considering they are still the same specs, they will perform VERY similarly.

The only difference is not if they throttle, it's how much they'll throttle. The real major difference between laptops of similar specs is cooling solutions, and every manufacturer does them a little differently. Of course the manufacturer does not intentionally throttle CPUs, it just depends on how strong their cooling solution is.

As far as that goes, both of them are very low end CPUs, and I would not expect much throttling if at all due to thermal impediments (1 blower fan should be more than enough to cool that CPU). They will perform quite similarly both in benchmarks and in real life.

EDIT: Intel has configurable ups and downs for TDP, which basically means you can set its base frequency according to your liking. It clocks down to a crawling 800MHz if you choose, at 10W TDP (could basically be cooled passively), up to 25W TDP for base 1.6GHz and 3.4GHz turbo (1 blower fan is more than sufficient to cool this). Really you shouldn't mess with this cause there's no real point to.
 

caqde

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May 31, 2007
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The configurable TDP is set by the OEM and unfortunately is not mentioned in the specs... So for a user to find out what the configured TDP for a notebook is they will need to either A) find a review or B) Play the lottery and buy it.

The TDP the OEM will set will be based on the desired performance the the cooling system they implemented for that notebook. It has been shown that two notebooks with similar specifications even with the same SSD/HDD can perform very differently. The difference in performance can be greater 20% in some cases sadly. (I'd post the link to the article that showed these differences but I can't seem to find it atm)

EDIT: It should be noted that the only way to change the TDP is to modify the BIOS, but I don't recommend it. Unless the OEM gives you the option in the BIOS, but I don't see HP, Dell, Lenovo etc doing this. This is something you'd likely see available in a gamer's notebook.
 
Solution

Bruno Vincent

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Mar 23, 2015
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4,580
Ok, so I think I'll go with an HP, I did a Cinebench on it in the showroom, and it got an identical rank to what the it should be, so I think I'll go for that one.

One thing that really confused me even more are the batteries....

Lenovo has basically 2 identical laptops, the 15.5" gets a 2 cell 30 w/h and 20% more expensive, the 14" gets 3 cell 52 w/h ... just doesn't make any sense, frustrating!
 

Bruno Vincent

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Mar 23, 2015
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4,580


Low end CPUs? They are faster than an i5 HQ7300 and nearly as fast as a i7 7700Hq right?

Or am I missing something here? ;)