How bad is this processor?

[stormy13]

Easier to see the full specs here,

HP Pavilion 15.6" Laptop featuring AMD Athlon II Dual-Core Processor P320 (G62-208CA) - Silver - Best Buy Canada

And as the others have said, that clown at Best Buy was talking out his youknowwhat.

 

[Petey7]

I didn't realize were talking 3GB DDR3 RAM. I somehow carried over specs of another person and assumed 2GB DDR2. $400 is an amazing price. I tend to not be fan of HP products, but it's still a really good deal.

 

[imeem]

i'm getting it from The Source because BB said there were out of stock and The Source said they have to make a special order if my sister wants to buy it. Both laptops are different model, but the only different is 70 GB on the HD and the best buy one doens't have dedicated video ram.

http://www.thesource.ca/estore/prod...y=Notebooks_English&catalog=Online&tab=2#more

http://www.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/product...spx?path=4bd226982f94ccaab26addfe5027411den02

 

[stormy13]

the best buy one doens't have dedicated video ram.

Actually neither of them do, both use whatever is set in the bios and taken from the system ram (up to 512 MB max usually). Unfortunately both BB and The Source are playing a little fast and loose with that spec, and what they are actually quoting is how much virtual video memory is available based on the total system ram. This is what they are using for that number,

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/89278-video-memory-virtualization-brief-guide.html

 

[whs]

i'm getting it from The Source because BB said there were out of stock and The Source said they have to make a special order if my sister wants to buy it. Both laptops are different model, but the only different is 70 GB on the HD and the best buy one doens't have dedicated video ram.

HP G62-220ca 15.6" laptop PC | Laptops - English | Ratings & Reviews | TheSource.ca

HP Pavilion 15.6" Laptop featuring AMD Athlon II Dual-Core Processor P320 (G62-208CA) - Silver - Best Buy Canada

There is no "dedicated" video RAM for the on-board ATI Radeon HD 4250. The must have been drinking something when they published this nuisance. In both cases it is an "up to" shared RAM.

Edit: LOL - Stormy types faster than me.

 

[imeem]

alright thx. So no laptop have dedicated video rams or only some? Because the person at Sony Style said 1 of the i5 laptop has dedicated video ram.

 

[whs]

alright thx. So no laptop have dedicated video rams or only some? Because the person at Sony Style said 1 of the i5 laptop has dedicated video ram.

There are some laptops that have a dedicated graphics card. But those cost between US$ 750 and $1500+. They are usually targeted at the gaming community. And they also run very hot most of the time.

 

[stormy13]

Because the person at Sony Style said 1 of the i5 laptop has dedicated video ram.

Unless the laptop had one of the non-integrated ATI HD5xxx or Nvidia GT/GTS/GTX (not sure which model numbers but from the 2xx and up) GPU's in it (and even though those are dedicated video cards in a laptop, upgrading them is still not the easiest), then he too was talking out his youknowwhat, as all the i3/i5 and the few laptop versions of the i7 that have integrated all use system ram.

If it is one of those laptops that has the ATI or Nvidia GPU in it, it will still use system ram for the integrated Intel as the dedicated card is only used when an application requires the extra power from it, other than that it will run on the integrated Intel.

 

[jeniuskid]

hey i just bought the exact same laptop two mondays ago from futureshop, except mine has 4GB DDR3. Otherwise they're the same laptop. I don't hav photoshop so idk if it will run smoothly or not, but i assure you that for the price, it's a good laptop. It's capable of playing HD movies and vids while you go on facebook and write a paper on ms word or something (i've done it).

 

[jayp]

I just picked up am acer 5551-2468 with the athlon II p320 and its performance seems to be about the same as the common intel budget processors t3400, t4400. it averages 1550 on the passmark tests, my t3400's average 1525, the t4400 averages 1602, (ran it 3 times and averaged it) So of course its not a monster processor but it will work just fine imho

yeah i have seen the radeon hd 4250 advertised as having "dedicated memory" so far all the ones that i have seen this is just "dedicated system memory" altho i did read on notebook check that it is possible for dedicated memory to be added to the 4250.

 

[Mikeman]

I don't think it's really that bad, actually. 2.1GHz, likely 2 x 1MB L2 cache (like most of the other dual core Athlon II's). For general use, it's probably more than is really needed (my laptop has a blazing 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo with 2x512KB of L2 cache and it still runs most of the programs I throw at it).

The HD4250 is the same onboard video that the 890GX chipset is based around. It's actually decent except that it doesn't do DX11. The "dedicated memory" for it is called "Side Port Memory," I'm pretty sure.

That's actually a very decent laptop, it could probably even handle quite a few games at reasonable settings.

 

[fANAT1C]

I don't think it's really that bad, actually. 2.1GHz, likely 2 x 1MB L2 cache (like most of the other dual core Athlon II's). For general use, it's probably more than is really needed (my laptop has a blazing 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo with 2x512KB of L2 cache and it still runs most of the programs I throw at it).

The HD4250 is the same onboard video that the 890GX chipset is based around. It's actually decent except that it doesn't do DX11. The "dedicated memory" for it is called "Side Port Memory," I'm pretty sure.

That's actually a very decent laptop, it could probably even handle quite a few games at reasonable settings.

I ran Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory on an Asus Eee PC 1005p and it worked well, never thought the netbook would make it!

I reached 96 frames per second on low settings.

 

[merkat106]

As a former technology salesperson, I can say that more times than not, that sales people are not computer techs. There are some exceptions (like when I was in sales). Take what salespeople claim with a grain of salt especially if the salespeople work for commission. A lot of it is BS and for commission salespeople, the bigger the price tag, the bigger the commission (money). I have always believed in being an informed consumer and doing my own research about a product.

But what I just said is merely an opinion

 

[imeem]

My sister decided to not get that laptop. She got a laptop with core i5 for $549.99 CAD.

 

[Keiichi25]

Late comer to all this, but yes, the sales person doesn't know what he is talking about... The original posting of the processor is actually not terribad... It is only terribad if you were looking at trying to do cutting edge gaming at full settings. And even then, it would be just laggy, but not 'can't use'...

I do agree with meekrat... The problem is, NEVER ask one of the Best Buy Blue shirts... Ask them for a serious Geek Squad person's actual opinion... While the Best Buy people are suppose to be 'familiar' with things... I have found that a fair deal of the time, they are people who get moved around from one section to another and might not know enough to really qualify their statements.

Geek Squad, while I am no fan boy about them either... They are suppose to be 'good' for what they are suppose to do. If they try to BS you on that... Ask for their manager and speak with them about the whole 'Honest Sales' bit...

At this time, there is currently no 'requirements' to run flash other than to have the appropriate OS that flash supports. Best Buy should have also their own software section... Look at the software and see what the requirements. Example: Photoshop CS5 has the following Windows requirements:

System requirements


Windows

• Intel® Pentium® 4 or AMD Athlon® 64 processor
• Microsoft® Windows® XP with Service Pack 3; Windows Vista® Home Premium, Business, Ultimate, or Enterprise with Service Pack 1 (Service Pack 2 recommended); or Windows 7
• 1GB of RAM
• 1GB of available hard-disk space for installation; additional free space required during installation (cannot install on removable flash-based storage devices)
• 1024x768 display (1280x800 recommended) with qualified hardware-accelerated OpenGL graphics card, 16-bit color, and 256MB of VRAM
• Some GPU-accelerated features require graphics support for Shader Model 3.0 and OpenGL 2.0
• DVD-ROM drive
• QuickTime 7.6.2 software required for multimedia features
• Broadband Internet connection required for online services*

So maybe the AMD processor might not be the best for CS5... But older versions can support the processor. One thing I want you to note is the GPU requirement is for the shader model... In some cases, you don't need to HIT all the requirements unless you need those features. And of course, there is other versions of the Photoshop software that isn't overkill like CS5 if you don't need all the stuff it does.

Anyways, since your sister has gotten the laptop she and you wanted, that is cool. But always go into a store a little more armed with information and definitely make sure the guys you talk to know what they are talking about.

 

[Darician]

My sister decided to not get that laptop. She got a laptop with core i5 for $549.99 CAD.

Very good indeed.