Slashdot Mirror
The Ethics of Desktop Chips Stuffed Into Laptop PCs
squareBIT writes "I recently found this article on THG about my SmartStep 250N having a desktop CPU stuffed into it. That's all fine and dandy. but when I paid for this thing, nobody told me it would run at HALF SPEED in battery mode. I don't recall there being any mention of this before I handed them thousands of dollars. Shouldn't there be some sort ethical ramifications put into action here? I feel so dirty ..." The least-satisfactory computer I've ever owned (won't even boot now) is a Toshiba with just such a chip -- wish I'd asked about that in the store.
Contrary to this was the exciting thing Toshiba did with the Libretto 50CT when they ran out of Pentium 75 chips... they started putting in P120s downclocked to 75. Unfortunately I didn't get one of those, but I *was* able to OC my 75 to 100... too bad someone stepped on my libretto and cracked the screen, eh?
If you bought an old Mustang and found out it was a four cylinder POS and not an eight cylinder monster would you feel cheated? Or would you feel stupid for not having researched a major purchase? Just because you have the cash on hand doesn't mean you have to buy something this second - check it out first. The internet is a fantastic way to learn the true specs of a product, especially computers. Use it.
Writers imply. Readers infer.
A CPU that only runs half as fast as you expect. Wouldn't that be a Cyrix or an AMD k5?
If the manufacturer and/or retailer is not going to take the responsibility and state things like this up front, then it's up to the consumers (us) to spread the word to each other in whatever way we can. Forums like Slashdot should go a long way towards educating the general public, and enlightening potential buyers. If "they're" not going to do it, we will...
Palaces, barricades, threats, meet promises
These are desktop CPUs, which don't have speedstep, being used in laptops.
If I spend $50 on something I want to know exactly what I'm getting. If you spend $2000, and are this unimformed than you deserve what you get. You must not have read the specs very closely, or compared it with other models, or read many reviews. I guess you won't make the same mistake twice.
There is. Its called Battery Optimized Mode .
Not having a SmartStep 250N in front of me (as I no longer work at Dell) I can't say what the options are to get to this feature.
Most if not all Dell laptops have this option.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
If you pull out all the papers they gave you, and look at the REALLY REALLY REALLY fine print, it's there. Right next to the spot where you agree to give them your soul upon purchasing it.
The only reason I keep my Windows partition is so I can mount it like the bitch that it is.
Did you bother to figure out what SmartStep/SpeedStep means?
If you did a modicum of research you would know that you run at a far slower speed in battery mode.
Now Toshiba DOES allow you to fix this setting (in the control panels) but this should not come as a surprise to any educated consumer.
When I was shopping around for a laptop for my wife we came across a darling little Toshiba Portege- and one of the first things mentioned in the CNET review even mentioned "Mobile Pentium III with Intel SpeedStep technology" and went on to explain what SpeedStep meant.
So when my wife types away in class if she can't find an outlet she can expect it to be slow. Easy Solution.
O.T. P.S.: is it my connect, or is slashdot slow today?
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
What you are talking about is actually a good feature for many laptops. If you want to maximize your performance while depending on battery, check your BIOS while booting. There probably is some switch for gliding between max. power savings and max. performance.
The article mentions in passing that the user has no control over this performance degradation.
Even if they did, it's hardly convienient have to reboot and enter the BIOS to rev up the processor in the midst of heavy operations.
Well if you can't make it run full speed, and they didn't tell you, return it.
The article says they clearly state this is the case, maybe they changed something, or you didn't look very hard.
Either way I'd return it, and ask for one that runs full speed.
I think this is generally a good idea, the way I use a laptop it would work well. When I am at a proper desk, I do the serious "work" that takes more CPU power, and I'm generally plugged in. When I'm using batteries, it would typically be less demanding applications (reading email, simple quick work in ofice software) and I don't need all that speed. Realistically most computers are overpowered for the work they need to do. Here at work I have a 350MHz Pentium machine, and it works fine.
1. It is called SmartStep. That should have been a major clue.
2. Common sense would tell you that a desktop processor running at full speed would drain a battery far too quickly.
Slashdotter are stupid and biased.
I don't see why you would need it to run at the full speed on battery anyway. If you're doing something CPU-intensive enough to need the full speed of the chip, then you can almost certainly plug it in; for most other things, half speed is more than enough and doesn't even get noticed. It's not like you're only running with half the RAM active or something like that.
In fact, you mentioned that you saw it on THG. Did you notice it at all yourself when using the laptop? Or did it run just as well, and you just like getting offended at these sort of things (which seems like exactly what you're doing here).
This has been a test. Had this been a real emergency, we would have fled in terror and you would not have been informed.
This is a clear explanation of SpeedStep, it says as clear as day "You 500 mhz chip will operate at 300 mhz speeds"
I don't mean to give anyone a hard time but if you are going to spend more than $100 (or 0x64 dollars for that stupid hex guy) you would save a lot of aggrevation by doing some research.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
While I don't think any manufacturer specifies the speed of the machine to get the maximum amount of battery life, this article does not tell us what the speed of the mobile P4 is while it is in energy saving mode...
There are many reasons why Dell wants to put a desktop CPU in the machine, why don't they give the user the option of running it at full speed while on battery sacrificing battery life. I know my Apple PowerBook gives me several options on energy consumption while on battery, including running full out.
Anyway, no manufacturer states the speed of their machine while on battery. They usually state the battery life depends on configuration and use. Dell is no different. If you go to the specifications page on the 250N you will see that it states that Power management features limit processor speed when running on battery. It's not like they are hiding this information from the purchaser, learn to read the fine print. I don't think that this is enough to get that excited about...
What, me worry?
A friend of mine went through hell trying to get any customer service from Toshiba. Even when they finally agreed that he deserved a replacement, he got censored (and censured) for telling other customers.
Yeah, all of Intel's mobile chips have this so-called Speed-Step "technology". An unusual way to describe a core clock throttle, but alright. When you're plugged into the wall, you run at the chip's advertised core clock, but use battery power and it scales down to some fraction of that.
Intel doesn't even advertise the lower core clock speed anymore for the P4, but on the P3-M 1 GHZ, the technology dropped the chip to 733 MHz when on battery power.
Pentium4 2.2 GHz tech specs.
Score: 5, Informative should, in this case, be Score: -1, Didn't Read The F'ing Article.
I quote: and So no, it is not a good feature for this laptop.four nine eighteen twenty-7 thirty-nine forty-7 fiftyeight sixty-nine seventy-9 eighty-8 one-hundred-and-nine one-twenty
It's a *WELL* publicized fact that laptops use power management in order to extend battery life. I mean, people deliberately go out and buy ultra-low voltage P3s with speedstep because they need the battery life...
Besides, it's pretty well known that *most* laptop action occurs in the *indoors* near "power outlets".
------- "From bored to fanboy in 3.8 asian girls" ----------
I work in IT for a law firm. If any lawyer came up to me and asked for a laptop that did NOT have this feature (or to turn it off), I would laugh in their face. How hard is it to understand: 1) Computers have so much speed now that only the most graphic intensive game or the most complex calculations are going to come close to pushing their limit. 2) Batteries have not kept up with chips, and thus have laughable capacities for the things you use. 3) Unless you carry spare fully charged batteries with you, you have to be a moron not to use the incredibally helpfull feature that you are complaining about. Even if you are playing Doom, it is far better to play Doom for 2 hours with a slight jerkiness and speed reduction, than to lose power and have to kill the game 1 hour into your 2 hour train ride.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
I don't think Dell (or any laptop manufacturer) would be that dumb. Atleast in Win you have (based on this: Power Management Dell(TM) SmartStep(TM) 200N and 250N control over your power usage on-the-fly (as usual).
There's not a whole lotta difference between "mobile" and desktop processors other than packaging.
Desktop CPU's use PGA's that were designed for socketed use. The extra 4 millimeters from the pins sticking out is worth it because it means the CPU can be swapped in and out. Flexibility is the goal here.
Mobile processors usually come in a BGA package because they're soldered directly to the motherboard via wave solder, or UV cured solder. Since they don't have that extra 4 millimeters of pins sticking out the bottom, their profile is smaller than that of a desktop processor.
Right now though, it seems a lot of manufacturers are at least trying to make the newer laptops as flexible as a desktop by offering expansion busses to replace the laptops video card, processor, ram ect.
Remember 7 or 8 years ago when you wanted to get laptop memory? Everytime you wanted to upgrade you would have to order a custom stick because the manufacturers were all doing their own thing. Back then they thought they had to keep every vertical market on their laptop to themselves. There were a few exceptions to this rule (chembook was one of the first to start using standard desktop parts in their laptops)
I don't think it's a bad thing either... Sorta lets you get more life outta your laptop.
This is labed as a "SmartStep" computer.
Do a little research on the net.
FROM Dell's WEbsite:
Power management features limit processor speed when running on battery.
You have no legal recourse when they make full disclosure.
These are manufactured in bulk, not like a house. Besides, you wouldn't actually buy your house without a final walkthrough! Your legal recourse would be to not buy the house!
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
calling the /. crowd the "general public" is a bit of a stretch, don't ya think? :-P
"I have no special gift, I am only passionately curious." - Albert Einstein
From Dell's online ordering: Power management features limit processor speed when running on battery.
There is no excuse for not reading this.
If you wonder "Gee, how much does it limit processor speed?" You should put down your credit card and start researching.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
"Like, I went to the store to buy this laptop, and uh, like I got it home, and figured out that if you didn't have it plugged into the wall, it runs like, um, half speed. *insert slow wierd sound here*
So, I returned it and bought an Apple iBook. I unplugged it from like the wall, and *insert strange zippy sound here* it was still running like at full speed.
I'm John, and I'm a certified Pron watcher."
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
Here's an interesting article on this. It's by a seller of discount laptops so it's a little biased, but still interesting. Main points-- (1) a desktop CPU is cheaper, (2) many users have their laptops plugged in so power consumption is less relevant and (3) even desktop CPU's use less power than older CPUs.
http://www.powernotebooks.com/P4_Truth.php3
WILL
Laptops are "portable" computers, but not really "mobile". The distinction, as I see it, lies in the fact that even with a fully charged batteries, many laptops don't give very useful operating times unless you're plugged in to an AC outlet.
Assuming you can find an outlet wherever you're likely to want to use your PC, laptops can be a decent choice. But without access to an AC outlet, you're not going to find a laptop to be useful for more than 30-40 minutes or so.
I can't tell you how many times I've had my laptop just shut down with no warning because the AC cable was loose and I didn't notice, and I'd only been using the computer for maybe 20-30 minutes.
So that's why I say a laptop is portable, but not mobile. You can't really go that far with one while it's umbilical is plugged in, so it's not really fair to call a laptop mobile.
And, if you're going to be plugged in 90% + of the time you're using it, then you're not going to have to deal with the reduced performance issue anyway.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Yeah, Slashdot is painfully slow here in PA. On a T1 too.
Who said Freedom was Fair?
Dell seems to be no better...
however My experience with toshiba was great. I dropped my wifes laptop with the 802.11b card sticking out and that shoved the PCMCIA card slot deep into the casing- I had bought the extended warranty (the laptop is 2 years old) and in under 24 hours I had a new system board. It seems like they have great service to me!
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
With as slow as Slashdot is running today, did someone enable Speed Step on the Slashdot servers? Maybe Cowboy Neal unplugged the servers so they are running in battery mode!
Look at it this way, when you're on power, you've got a better chip than the equivalent mobile CPU, right?
;^). At the beach? Sand plays hob with your CD drive -- which won't last long on battery power either.
And the control panel for SpeedStep (under Windoze at least) lets you turn it off and burn through your batteries anyway.
And how often are you away from power? Cars and planes, it's only $100 or so for a DC adapter. Camping? Unless you're backcountry, you've probably got an accessible outlet, even if it's next to the sink
Frankly, what are all those cycles for? I can only think of a few things:
* Gaming -- but if you've got broadband to play, isn't there a power outlet around?
* Digital photos and video -- snag some extra batteries -- if you're video editing, you've got a backpack full of gear anyway.
* Warskating?
* Serving Oggs from a park bench?
* Digital capture at the Two Towers premiere?
Design for Use, not Construction!
Forgive me if I come off sounding snide, but you really should have done your research. Intel has at least for the last 4 years been differentiating between their desktop processors and their mobile processors. You can always tell this because laptop processors are distinguished with the word "mobile". It's not that tricky, and is why I waited a few extra monthes for laptops to start using the mobile processors in their laptops instead of the full-blown model
I'm only paranoid because everyone is against me...
The point is Dell is using desktop CPU's in their SmartStep model laptops - and as a result these laptops don't behave like you would expect from a laptop using a 'Speedstep' compliant chip.
.. or buttons on the keyboard etc ..
Desktop CPU's are not compatible with Speedstep technology (Speedstep reduces speed - but allows the user to bypass this if need be within software)
The Dell SmartStep laptop actually reduces your speed by half in battery mode and this CANNOT be altered via software
Dell makes no mention of this fact on their website, product brochures, or any other material you would read before purchasing the laptop.
I shelled out big bucks for my "desktop replacement" Toshiba satellite 5000 which has a desktop PIII 1000GHz chip. Unfortunately, the processor runs so hot that it constantly overheated and powered down. The BIOS "fix" clocks down the CPU when it gets hot (which is always) so it doesn't shut down spontaneously any more, but now I have a VERY expensive pentium two equivalent. When you apply the BIOS fix it changes the BIOS so that the install disks which contain the gimped version of your Win OS won't unstall on the "unrecognized laptop" until you take it in to an authorized dealer.
Not to mention that this laptop doesn't even have a standard bios that you can configure. It's some wierd proprietary thing that lets you make a password and select boot priority and that's it.
The sound is problematic too because it runs through ACPI, which is fine for windows, but very difficult if you want to run linux. So for the one in four linux distros that can actually boot up on this laptop, so far none of them have sound that works.
Toshiba won't do a thing to help you when you get these headaches. I would stay away from buying a brand new laptop until you can do a little research to see what sort of problems will crop up.
Until about a month or two ago, I thought laptops were pretty much the ideal desktop machine if you could afford them - OK, their expandability tends to suck, but they're nearly as fast as desktops, quiet, have un-flickery screens etc., and they're portable into the bargain. About a month or two ago, I joined the semi-official student tech support team at my college, and I've dealt with two overheating laptops since then. Is it just bad luck, or do modern laptops have trouble running their CPUs at full speed?
I just recently bought a Toshiba Satelite 1200 and have been pretty happy with the performance. It has a power managment console that allows you tell it what mode to run in. In the full power mode you run your processor at full power. One of the default modes is power conserve mode where you processor runs at lower and lower speeds as the power drains. However you can run the full power mode when running on just batteries, you just don't get as much battery life. I still find I get close to the advertised 3 hours. My two biggest complaints about the Toshiba is that the bottom tends to get hot, and there is no docking station port. All in all, really happy.
THIS SPACE FOR RENT
As I recall the first company to use the "smartstep" approach to portable computing was Apple with the 5300 series. However their solution then (even better with OS X) was only to run the CPU at what was required. If you were on the road and needed all the CPU horsepower, you got it, but inbetween clicks and hard drive activity, the CPU throttled down.
As to the chips themselves, lower power RISC chips actually can be used in both desktops and laptops and you don't have to deal with this sort of engineering workaround of marketing. The other issue with using many desktop chips in laptops is heat. For instance, my mother purchased an Wintel laptop with a desktop chip that was designed with a huge fan on the bottom of the computer, so that if you actually placed it on your lap, you would block the fan and the laptop would overheat and shutdown. I bought her a Powerbook (the first Mac she ever owned) and she has never gone back to the Wintel crowd. It's thin, it's light and she always has all the power she needs battery or AC power.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
It is marketroid disinformation - but only just. /. is real slow today. Dunno why. Taco?
A laptop is blatantly intended for mobile use, which implies extended battery-mode use. The processor speed should not be advertised assuming that the machine is plugged in to a wall.
This is a little bit like advertising a car as 'the safest in the world' and subsequently discovering that they meant 'the safest in the world when standing still in an empty parking lot'.
OK, extreme example, but you know what I mean.
And to add to another earlier post:
OT PS: Yes,
Blearf. Blearf, I say.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
On the Latitudes we have here at work, it is F2 to get into setup, then go to the 5th page (Alt-P to move through pages), about 2/3 of the way down the page.
Denver Isuzu Suzuki
As I understand it, the SmartStep systems with desktop CPUs are targeted toward a business-traveller market that just wants a portable high-power system. They don't care about battery life, since they can plug it in when they're in a conference room, with projector attached. What they want is raw performance. As has already been noted, you'd do well to research your purchases in the future.
These people looked deep into my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined.
Interesting. The why does my Dell fan only work when its unpluged? Seems like it would need more cooling when plugged in if the power consumption should be higher?
If you bought an old Mustang and found out it was a four cylinder POS and not an eight cylinder monster would you feel cheated?
.8 Ghz faster than my current 1.2 Ghz computer."
I would feel cheated if the dealer told me it was an eight cylinder mark2, and expected me to do extra research to find out that the mark2 eight cylinder engine would disable half the cylinders whenever I took it out of the driveway.
The problem has two possible solutions (and I'd recommend a combination of both):
1. Consumers should better educate themselves before buying, or
2. Companies should avoid using misleading advertisements.
Most folks see a laptop ad that says "2.0 Ghz processor featuring SpeedStep technology," but only come away believing that "this new 2.0 Ghz computer is
We've seen similar naming problems with 3d graphics cards. Geforce4 MX (slower than Geforce 3ti) vs. Geforce 4 4600 (faster than 3ti), or Radeon 9700 vs. Radeon 9700 Pro. Sometimes "Pro" or "Deluxe" means better. Other times "Pro" or "Deluxe" means crappier. (Ok so deluxe usually means crappier, but you get my point)
I think the main problem stems from the fact that computer performance cannot be fairly conveyed in a few convenient, marketable numbers. AMD has been combating that status quo with their XP naming scheme; Athlon Tbird 1.4 Ghz vs. new Athlon XP 1600 (runs at 1.4 Ghz) vs. Pentium 1.6 Ghz.
So, who is responsible for getting the information to the customer that speedstep technology would significantly slow down their portable computer whenever they go on battteries?
$8.95/mo web hosting
Did you ever see a Dell laptop? The whole lot of them have the BIOS settings accessible during normal operation through the right keystroke.
Yes, you can change the Power Saving parameters to "gimme all the juice, baby" just before starting UT2003...
That being said, every state in the US has a version of the Uniform Commercial Code. Section 2-313 deals with Express Warranties. Any affirmation of fact or promise or description of the goods creates an express warranty which is breached if the goods sold and delivered do not conform to the factual affirmation or description or if the promise made is broken. For example, if the processor speed is labeled as 1 GHz, the consumer is entitled to rely on the 1 GHz measure. A split 1 GHz/500 MHz ration when running on AC/battery does not conform to the affirmation of fact (processor speed) made by the merchant and could be said to breach the express warranty.
Section 2-314 is the Implied Warranty of Merchantability. The warranty is created simply by virtue of making the sale. If the goods sold are not such that would pass without objection in the trade then the warranty has been breached. Here, the argument would be that the industry creates mobile versions of chips for laptops because of battery life concerns. If someone wants to depart from that practice and use a speed slowdown to reduce power consumption, then that fact must be disclosed and agreed-to by the consumer prior to the sale. Otherwise, the consumer is entitled to rely on the standard practice when making the purchase. Such undisclosed use of "slowed" desktop processors would not pass without objection in the trade and could be said to breach the implied warranty of merchatability.
Additionally, virtually every state has a "Little FTC Act" or Consumer Protection statute. These statutes outlaw "unfair or deceptive" business practices. Breaches of warranty are usually automatic violations of these statutes. The penalty is usually up to three times your damages (for example, the cost of your laptop times 3) plus attorneys fees if you hire a lawyer.
Laws affecting technology will always be bad until enough techies become lawyers.
But overall, the number of happy users is far more than the number of disgruntled ones.
,Dell happily shipped me a " - Yes, some people who had problematic DVD drivers were given not only a replacement, but an UPGRADE..
I have an Inspiron 8200. My dad has an 8000. We have had stellar results with our laptops.
I'm a regular on the Dell support forums (helping ppl out) - For every guy that comes in ranting about Dell's crappy support, 3-5 people reply to him with, "For one, this is the wrong place. Use the customer support forum if you have customer service complaints. FYI, when I had
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Maybe in the past, mobile CPUs were soldered-on BGAs, but in most recent laptops (Dell Inspiron 8x00, probably most other recent Dells), even the "Mobile" CPU is replacable. In the I8x00 series, you can even upgrade the video card (this made Slashdot a while ago).
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Intel CPUs can scale up to 100% speed.
Unfortunately, they can only scale down to a preset speed (In fact, they can only go to that speed or max, nothing in between). IMO that speed is still too high - 1.2 GHz on my P4-M 1.7.
The Transmeta advantage is that it can adjust its clock speed far LOWER and in finer increments.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Obviously, you don't own a Fujisu P-2000. With 2 batteries attached, I get 14 hours of battery life with a notebook that weighs under 4 pounds. Granted, its no speed demon, but it certainly fits anyone's definition of a mobile pc.
Dell laptops and many other laptops have been speed stepping to improve battery life for a long time. If you didn't know this you didn't do any research before buying a laptop. You should of realized this the first time you used the laptop. Where I work I got a new Dell about a year ago. It was real obvious the speed differece the first time I undocket the computer. I like the feature, I don't mind the speed difference for the battery life.
Next you will start bitching about how hot the laptop runs, because it doesn't use a mobile CPU. That is the big issue with putting regular P4's in a laptop.
Do your homework!
Recently they started putting a interesting "disclaimer" on the laptops they sell (I checked specs pdfs for 1905 and 5202 series, but it seems like they all got one appended):
Central Processing Unit ("CPUE Performance Disclaimer:
CPU performance in your computer product may vary from specifications
under the following conditions:
use of certain external peripheral products
use of battery power instead of AC power without changing factory
pre-set power management settings
use of certain multimedia games or videos with special effects
use of standard telephone lines or low speed network connections
use of complex modeling software, such as high end computer aided
design applications
use of computer in areas with low air pressure (high altitude >1,000
meters or >3,280 feet above sea level)
use of computer at temperatures outside the range of 5C to 35C
(41F to 95 F) or >25C (77F) at high altitude (all temperature
references are approximate).
Under some conditions, your computer product may automatically shut-down.
This is a normal protective feature designed to reduce the risk of lost
data or damage to the product when used outside recommended
conditions. To avoid risk of lost data, always make back-up copies of data
by periodically storing it on an external storage medium. For optimum
performance, use your computer product only under recommended
conditions. Read additional restrictions under "Environmental ConditionsEin
your product Resource Guide. Contact Toshiba Technical Service and
Support for more information.
Wow, you mean, my new laptop will not perform as advertised, and might actually just TURN OFF while I am NORMALLY using it? Why the heck would I want to spend $2.5k for a Satellite 5205 to find out it will clock down to half speed while "being used" and then if I "use it too much" will just simply shutdown?
To the story author, be happy you didn't buy from toshiba or else you'll be retyping your report each time Toshiba engineers decide its time for your new laptop to turn off to protect itself from overheating.
Usually the fans on Dell laptops are less aggressive when unplugged (Fans consume power...) This is the case with my Inspiron 8200.
That said, Dell usually sets the temperature threshold pretty high - If you run an Inspiron, do a search for FanGUI.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
When I purchased my HP laptop around 2 years ago, all I had to do was click on the little "SpeedStep" icon in the system tray, and then select the option to NOT cut the CPU time in half when running on battery power. I remember this utility being an Intel program so if you don't have it on your computer, I would contact the manufacturer and tell them to send you a copy of the utility.
Intel charges more for P4-Ms than P4-desktops for a reason. The P4-M has a whole slew of features to save power, not the least of which is SpeedStep.
SpeedStep drops the CPU's voltage as well as the frequency when it goes into battery-optimized mode. The laptop in question just throttles the CPU. That's bad.
You get what you pay for. Look for laptops with a "P4-M" chip. Do some homework, and you can get a reasonably power-efficient laptop.
I haven't used a PC laptop since about 1994 - that was a 33 MHz Pentium with 16 MB of RAM and a monochrome screen which would run for a little over an hour on its battery, and that was with every screen-dimming, hard-disk unspinning, power-saving option I could find turned on.
Every Mac laptop I've used since then would run for at least two hours on one battery. My current 500 MHz iBook runs for just under three hours on a charge, will sleep for over a week unplugged, has a wake-from-sleep time of two seconds, and can be safely run completely to battery exhaustion - with its last gasp it dumps the whole processor state to disk, so if you then plug it in and hit the boot button, you come up exactly where you left off.
I knew things were bad in the PC universe regarding power consumption, sleep and wake, and state preservation, but is it really that bad? Has battery life really not improved for PC laptops since 1993?
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
My Toshiba Protege 2000 with both batteries lasts for about five hours. I used to sit outside the Uni with wireless during weekends (no coverage in the building we had access to during weekends, doh!). 5 hours with Wireless enabled (and usually hdd spinning because I'm downloading something), that's good enough for me.
I'll get more than that when I'm only playing games, and you won't believe how many hours it'll play mp3s if I put on a playlist and let the screen black out (that's the real power drain in this one).
Oh and speedstep is a great technology. Dynamic switching makes it transparent for most tasks, if not I can configure it as I want it. Nothing like P3-175MHz @ 0.6W or thereabout (750MHz @ 10W on full power) for when you're just idling.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
So am I the only one that laments my home desktop PC being this large noisy machine that consumes a lot of electric power?
I'd like a desktop machine with a real keyboard, mouse and monitor, but
The best way I see for this to happen is for a chip designed for laptops to be incorporated into the next generation desktops.
Why not?
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Back in my day, they really DID put vanilla desktop chips into laptops! A friend of mine had a 200mhz laptop that heated up so much that it melted the keys on the keyboard above the heat exhaust (which went right out of the PCMCIA slots, good thing he wasn't a serious card user...)
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
and they don't throttle back the processor because of poor processor engineering.
Yeah, they just run at half speed all the time.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
is, did you research your laptop before you bought it? I mean, I buy desktop clones all the time without thinking about it. I mean, a desktop is a desktop is a desktop, for the most part. When it comes to laptops though, I'm paying quite a bit extra and I'm pretty damn careful about what I get.
Despite Timothy's discouraging words, I personally love my Toshiba Satellite. It's the best laptop I've ever used. Actually, until I got the Satellite, I had always hated laptops. These things rock.
Our local Fry's is selling these things under the brand QuickNote. We bought two of them for customer visits to our co. and we may get a few more. It has an AMD desktop 1Ghz cpu in it with a massive heatpipe -> a copper radiator like structure. Amazing looking. It has NO battery. Don't let the A/C cord fall out! It has WindowsXP home prebundled. Uses DDR PC2100 memory (128Meg of which windows only see's 96, must be the AGP screen buffer eats the other 32Mb). Think about that price for a moment... XP alone is like $100 to an OEM (or is it?...)
Also the unit has a warning on it that the feet must be in the down position, tilting the case off the flat so that airflow can move to the radiator.
I had heard when the P4 came out, Taiwan Inc figured out how to duct the heat out of a desktop cpu based notebook so they could be the first to offer a P4 notebook.
Hedley
Speedstep is a fairly easy thing to research; they make a point of saying that laptops have it.. it's quite clearly labeled as such....
And a speedstep enabled machine will let you run it at full clock all the time if you want to, easily. For instance, my laptop has a nice button on the windows system tray that lets me flip it between different cpu settings.
In this case, the laptop does NOT have speedstep, it's a desktop processor, and the laptop is basically hardwired to run it at half speed when the AC is disconnected, the user has absolutely no way to change this behavior.
It's not a common behavior, and one I think most readers here would not even know about until they looked in detail at those specific models of laptop.
No, Mhz is not an all-encompasing speed indicator. but it's still quite releveant, and the difference between 1Ghz and 500Mhz is rather large, especially when you are forking out several thousand dollars.
So, instead of "feeling dirty" because the people who designed your laptop were intelligent about it, why not "feel dirty" because you don't know enough about computers to understand why this is an issue, or maybe "feel dirty" because you've been sucked into the trap of thinking that clock speed is the be-all and end-all of computer performance.
Underclocking and reduced core voltage are NOT the same thing, underclocking can allow you to lower core voltage and remain stable but they are not the same thing. In fact reducing voltage for under/overclocking is usually no more then 10-15% whereas the difference between mobile and desktop cpu's can be 30-40%. And the thermal protection circuit on the P4 is really nothing like speedstep other than they can both reduce the clockspeed of the cpu.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Case in point; Back when MFM hard drives were the only show in town, I built my first computer from parts. After a few weeks researching each part, I boldly went in and asked for a 1:1 hard drive controller -- paying extra for it -- along with the other premium pieces needed to build the beast.
Meaningless fact: The old MFM drives would not necessarily be fast enough to continuously read data. Instead, they would read a track, fill up, and then skip a track or more; the disk would have a 1:2, 1:3, ... interleaving of tracks. If the drive and controller were in tune, the data could be read one track after another with no gaps; 1:1 interleave.
After putting it all together, I ran some tests and found that data was being read from the drive with a 1:2 interleave. When I accused the uber geek salesman back at the store of giving me the wrong parts, his only comment -- sealed with a grin -- was;
Since then, I've assumed that no matter how I plan something isn't going to be right.
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
What the poster is complaining about isn't the "SpeedStep" per se; if he had expected to get 2 hours of battery life and instead got 3 I expect he'd be delighted. Instead, he was expecting to get 2 hours of battery life at full speed because the processor used 30W of power and instead got a proc that would only get 2 hours at half speed because it used 55W of power. How hard is that to understand? When people buy a portable computer they expect the portable version of the CPU to be inside, and if it isn't then it should be listed as the demerit it is, not as a "feature".
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Desktop motherboards that can accept chips designed for laptops. Intel's Banias chip is going to smoke all the benchmarks for P4s megahertz for megahertz, and it's actually based on the PIII core.And it's going to do it for less power consumption and it will give off less heat.
There will probably be a point where mini-boxen and laptops will converge. I actually prefer the mini-box plus separate LCD screen solution because it allows for a lot more bang for the buck, plus portability. You can't use it on a plane or a train but that's fine with me...I'd rather keep the money in my pocket.
It will be interesting to see what VIA does too with the Centaur lineage chips. They might have an interesting (and cheap) laptop chip up their sleeve...
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
While I think that they wanted to do something to have the fastest laptop, they did not have to do this. I still think it was a bad idea and it should have been made clear it was not a Mobile chip. This was common when 2 GHz laptops hit. I saw alot of them stuffing desktop CPU's in laptops. Still, I think that when your most likely to be using a battery, you might only be playing in single player mode on Quake III and everyone knows that if it's smooth it should be fine in single player mode. You only need more then 40 fps when in deathmatches (in my opinion). Those who go for fps want the best...STAY AWAY from laptops....period.
Gorkman
Dell makes no mention of this fact on their website, product brochures, or any other material you would read before purchasing the laptop
Actually, Dell does. On the product web page.
Look at the actual web page detailing the computer.
First, see footnote #2. "Power management features limit processor speed when running on battery."
Then go up the page to where it has "Learn More" next to Processors, and click on it. That explains the difference between a Penitum 4 and a Pentium 4-M. Look at the "Details" tab and note the footnote on the Pentium 4 speeds that says "Power management features limit processor speed when running on battery."
Now, finally, note that there's no M after the processor name in the specs.
What does this mean? Dell both said that speed is reduced when running on battery AND that it isn't the mobile processor. All on the product web page.
75% of the Windows laptops I have been assigned over the last 5 years have had that "feature."
Yes, feature. In each case the builder added little stickers and tray icons saying how it had a "power saving feature" that slows down the CPU to save battery power. The tray icon points to an applet that controls what triggers the speed drop.
The biggest offenders in my case where IBM and Toshiba. Neither could play a full DVD. I remember one specific instance that the battery died right at the intermission for 2001: A Space Odyssey!
My 600 MHz iBook on OS X 10.2 has this kind of feature in the system preferences, but as far as I can tell it defaults to full power. You would have to specifically set it to cut performance to save power. And I can watch a whole DVD without sweating it out.
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
...runs at lower speed when I take it off the wall.
Unless I tell it not to by using the pretty well marked and detailed control panel.
Not the BIOS, the equivalent of the notice they told Arthur Dent he should have seen about knocking down his house.
Permissive and forgiving - really good parts of a good UI.
And some very good cars have been taught to cut the feed to some cylinders when they don't need the torque.
But again, research should have told you that.
Just like someone *should* have told users that to 'stop' you press 'start', that the delete key works in the future only, and - well, if we're going to start detailing common UI foibles that pretty much are wince-inducing 'features' - it's going to be a looonnnng night.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
and its in about 75% of ALL laptops out on the market. all of the GOOD units should have a control for this in the power management settings for Winxxxx. :)
if you want to deal with the hassle of looking up part #s you can buy a non-speedstep mobo for an additional $500-1000
the history of the world
Can you imagine the gripes when CPUs become asynchronous? People may actually have to look at the performance of the thing before buying.
Seller: "This model is the fastest."
Buyer: "No way, there isn't a clock speed listed on this thing...it must suck!"
-ted
Heh, found this article, written in '97, about the state of mobile processors. Wow, much has changed in only 5 years. Just reflect. 8 watts, and they were panicking. Wow.
today is spelling optional day.
Shouldn't it be "...and like, halfa my speed was gone. It devoured my speed. It was some really good speed. And I like, had to plug it in quickly to get it back and it wasn't as good. ..."
In battery mode, it showed that the CPU is only half as fast as it is when running on the mains.
See, it *IS* in the article!
Alot of people are complaining about it and how the uneducated computer user is getting confused. I am repeating what has been said here many times, but it needs repeating. If you are spending 2-4k for something you better know what that something is. If you don't feel like doing your own research, ask a friend or co-worker. If you go into the purchase unarmed, you get what you deserve.
tinfoilmedia
So the P4 runs at 2.2ghz when plugged into a powerpoint & 1.1ghz when running of it's battery, that would be about the same speed as a PIII 800mhz.
That's plenty fast, I'd say on 97% of software out there the average user notices buggerall differance between a P111 500mhz & a topline T'bird or P4.
Lets see doing a email there wouldn't be any differance, browsing the web, no differance, downloading MP3s or warez, no difference again, writing a letter no differance, wanking off on ICQ no diifferance agian, etc, etc
Sure using Quake you might get 90fps instead of 150fps, but it's not as if you'd really notice.
Ok on rendering 3D & compiling code things could noticably slow down in battery mood, but it sounds like you need to slow down too, so what's wrong with that?
Unfortunately, I'm with the original author on this. When I pay massive money for a laptop, I expect massive performance. It would be one thing if it was configurable, and I could choose to run long or run hard, but in this case, I don't have a choice, and nobody mentions it when you lay down the dollars.
For my experience, there are quite a number of things you'd need power for:
1.) Working on a massive spreadsheet while you eat lunch. You don't need to work for four hours, you need to get it done in one.
2.) Building a presentation or graphic ad en route to a site. Again, my flights run about two hours of work time (can't use the laptop on takeoff/landing) so longer battery life is useless when held against getting the job done in the time allotted.
3.) Compiling code. When I run a build I'm killing time until it's done. It's cheaper to get it done faster and have a spare battery on hand than stand around (with five other overpaid workers) at a work site (where the nearest plug is 100 feet away) while some calculation happens.
So, there are a number of applications where speed trumps longevity, and if the computer is going to force me to choose long run over power run, at least they should tell me before a pay good money for a laptop that's going to do it.
Virg