laptop
January 26, 2011 10:25 AM Subscribe
Another 'what laptop to get' question. No gaming, but lots of data mining. What kind of processor?
If I'm doing a lot of data mining requiring tons of calculations and searching through many files so processor speed is very important to me. I'm looking at the prices of the intel processors, and for my purposes is the L3 cache very important (more so than speed)? What are my tradeoffs there? I need a big screen (17"), a big hard drive (2TB). I want a high performance laptop, but I'm not going to be doing any gaming, which is how it seems most high end laptops are marketed. I'm thinking the HP Envy 17 is the way to go. Thanks for the advice.
Like this processor adds $150 to the price:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-580M Dual Core Processor (2.66GHz, 3MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.33GHz
Like this processor adds $200 to the price:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-720QM Quad Core processor (1.6GHz, 6MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 2.8GHz
And this one adds $600:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-840QM Quad Core processor (1.86GHz, 8MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.2GHz
The first one has the fastest speed, but obviously isn't the same quality. What exactly is the difference I'm looking at here? (not that I can probably afford the $600 one anyway, but curious)
If I'm doing a lot of data mining requiring tons of calculations and searching through many files so processor speed is very important to me. I'm looking at the prices of the intel processors, and for my purposes is the L3 cache very important (more so than speed)? What are my tradeoffs there? I need a big screen (17"), a big hard drive (2TB). I want a high performance laptop, but I'm not going to be doing any gaming, which is how it seems most high end laptops are marketed. I'm thinking the HP Envy 17 is the way to go. Thanks for the advice.
Like this processor adds $150 to the price:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-580M Dual Core Processor (2.66GHz, 3MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.33GHz
Like this processor adds $200 to the price:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-720QM Quad Core processor (1.6GHz, 6MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 2.8GHz
And this one adds $600:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-840QM Quad Core processor (1.86GHz, 8MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.2GHz
The first one has the fastest speed, but obviously isn't the same quality. What exactly is the difference I'm looking at here? (not that I can probably afford the $600 one anyway, but curious)
What kind of computer do you use now and what sorts of problems are you encountering? Your current computer may be suitable if you replaced your hard drive with a SSD.
What software are you using to do this data analysis?
However, how much data do you have? You specify a 2TB drive. Is that for data that you'll be accessing all at once? Do you need access to all of this data immediately all the time?
I agree with GuyZero that your bottleneck will be the hard drive and not the CPU.
You'll probably want a minimum of 4GB of RAM.
Depending on the software you are using, it may not take advantage of multiple cores efficiently.
posted by reddot at 10:40 AM on January 26, 2011
What software are you using to do this data analysis?
However, how much data do you have? You specify a 2TB drive. Is that for data that you'll be accessing all at once? Do you need access to all of this data immediately all the time?
I agree with GuyZero that your bottleneck will be the hard drive and not the CPU.
You'll probably want a minimum of 4GB of RAM.
Depending on the software you are using, it may not take advantage of multiple cores efficiently.
posted by reddot at 10:40 AM on January 26, 2011
Unless you have a personal sherpa to carry around that thing for you, I'd reconsider the 17" laptop. You might want to consider, and I strongly recommend, just buying a really good desktop workstation and connecting to it remotely via Remote Desktop or RDP on your new 11" to 13" laptop.
The workstation does the heavy lifting, and you can have much, much more processing power for much less money that way without undermining your ability to actually carry around your laptop.
posted by mhoye at 10:40 AM on January 26, 2011 [2 favorites]
The workstation does the heavy lifting, and you can have much, much more processing power for much less money that way without undermining your ability to actually carry around your laptop.
posted by mhoye at 10:40 AM on January 26, 2011 [2 favorites]
Oh, if you plan on having datasets on an external hard drive look for a laptop that has a eSATA/USB combo port or one that has a USB 3 port. Again, drives are sloooooow and USB 2.0 is pretty pokey on top of that.
posted by GuyZero at 10:42 AM on January 26, 2011
posted by GuyZero at 10:42 AM on January 26, 2011
None of the above! If you are buying a new laptop you want a laptop with a Sandy Bridge processor. Sandy Bridge processors run 10-40% better than their previous generation counterparts on most benchmarks.
In general, you want the following:
- 4GB RAM, minimum. 8GB may be better suited.
- A processor that is of the i5-2XXX or i7-2XXX variety, where the XXX is the particular processor. The important part is the 2, which indicates it is a Sandy Bridge processor. If your applications are heavily threaded, you want an i7 variant that has Hyper-Threading, as it will improve your performance. If your applications are not heavily threaded, it does not matter i5 or i7. I would want to make sure the processor is a quad-core either way.
- If you need data to load and save quickly, I would want to invest in a Solid State Drive. The cost of a SSD is quite significant, there is no doubt about that, but the speed at which data reads and writes makes the computer run noticeably faster.
- I advise everyone to at least consider having a laptop with a decent mobile video chip. Intel graphics on pre-Sandy Bridge computers were very slow. Even without gaming, you will want to investigate into what type of graphics chip is installed as a low- to mid-range AMD or nVidia chip will improve even basic video considerably.
Random suggestion that would rock for you: This Asus Laptop on newegg. It's $1850, but it's loaded. If you need more data storage than 1TB (that this computer has) get a fast external hard drive. This laptop has a USB 3.0 hookup so a USB 3.0 external will run fast.
posted by Mister Fabulous at 10:58 AM on January 26, 2011
In general, you want the following:
- 4GB RAM, minimum. 8GB may be better suited.
- A processor that is of the i5-2XXX or i7-2XXX variety, where the XXX is the particular processor. The important part is the 2, which indicates it is a Sandy Bridge processor. If your applications are heavily threaded, you want an i7 variant that has Hyper-Threading, as it will improve your performance. If your applications are not heavily threaded, it does not matter i5 or i7. I would want to make sure the processor is a quad-core either way.
- If you need data to load and save quickly, I would want to invest in a Solid State Drive. The cost of a SSD is quite significant, there is no doubt about that, but the speed at which data reads and writes makes the computer run noticeably faster.
- I advise everyone to at least consider having a laptop with a decent mobile video chip. Intel graphics on pre-Sandy Bridge computers were very slow. Even without gaming, you will want to investigate into what type of graphics chip is installed as a low- to mid-range AMD or nVidia chip will improve even basic video considerably.
Random suggestion that would rock for you: This Asus Laptop on newegg. It's $1850, but it's loaded. If you need more data storage than 1TB (that this computer has) get a fast external hard drive. This laptop has a USB 3.0 hookup so a USB 3.0 external will run fast.
posted by Mister Fabulous at 10:58 AM on January 26, 2011
First you need to determine if the main program you'll be using is optimized for multi-threading. If it isn't, more than two cores may be a waste of money.
Some general recommendations: don't go crazy with the processor. Go crazy with the memory and an SSD. Shop Dell Outlet for an older Precision workstation, or look at an older Republic of Gaming laptop that has two drive bays. That way you can get a 128MB SSD for your operating system, and a 1TB drive for storage. You'll have to copy your datasets if they will fit on the SSD, but the access time for small files can be up to 8x faster on an SSD than on a traditional platter drive.
posted by notion at 11:01 AM on January 26, 2011
Some general recommendations: don't go crazy with the processor. Go crazy with the memory and an SSD. Shop Dell Outlet for an older Precision workstation, or look at an older Republic of Gaming laptop that has two drive bays. That way you can get a 128MB SSD for your operating system, and a 1TB drive for storage. You'll have to copy your datasets if they will fit on the SSD, but the access time for small files can be up to 8x faster on an SSD than on a traditional platter drive.
posted by notion at 11:01 AM on January 26, 2011
That Asus is pretty boss. I'm not sure exactly what brand those drives are but I have heard good reviews of hybrid SSD drives. They give great performance and don't poop out with fragmentation like some older pure SSDs so after a while.
posted by GuyZero at 11:10 AM on January 26, 2011
posted by GuyZero at 11:10 AM on January 26, 2011
Unless you're someplace where network access is unavailable, you'll save money (and your back) going with a lightweight laptop + large, heavy, fast boat anchor machine chock full o' fast disk and ram at home, and just connecting remotely.
posted by Geckwoistmeinauto at 11:58 AM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by Geckwoistmeinauto at 11:58 AM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]
Note that if you are getting more than 4GB of memory (technically more than 3GB) then you need a 64bit OS.
Other than that, spend through the nose for memory and a fast disk. I believe that a fast disk can not yet saturate a USB2 connection, so you don't have to worry too much about the nature of the connection, but my information is a year or two old and might be out of date already (nah, the industry doesn't move that fast, amirite?).
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 2:07 PM on January 26, 2011
Other than that, spend through the nose for memory and a fast disk. I believe that a fast disk can not yet saturate a USB2 connection, so you don't have to worry too much about the nature of the connection, but my information is a year or two old and might be out of date already (nah, the industry doesn't move that fast, amirite?).
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 2:07 PM on January 26, 2011
Yes, "searching through many files" will almost definitely be IO-bound, which is to say, even with a not-great processor, the speed the disk can supply the data will be the bottleneck, not the speed the processor can search it, and additional cores will make little to no difference. This is really not a task to which laptops are well-suited, since you can generally get much more performant disks for less money in desktop machines. If you do get a laptop, like others have said, get an SSD.
posted by andrewpendleton at 5:22 PM on January 26, 2011
posted by andrewpendleton at 5:22 PM on January 26, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
But if you data isn't cacheable fully in memory then you want whatever laptop has a 7200rpm drive or preferably a SSD. IO bandwidth will be a bigger bottleneck then CPU speed.
posted by GuyZero at 10:31 AM on January 26, 2011