Will I regret a Celeron?

October 29, 2005 9:34 AM

I've been happy with my IBM Thinkpad T21, but I want CD-RW, DVD and something shiny & new. I'm looking at an IBM TPad R40 model 2681 - Celeron 2.0GHz RAM256 HD40G CD-RW/DVD + 802.11B Wifi from a reliable online vendor. US 575. Will I regret the Celeron as opposed to PIII?

Home use, mostly Internet and some web dev. More RAM is @ US50. 802.11b is not great, but Broadband doesn't exceed 11 megabits, so not a big deal. I already have an external USB hard drive so drive space is no problem, and 4x my current drive. Feeling spendy and will probably decide by this evening.

posted by theora55 to shopping (14 comments total)

Nah, I don't think you'll regret the Celeron. Should be a lot faster CPU than you currently have, and it doesn't sound like you're doing anything particularly demanding with the machine.

I'd be happy with that machine, except that I'd want at least 512mb of RAM. That's probably the first thing you'll want to upgrade.
posted by selfnoise at 9:54 AM on October 29, 2005

i'm sitting here now doing web dev on an x31 (tomcat, eclipse, mysql, win2k) while listening to last.fm 128k streaming audio on the headphones. no probs. your spec has a faster chip than my 1.3 mhz pentium m.

so if it's power (rather than battery life) i don't think you'll have a problem. however, i do have 1gb ram.
posted by andrew cooke at 9:56 AM on October 29, 2005

I think you'll regreat the 256 ram.
posted by fshgrl at 10:03 AM on October 29, 2005

I've heard that the R-series isn't built to the same spec as the T. The T-series (at least when I bought my T20) is very robust, but, sadly, very expensive. I've seen it said that they cut quite a few corners to make the lower pricepoints in the R.

I think the Celeron will probably be a little faster than your P3... I'm assuming it's around 1ghz. (my T20 is 733mhz). A 2ghz Celeron will probably be about the same speed as your P3... a little slower maybe at some things, a little faster at others. (video encoding is likely to be quite a bit better on the Celeron.) The P4 architecture really needs fast RAM and high clock speeds to run well, and the Celeron provides neither.

If it's at all doable, I'd hold out for a Pentium-M with at least 512 megs of RAM. The P-Ms are extremely good notebook CPUs... a great deal of performance per MHZ, and very low power. (they're based off the P3, which is why they're so good.) You can go for hours and hours on batteries, and because they don't generate much heat, they tend to be cool on your lap and have quiet fans. A good P-M machine is likely to last you A LOT longer than that Celeron one will. (and note that you want Pentium-M, not Pentium 4 Mobile... the P4M bites.)

AMD isn't very good in the mobile space.. you really want Pentium-M if you can manage it.

If all you really NEED is a CD-RW, remember you can get those via USB. You probably won't have USB 2.0 ports on your T21, but you can add a pair with a PCMCIA card if you want. Could probably also do Firewire the same way... likely more expensive with no real difference in actual performance.

The USB CDs aren't very good for trying to run games from (or copying games).. they can be squirrely for copy protection. Other than that, it should work fine and let you burn happily.
posted by Malor at 10:30 AM on October 29, 2005

BTW, if you don't have USB 2 already, adding that will also improve your hard drive.
posted by Malor at 10:44 AM on October 29, 2005

You don't mention the length of the warranty. In my opinion the warranty is one of the most important items purchased with a new laptop. I've had good luck with IBM's warranty department in the past and haven't heard any horror stories yet since Lenovo took over operations.

The R series seem to typically have one year warranties while the T and X series seem to have 3 year warranties. I wouldn't buy an R series personally. My roommate bought an R series (against my recommendations) and he's happy with it.
posted by jackmakrl at 10:46 AM on October 29, 2005

After thinking about it some more... one of the big selling points of the Thinkpads is their fairly generic Ultrabay that takes many different devices. Have you called IBM to see if you can just order a DVD/CD-RW to fit in your current bay? They must have existed at one time... surely there were DVD/CD-RW combos before they switched to Ultrabay 2.

if IBM/Lenovo has discontinued the parts, you might also shop EBay. I'm strongly suspicious you'll be able to find one, and probably for fifty bucks or less.
posted by Malor at 10:54 AM on October 29, 2005

I have to agree with those that say bump the ram. With the Celeron processor, the ram becomes even more important. A Celeron loaded up with ram is not too bad.

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posted by Independent Scholarship at 11:20 AM on October 29, 2005

I second the recommendation to hold out for a Pentium or Celeron M, instead of a P4 or Celeron 4. There are power saving advantages as well as performance advantages. And don't be thrown off my the difference in Mhz. A Celeron 4 2.0 Mhz is about equivalent to a Celeron M 1.4 Mhz as far as performance goes.

It's an aggressive price and you mentioned you want something shiny and new, so I would check whether this is a refurbished system as the R40's reached end of life in 2004 and Lenovo has now moved to the R50 and R52.

For an inexpensive brand new system, you may want to consider the newly announced wide screen Z60m starting at $799 USD. It holds promise as the first Thinkpad really meant for a home user.
posted by Ms.Pants at 12:56 PM on October 29, 2005

If it's a normal Mobile Celeron, not a Celeron M, I'd be wary. I used to use a PIII-450 at one of my jobs, and the IT guys "helpfully" upgraded me to a Celeron 2.8GHz. While faster in terms of pure number crunching, the responsiveness of the system was very disappointing, even compared to a PIII six times slower.

Also, all Celerons, both the old Mobile Celeron and newer Celeron Ms, don't support SpeedStep, so your battery life will suffer quite a bit compared to a real Pentium M.

Me, I'd try to get a Thinkpad with a Pentium M in it. They're amazing processors with fantastic battery life.
posted by zsazsa at 3:33 PM on October 29, 2005

i went to ibm's and intel's sites to understand better what the trade-off was, and the model you describe doesn't exist. there's no r series model with a chip faster than 1.8 ghz and the celerons only go up to 1.5.

intel give a max processor speed of 1.6 for celeron m.
posted by andrew cooke at 4:05 PM on October 29, 2005

How does it compare in weight and thickness to your previous one? That is usually very noticeable in actual use.
posted by smackfu at 7:35 PM on October 29, 2005

Also, 802.11b is old news - if you're going to want any kind of range out of your wifi connection, and/or want to transfer files across a wireless LAN (as in, from another computer connected wirelessly to the same router, not via the internet), you'll want 802.11g.
posted by armoured-ant at 3:04 AM on October 30, 2005

range for b and g is the same; g has higher throughput if there are no b users on the same hub.
posted by andrew cooke at 4:03 AM on October 30, 2005