AnandTech: Mobile CPU Wars: Core 2 Duo vs. Core Duo

AnandTech: Mobile CPU Wars: Core 2 Duo vs. Core Duo

How does the new Intel Mobile Core 2 Duo fare against it's Core Duo predecesor? Simply put a very good chip just got even better:

While Core 2 Duo does look nice, as long as you've got a good notebook today you'll probably want to wait until Santa Rosa before upgrading (at the earliest). With Santa Rosa, clock speeds will go up slightly but more importantly we'll get access to a faster FSB. Unfortunately a side-effect of keeping Core 2 Duo fed with a faster FSB is that while performance may go up, battery life may go down. It'll be interesting to see what Intel can pull off with the new platform; one of the funny things about performance and battery life is that if you can complete a task quickly enough thus returning your CPU to an idle state faster, battery life will grow even though instantaneous power consumption may be higher.

For Apple users this means that early adopters of the new MacBook or MacBook Pro won't be too pressured to upgrade again by the end of this year. Of course Apple has this way of making incremental changes irresistible.

I bet we'll see Intel Core 2 Duo chips in the MacBook Pro before the end of the year. Those laptops will simply fly! Also the good news is that you could drop a Core 2 Duo chip into a Mac Mini... imagine that!