is an older dell m70 (1 year) still rocking?

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kandor

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Aug 24, 2005
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Hi all,

I have a line a new (but older) dell m70 with a pentium M 755 at 2 ghz. (this is only 400 fsb)

It has 2gb of ram which is good, but the 80gb hd is only 5400rpm which is bad. Everything else is fine as far as I know. I don't believe the quadro fx go1400 chipset has changed much in the last year?

Mainly I'm wondering if I would even notice the difference in fsb speed. I think I can live with the 5400 rpm drive.

What do you think?

Kandor
 
I seriously dont think so and 5400 is a good place to be with HDDs anyway.
 
A 7200 rpm drive is pretty cheap anyways, that's of minor concern. I doubt you'll notice the difference between 400 fsb and 533.
 
Thats still an amazing laptop. Hell my laptop (see sig) will be a kicking laptop for years to come.

The 5400 rpm hd is really of VERY little concern unless you are gaming and want to speed up those load times. The processor and ram in that baby are going to be strong for a long time.
 
Still a nice laptop.

I recently went from a 60GB 7200RPM to a 100GB 5400RPM and I can not tell a difference in speed. I think it is because of the density of the 100GB that makes it comparable with the 60GB 7200RPM.
 
I was just reflecting that almost a year later and I feel no urge to upgrade my M70. And I'm running with the stock 40gb 5,400 RPM hard drive (when doing heavy lifting I have an external 250gb 7,200rpm hard drive).

In the 15.4" formfactor, even today I'm not sure what else is out there that can compete with the year old M70?????
 
Well thanks everyone, I did buy this laptop and am now anxiously awaiting it's arrival. This is my first laptop being a hardcore desktop user (all 3d cad/cam) so I'm looking forward to this machines power. And the price was sweet.

Kandor
 
kandor said:
Well thanks everyone, I did buy this laptop and am now anxiously awaiting it's arrival. This is my first laptop being a hardcore desktop user (all 3d cad/cam) so I'm looking forward to this machines power. And the price was sweet.

Kandor
Click to expand...

If you are looking for sheer power, you've come to the wrong place. Laptops very rarely have the "holy horsepower" feeling you get from a nice tuned desktop. See the lappy in my sig? Still can't touch an Athlon XP at 2.4GHz with half a gig of ram and a plain old 7200rpm drive.
 
True, I work on a amd x2 4800+ with 4gb of ram so I have no expectations for a speed demon but from my research the m70 is anecdotally at least recomended by other people who work in my field.

The goal really is for the laptop to be 'good enough' to be productive. Maybe good enough to stay at the cottage for an extra day in the summer with the office forwarded to my cell phone :)
 
if you wanted something that would feel as smooth as your X2, you shouldve at least waited for yonah... which is being launched in 4 days (the 6th)

dual core, 65nm, 2mb, 667mhz fsb, new wireless chipset, better system chipset, lower power consumption, better than dothan in single threaded apps, 4gb support/DDR2, SATA HDD's, the list goes on...
 
Wow - but what about the price? I got the above mentioned m70 w/ 2gb ram etc for 2k.

Kandor
 
well, similarly clocked Yonah chips are going to the same price as the Dothans now, due to the smaller process the die size is actually smaller so its costing intel less to make these than it was dothan...

prices should be right on par with laptops NOW, sans the "early adoptor" period.
 
Just curious to why you would be wondering if the laptop isn't ok, is it not meeting all your requirements?
 
Well, I don't even have it yet. But basically I was trying to determine if chipset changes, fsb speed changes etc were enough to make a roughly 1 yr old (but new) m70 worth purchasing.

For eg. if an M70 made today were significantly faster than one made last dec 2004 then I may have reconsidered buying it even at the steep discount I found it for.
 
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