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i5 vs. i7 vs. C2D
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Senior User
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: San Jose
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Popped by the nearest Apple store this afternoon for a look at the new machines. Ran my favorite floating point benchmark on 3 of the MBPs. Was a bit shocked how much better the i5 and i7 were than the C2D (2.4GHZ i5 was 50% faster than the 2.6GHZ C2D!). I was thinking about getting the 13" MBP to replace my dying ThinkPad, but between the performance difference and the non-improvement of the glossy/matte screen situation of 2 years ago, I'm seriously considering the 15" matte model instead.
Aside from the clock speed and cache size differences, is there any particular advantage to the i7 over the i5?
Also, I do a lot of Lightroom stuff on my i7 hackintosh and I'm reasonably satisfied with the performance. Does anyone have experience (or benchmarks) on how the mobile machines would compare (my machine is essentially the same spec as the i7 iMac)? I'd be stoked if I could get away with using the MBP for everything...
Thanks!
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Edmonton, AB
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The biggest advantage the i7 has over the i5 is that it supports hyperthreading.
The mobile i7 is a different processor from the desktop i7 used in the iMac. Intel Has a decent chart for comparison. You can't compare the processor used in your i7 hackintosh to the one used in the MBP. For the record the MBP uses the 620m While the iMac uses the 860.
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Jun 1999
Location: Las Vegas, NV, USA
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The i5 also supports hyper-threading. In fact, the only difference between the i5 and i7 in the new MacBook Pros is that that i5 has 3MB of cache and the i7 has 4MB. That's the only difference (besides clock speed).
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: in front of my Mac
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But that difference is important. The extra 1 MB cache gains it another 5% over the 5% it already gets from the increased clock. Of course only you can judge if those extra 10% (plus 256 MB VRAM) are worth $200 to you.
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Senior User
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: San Jose
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Okay, thanks for the info.
Guess I'll probably go for the i5 then, although availability may be an issue with the matte screen.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 2006
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Have you tried the student or Corp discount? It saves a chunk of cash on the newer models. I think it's about 200 on the 17.
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iMac 27inch 3.4 i7 16gb ram, MacBook Air 11 inch i5 128gb, iMac 27inch 2.8 i7 8gb ram, MacBook Pro 17 inch 2.66 i7, 4gb ram 500gb HDD Seagate XT,
iPhone 4 - Time Capsule 2tb, Apple TV - iPad 2 64gb
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Senior User
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: San Jose
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Thanks for the tip. Student discount on a base 15" i5 with matte screen is $115. That covers around 2/3 of the sales tax here...
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: London, Ontario
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Truckee, CA
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Originally Posted by mfbernstein 
Thanks for the tip. Student discount on a base 15" i5 with matte screen is $115. That covers around 2/3 of the sales tax here...
A better deal is to buy from someone like smalldog.com or MacMall.com and save paying sales tax.
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Senior User
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: San Jose
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Originally Posted by SierraDragon
A better deal is to buy from someone like smalldog.com or MacMall.com and save paying sales tax.
I considered that too but I don't know what the screen situation would be in that case - would ordinary retailers get 2.4GHZ i5 models with matte screens?
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 2006
Status:
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Originally Posted by mfbernstein
Thanks for the tip. Student discount on a base 15" i5 with matte screen is $115. That covers around 2/3 of the sales tax here...
Not a problem, it's a team effort 
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iMac 27inch 3.4 i7 16gb ram, MacBook Air 11 inch i5 128gb, iMac 27inch 2.8 i7 8gb ram, MacBook Pro 17 inch 2.66 i7, 4gb ram 500gb HDD Seagate XT,
iPhone 4 - Time Capsule 2tb, Apple TV - iPad 2 64gb
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Truckee, CA
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Originally Posted by mfbernstein
I considered that too but I don't know what the screen situation would be in that case - would ordinary retailers get 2.4GHZ i5 models with matte screens?
My friend just ordered a matte display 7200 rpm HD 15" MBP from MacMall. Alleges to ship in a few days.
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Senior User
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: San Jose
Status:
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Originally Posted by SierraDragon
My friend just ordered a matte display 7200 rpm HD 15" MBP from MacMall. Alleges to ship in a few days.
Excellent!
I see that Smalldog has my preferred configuration, but it's backordered. Still cheaper than local, even with the Education discount. I'll post my performance question (vs. i7 desktop) to another thread.
Thanks again.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 2006
Status:
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Originally Posted by mfbernstein
Excellent!
I see that Smalldog has my preferred configuration, but it's backordered. Still cheaper than local, even with the Education discount. I'll post my performance question (vs. i7 desktop) to another thread.
Thanks again.
Interesting stuff. I am very impatient so I normally go to the Apple store or order online with the cheapest price I can get.
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iMac 27inch 3.4 i7 16gb ram, MacBook Air 11 inch i5 128gb, iMac 27inch 2.8 i7 8gb ram, MacBook Pro 17 inch 2.66 i7, 4gb ram 500gb HDD Seagate XT,
iPhone 4 - Time Capsule 2tb, Apple TV - iPad 2 64gb
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