Hardware Related Tips and Tricks :
When buying Windows OS based laptop computers, few important key factors:
• Processor / Processing Power :
Few "Intel" processors : Intel Core i5, Core i7, Core i3, Core 2 Quad, etc processors.
Few "AMD" processors : AMD Turion, Neo, Turion Neo, Athlon Neo, Phenom, Phenom II Quad Core, etc processors.
See below, to get an idea on "Processing Power" and "Processor Power Usage" and "Battery Power", these are three different things.
Processing power is measured with "MegaFlops", "GigaFlops", "TeraFlops", etc . FLOPS = Floating Point Operations Per Second. "Flops" is a rate of number of calculations done in each second. Processor's Power usage is also known as Processor power consumption, measured with "watt", which shows how much electrical power the processor/cpu consumes. Watt = Ampere X voltage. Battery power is shown with "mAh" (milli-Ampere-hour) or "AH", where AH is Ampere-Hour. It is a rate of electricity current flow. Charge (Coulomb, Q) = Ampere X second. For example, One Ampere-hour is equal to 3,600 coulombs, the electric charge transferred by a steady current of one ampere (I) for one hour. So, a 1 Ah battery pack with a nominal voltage of 10 volts would deliver 36,000 coulombs of charge (or 2.2×1022 electrons), it is 36 kJ (Kilo Joules) of energy (36 kJ = 10 Wh). Different type of task or multiple programs/softwares can cause different type of power usage, with different amount of processing power used.
• Processor Core : One physical processor can have multiple processor inside it. Those internal sub processors are known as 'Core'. They are combined and interconnected to each other to provide even more 'Processing Power' and to do more multiple type of tasks.
• Processor Cache memory : More amount of cache memory inside the processor can give better processing power.
• Memory Controller inside Processor : Around 2003, 'AMD' initially 1st time placed the Memory Controller functionality inside AMD Athlon 64 processors, which resulted in much better processing performance than 'Intel' Processors, even though 'AMD' Processor's speed (MegaHertz/GigaHertz) was slower. 'Intel' later implemented similar technique in i3, i5, i7 series processors starting from mid of 2009, to catch up with 'AMD'. Multiple memory channels with enough RAM in each channel, can give better processing power, for multiple tasks. Newer model Processor and newer model of Laptop have such features.
• Amount of RAM, and type : Chosen laptop/computer should have at least 1GB RAM memory, if you have chosen Windows 7. If the computer will use Windows XP, then have at least 512MB RAM. The more RAM it will have, the better it will perform. Different RAM chips / circuits can operate at different clock speed, for example, 100MHz, 133MHz, 266MHz, 333MHz, 400MHz, 466MHz, 533MHz, 600MHz, etc. Different type of RAM can transfer data bits / bytes at different rate, for example, DDR (Dual Data Rate), DDR2, DDR3, etc. Faster rate RAM is better. See below for further relation between RAM and OS.
• Hard drive : Hard-drive(HDD) can be any size, above 30GB. If you are gonna work with lot of video, and since video files are usually huge, then look for larger storage capacity Hard Drive, 320GB, 500GB, etc.
• Operating System (OS) : Choose Windows 7 OS computer. "64 bit" OS version performs better than "32 bit" OS version. There are less number of 64 bit Programs/Software available, but day by day, more & more 64 bit software/programs are coming out. Almost all 32 bit programs will work inside 64 bit OS. In a 32bit OS computer, more than 4GB RAM is not needed. But in a 64 bit OS computer, more than 4GB RAM can be used. Windows XP is next best alternative other than Windows 7.
• Electricity/Power Usage (Watt) : Newer model processors, which uses smaller nm (nano-meter) micro circuitry, those uses less electrical / battery power to operate itself, Plus, different sections of a processor can be turned off or kept in a standby mode and can also be operated at different speed, based on various factors, so that, laptop battery can last longer. Not all, but some newer Processors are less powerful than their older model Processor, processing power/capability wise, for example Intel Atom Processor. But since the newer model processor uses smaller nm circuitry, they uses less electricity / battery-power, is an advantage.
• Battery Cell : If the laptop battery have multiple cells in it, then it will be able to provide more electrical / battery power for longer time. Most laptop uses Li-Ion (Lithium Ion) Battery. Li-Ion Battery performs better than Ni-MH, Ni-Cd Battery. And Li-Poly (Li-Ion Polymar) Battery is better than Li-Ion Battery. And LFP (Li-Iron-Phosphate) is better than Li-Ion, Li-Poly Battery. Battery kept in a cooler (dry) place, can help to increase Li-based Battery life.
• Video or Graphics Adapter/Card : Different Graphics Adapter (also known as Video Card) can have different type of features and can support different type of Graphics and related standards. Graphics Adapter with Direct3D, DirectX, Pixel Shader, Tessellation, OpenGL, etc features are better. If a graphics adapter have more Video RAM (VRAM) for itself, then it can retrieve/load, process, store more graphical information and images, without burdenning the CPU (central processing unit). A faster Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) processor with a faster VRAM, can output those images on the Computer's Screen at a faster rate. If GPU is partially or fully inside the CPU, then it can achieve even better performance. GPU manufacturers still making better external GPU adapters, than a GPU placed inside the CPU by the CPU manufacturers, in some of the CPUs.
Last updated, completely : 2010.
Last updated, few portions/partially : 2011 Feb 10.
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