AMD vs Intel Processor

[AZ-Tax]

Comparing laptops with the:

Intel Core 2 Duo processor

vs

AMD Athlon II dual-core processor


The laptop with the AMD if lower priced then the laptop with the Intal processor. It use to be the AMD was much slower but I have read articles that the AMD processors have now become more equal in speed to the Intel processor.

Your thoughts and/or experiences?

[Bees Knees]

At the rate computers become out of date, I always try to buy the most horse power available in my price range as possible. That way it will work longer with tax software that continually demands more horse power each year to run. It is cheaper to spend $1,200 every 3 years for a new computer than it is to spend $900 every 2 years for a new computer.

[FEDUKE404]

Not much of a difference?

I can't help you much on the technical comparisons between the two processors, but my quasi-educated guess is it won't make much difference which one you choose. If you are playing a lot of online video games, or working with CAD, then the processor could be a factor. But most tax preparation software is nothing more than a glorified spread sheet, which simply does not require warp speed processors. (It's kinda like feeling better because the speedometer on your car goes to 160 mph when you never drive half that speed.)

You DO need to spend your time working on regular computer maintenance, such as cleaning up/compacting the registry, removing bad links, getting rid of unnecessary (perhaps malicious!) cookies, defragging the hard drive, and removing unneeded junk from the start up menu. Performing timely updates from Microsoft et al is an absolute MUST! It goes without saying you should have proper firewalls, antivirus stuff, etc and also update that software frequently (most now do that automatically).

Many people feel they "need" a new computer because things start running too slow, lock up, or whatever. The vast majority of those failures can be linked to the lack of doing the above. Another problem is sometimes the available memory starts getting used up, so an upgrade there will solve your problem far cheaper than a new computer. Memory is now reasonably cheap.

Of course, sometimes technology will catch up with you, e.g. if you are still running Win 3.2 you might have a problem. I'm currently running Win XP (Vista is in the box, never installed) without ANY problems but with the next computer I will of course go to the Win 7 software. Hopefully by then Vista will be nothing but a distant painful memory.

I hope this info helps!

FE

[David1980]

Agree with FEDUKE404. Processor speed simply isn't an issue with tax prep software. As far as the "What is the best CPU?" question it varies. Do you go with single core, dual core, quad core, multiple quad cores ... Intel, AMD, ... 32-bit, 64-bit, ... etc. It all depends on what you actually want to do. As the best CPU in the world for playing the newest baddest 3d "shoot em up" game will be a totally different CPU than the best CPU in the world for working on a computer animation movie. You can usually find lists of CPU benchmarks for common tasks on the computer hardware sites which give a nice "at a glance" comparison for your specific tasks.

The "best" cpu for any given task tends to change from AMD to Intel and vice versa pretty frequently depending on who's got the most recent new stuff out. One rule I've noted is that while the "best" CPU may differ and even have a decent lead on the other from time to time, I never can justify buying the "best". I simply won't pay $600+ for a CPU when I get 90% of the performance for $200. And at $200, Intel and AMD always have comparable offerings even when one has a significant lead in the $600+ chip market. (Once upon a time AMD had a price advantage, but they stopped that marketing approach a few years back and now it's pretty much priced equally.)

[geekgirldany]

I agree with the others. The processors really don't matter much anymore. I would look at who built it. Dell, HP, Compaq, etc. Start your research there on the model type you are wanting to buy and find reviews. Dell released a laptop that was constantly overheating and shutting down. I had a customer buy a new one and another one I had to replace the fan/heatsink on the CPU. Which is fun on a laptop.

I actually build my desktop computers and use my laptop as a backup. There is still a big price difference between AMD and Intel if you build the computer yourself. Around $100 in the quad core. I built two about one year ago and got the quad core AMD Phenom. Haven't had a bit of trouble. Nice fast computer.