hello people! i just want to ask because im wondering why intel has a pentium, a celeron, centrino, a core, a core 2, viiv, etc.? why do they have to make "families" of processors? does each have a specialty or something? if yes, can you give some descriptions on where each family is gud at? like "centrino is great for laptops..",etc.? thanks!
2007-04-05 18:25:51 · 4 answers · asked by Jai D 1 in Computers & Internet ➔ Hardware ➔ Other - Hardware
ew that is a really big question!
Pentium: Used to be Intel's top-of-the-line product, however it still sells a lot. The Pentium got a face-lift with hyper-threading, an older technology that let's the chip multi-task more efficiently.
Celeron: These chips were made in the same batch as Pentiums, as they were meant to be Pentiums. They work just fine, but are considered the "duds" of the bunch.
Centrino: A cooler running chip that uses less energy. It is ideal for running on a laptop.
The Core Line: These processors are very interesting because they integrate 2 autonomous chips on one core chip. They tend to have massive amounts of cache, which greatly improves performance. Duo core has 2 autonomous cores, quad has 4 and so on...
Xeon: These chips are made to fulfill the special needs of servers.
AMD vs Pentium: AMD relies on a "short pipeline" (whatever that means), and is very good a crunching the hell out of data one application at a time. They Persistently outperform Pentiums in this respect. However, they are also referred to as "Anti-Multitasking-Devices. Pentium has a "long pipeline" (whatever that means), and they really focus on the typical PC desktop environment, with the user executing many applications at once. They are excellent at multi-tasking, and even more so with the new duo-core processors!
2007-04-05 18:39:14 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
ok heres the quick and dirty, Intel has a bunch of new chips and is notorious for confusing people with names, Core 2 duo is top of their line based on a new architecture (conroe) which is superior to all out there at the moment. Viiv (pronounced vive) is a set of standards, guaranteeing that the PC will be capable of certain things, like multimedia, work, and fun. AMD has a similar set of standards AMD LIVE! (shockingly similar pronunciation)
Pentiums were based on old horrific netburst architecture, which is slow. Pentium D is a dual core netburst CPU. Celeron is a handicaped pentium. And a A centrino is a mobile PC specific processor meant to have low power consumption.
The previous poster was right about shorter Pipelines in AMD's but only the single core AMD are bad at multi tasking, the X2 athlons are great (own one) and the New Core 2 Duo wipes the snot out of anything on the market, so if you can afford it go for that.
2007-04-05 19:05:44 · answer #2 · answered by hibrad2003 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Slight correction to all of the above...
Pentium family: first launched in 1993, Pentium is now at Pentium IV (4) generation. First Pentium was only 60 MHz fast, while the latest Pentium IV is as fast as 3.8 GHz. It is considered the "mainstream" processor. Within each Pentium family you would run into several revisions of CPUs, each named after a river (Intel trivia)
Celeron family: a low-end processor for the low-end PC market, it lacks some of the features that generation of mainstream CPU would have, such as smaller CPU cache, lower clock speed, and so on.
Core family: the family of CPUs after the Pentium series. Core Duo is a dual-processor CPU.
Centrino platform: it's actually a GROUP of chips that together forms the Intel's mobile computing standard. There is no chip called Centrino. It's more of a "standard", and it's composed of some low power core logic chipset, a low-power network card, low-power "mobile" CPU, and low-power video chipset.
VIIV platform: it's a group of chips that together forms Intel's media center PC standard. There is no chip called VIIV. It's a standard that describes a group of chips.
2007-04-05 19:20:14 · answer #3 · answered by Kasey C 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
hey man....each intel "group" is at a different entry level, for example
the pentiums are th most common ones, and are very good depending on which u get
a celeron is a cheaper, low end model
core 2 is a dual proccesor, for "twice the power" they are great for multi tasking but sost more
viiv is a newer model theyve been implementing
all ahve the strenghths and weaknesses, but the best bet for any job is a pentium 4 ht , as it isnt TOO expensive, and is quite powerful
good luck
2007-04-05 18:32:37 · answer #4 · answered by thenox 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋