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Ninjitsu
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Quad Core Silvermont vs Haswell Pentiums

Fri Nov 07, 2014 10:17 am

Does anyone know of a good set of benchmarks comparing between the quad Silvermont Pentiums being put into many of the lower end, 15 inch laptops and the dual-core Haswell Pentiums they're replacing?

For example, from whatever little benchmarks I've been able to find, the Pentium 3558U ties the N3530 in multithreaded workloads but beats it at single threaded stuff, while drawing somewhat more power.

I'm also interested in subjective commentary on the subjective experience between both. So far I've been recommending dual Haswells over quad Silvermonts to people, should I be changing that?
 
Chrispy_
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Re: Quad Core Silvermont vs Haswell Pentiums

Sat Nov 08, 2014 8:05 am

Not laptops but Anandtech Bench has the J1900 desktop Silvermont Quad that you can compare with Desktop Pentiums.

Just extrapolate based on clockspeeds.

I haven't really done anything serious on a Bay Trail laptop, but all I can say is that it feels a lot more like a ULV part than the old Atoms. Whilst setting the laptop up and installing software, drivers, and browsing the web it felt like any other full-fat laptop.

I've read a few articles and they way my head works is to map out a very rough ratio of performance to what I'm familiar with, so Chrispy_'s very-rough rule-of-thumb is that a single Silvermont core is one-third the performance of a Haswell core, clock for clock (IPC).

2.0GHz Silvermont quad-core = 8.0GHz Silvermont single ------Divide by 3-----> 2.66GHz Haswell single = 1.33GHz ULV Haswell Dual-core.

It doesn't sound much, but for everyday use, most Haswells run at their power-saving base clock most of the time. You'll only feel the squeeze when you need single-threaded stuff which relies on high-IPC.
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Ninjitsu
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Re: Quad Core Silvermont vs Haswell Pentiums

Sat Nov 08, 2014 9:43 am

Hmmm, thanks for the input. I actually did go to AnandTech, but there's a problem: TDP.

Mobile U series Pentiums are 15w TDP parts, while the Atoms are around 7w. I'm curious how that affects battery life as well.

Also wondering about the rest of the platform (I/O, memory bandwidth, etc.), including the IGP. Obviously, the Haswell Pentiums have more recent GPU designs with higher clocks (and a wider operating range) so they should perform better at the same light GPU workloads.

I think your rule of thumb is pretty accurate, though. I hadn't worked it out properly on paper, but like you said too, I mapped performance relative to what I knew.

Wish TR had a proper look at this stuff...

So my key issues of interest now (since you've shared your subjective experiences) are TDP, throttling and battery life. Secondary issue is overall platform performance.
 
arunphilip
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Re: Quad Core Silvermont vs Haswell Pentiums

Wed Nov 12, 2014 4:41 am

Ninjitsu wrote:
Mobile U series Pentiums are 15w TDP parts, while the Atoms are around 7w. I'm curious how that affects battery life as well.


The difference in battery life will not be too much, since other components (e.g. screen) have a bigger impact on battery life than CPU.

If you're not pegging the CPU heavily, all current mobile Intels will idle at a similarly low value, differences are not worth getting excited about.
If you *are* pegging the CPU, the Pentium will complete the workload faster and return to idle sooner compared to the Atom. From the user standpoint, it'll be less frustrating to wait for things to complete.

If budget/price isn't a concern, look to the Pentium, not the Atom.
 
Ninjitsu
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Re: Quad Core Silvermont vs Haswell Pentiums

Fri Nov 21, 2014 3:46 am

Yeah, I suppose so.
arunphilip wrote:
If budget/price isn't a concern, look to the Pentium, not the Atom.

Haha, that's the thing, they're being sold at the same price point.
 
LoneWolf15
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Re: Quad Core Silvermont vs Haswell Pentiums

Fri Nov 21, 2014 9:30 pm

To me, it's another "What do you want to do with it?" question.

The Silvermonts will win the battery life race and perform well.

The Haswells will perform better, but probably have a little less battery life. They may not be quite as thin-and-light either, though they'll be reasonable.

For the person who wants something very portable and is surfing, e-mail, and Office, maybe with a VPN connection, I think the quad-core Silvermonts are pretty cool. There's plenty of times when one would do the job I need; I'd guess about 70-80% of the time, it would be enough for me in a day-to-day IT job.

For the person who wants to do more than that on their laptop, the Haswell is probably the better choice. That's my 20% that remains.
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