Intel Santa Rosa Preview: Centrino V Evolves
by Anand Lal Shimpi on May 10, 2007 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
Final Words:
Intel's Centrino platform has been the sum of a series of evolutionary steps, each building on a very solid foundation originally introduced in 2003. Each step along the way brought us new technologies, better performance, and longer battery life. Unfortunately, with such high expectations for constant improvements in performance and power efficiency, it's not too difficult to feel let down by Santa Rosa; there's simply no tangible performance improvement for the vast majority of applications. For the first Centrino platform with no major CPU enhancements, we have to look to the platform for the real attraction to Santa Rosa.
The inclusion of 802.11n is a nice feature, however later versions of Intel's Napa Centrino platform began shipping with 802.11n support, which steals some of Santa Rosa's thunder. Santa Rosa does bring improved integrated graphics, in theory, but without being able to test it we're unsure of its impact on notebook usability and battery life.
That leaves Intel's Turbo Memory as the saving grace for the platform. While we would love to give you the final verdict on Intel's Turbo Memory today, we simply can't. From what we've seen, it's unimpressive, however Intel does claim that we should be seeing more than what we are. When we find out why, you'll be the first to know, until then - we see no reason to upgrade.
If you're in the market for a new notebook anyway, Santa Rosa becomes a lot more attractive. It comes with all the latest features, and with NVIDIA's newly launched GeForce 8M Series you could get DirectX 10 support in the mix as well. Assuming relative price parity between Napa and Santa Rosa notebooks, there's quite a bit of new hardware available starting today. If you've been waiting for the right time to buy a new notebook, your wait may be drawing to a close. If you already have a decent laptop, however, we wouldn't rush out to replace it anytime soon.
Intel's Centrino platform has been the sum of a series of evolutionary steps, each building on a very solid foundation originally introduced in 2003. Each step along the way brought us new technologies, better performance, and longer battery life. Unfortunately, with such high expectations for constant improvements in performance and power efficiency, it's not too difficult to feel let down by Santa Rosa; there's simply no tangible performance improvement for the vast majority of applications. For the first Centrino platform with no major CPU enhancements, we have to look to the platform for the real attraction to Santa Rosa.
The inclusion of 802.11n is a nice feature, however later versions of Intel's Napa Centrino platform began shipping with 802.11n support, which steals some of Santa Rosa's thunder. Santa Rosa does bring improved integrated graphics, in theory, but without being able to test it we're unsure of its impact on notebook usability and battery life.
That leaves Intel's Turbo Memory as the saving grace for the platform. While we would love to give you the final verdict on Intel's Turbo Memory today, we simply can't. From what we've seen, it's unimpressive, however Intel does claim that we should be seeing more than what we are. When we find out why, you'll be the first to know, until then - we see no reason to upgrade.
If you're in the market for a new notebook anyway, Santa Rosa becomes a lot more attractive. It comes with all the latest features, and with NVIDIA's newly launched GeForce 8M Series you could get DirectX 10 support in the mix as well. Assuming relative price parity between Napa and Santa Rosa notebooks, there's quite a bit of new hardware available starting today. If you've been waiting for the right time to buy a new notebook, your wait may be drawing to a close. If you already have a decent laptop, however, we wouldn't rush out to replace it anytime soon.
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Lord Evermore - Saturday, May 12, 2007 - link
Mobile sockets are just oh so cute!Just what we needed. A nice new proprietary memory card that you can only get from an OEM included in a system. What actual interface type does it use? Can the amount of the flash that's reserved for ReadyBoost or ReadyDrive be changed? Seems kind of stupid if not, a total waste of half the flash you paid for. Even with 1GB completely available, in some cases that will be useless for speeding up hibernation since it might not be enough to store the system state.
For that matter, if you've got the money to be buying the flash, which is guaranteed to be more expensive than a 1GB flash thumbdrive, wouldn't you be buying with enough memory to start with, and possibly also getting a hybrid hard drive that already had flash (possibly more than just a piddly 1GB)? Really I still just don't see a point other than to sell more flash memory. Put more DRAM into the drives, they need it. With enough memory in the system, you already have a disk cache in memory that can be used for the often-needed data, which is faster than even the Flash. One of the big things with Vista is how it always seems to be using so much memory, and this is exactly the reason.
IS 802.11n ever actually going to be finalized? Or have they contracted beta-fever from software developers? And dang, that laptop maker is serious about keeping that wireless card in place.
coolme - Wednesday, May 16, 2007 - link
The intel turbo memory module uses PCI express x1 interface.The major thing about flash is that it's non-volatile meaning that it can be used for boot-up and/or hibernation sequences.
jediknight - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
There were really three things I wondered about this platform:1) Performance of robson
2) Performance of GMA X3000
3) Battery life improvements
None of which were answered in this one.
I second the suggestion to hold off on reviews until you have something to really.. review.
IntelUser2000 - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
The power consumption figures are certainly interesting. The only difference between two systems is the video cards and the CPU, and I doubt the Geforce 8600M consumes less idle power than the Radeon X1600. The power consumption figures indicate there may be a battery life increase of 25-30%.rexian96 - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
Many questions posted above & none answered. Well, I'll add mine. Are these new T7300 processors compatible with current socket 479? Did I miss it or the article never talked about it.Freddo - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
On the second page; "Despite the minor changes to the CPU, Intel has introduced a new socket pinout with Santa Rosa, meaning that these new Merom chips won't work in older platforms and vice versa."TA152H - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
What a worthless review.Why even bother with it? If Intel is too arrogant to provide something worthwhile, why do them the favor of reviewing their item. Am I missing something here? They send an item with two big changes - a new IGP and a new solid state memory that is supposed to be the greatest thing since Cheddar Cheese, and neither can be reviewed properly. It's either the height of audacity or stupidity, and I don't think they're stupid. My guess is they just want press for their items without having to reveal too much, assuming there is anything rational about it. I don't get it.
I wouldn't do them the favor of even reviewing stuff like this. They get exposure, albeit not particularly positive, and they give essentially nothing. If they want to play weird games, let them play it alone. Sending something like this is just arrogant.
mongoosesRawesome - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
How does linux support the Robson technology? Does it see half the memory as part of the hard drive?solipsism - Thursday, May 10, 2007 - link
Is it 8GB or are we stuck with the same 4GB limitation as in the 945PM chipset?
solipsism - Friday, May 11, 2007 - link
It's still a 4GB maximumPage 30 :: http://cache-www.intel.com/cd/00/00/33/40/334087_3...