IBM ThinkPad X31 Review - Benchmarking

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The X31 is going up against two desktop computers, in an attempt to compare it to a powerful desktop and a smaller 'home' PC. The first PC has:

• EPoX EP-4PDA5+ motherboard
• ASUS Radeon 9600XT 128MB video card
• 1 GB PC3200 Infineon RAM in a dual channel setup

The second PC, a Gigabyte GOPC SFF PC, is going to be our 'home' computer:

• SiS 661FX/963 chipset with integrated video
• 512 MB Crucial PC3200 RAM

Both of these computers were powered by the same Intel Pentium 4 2.4GHz 'C' HyperThreading processor and Maxtor 80GB hard drive.

I wanted to include PC Magazine's Business and Media Creation Winstone 2004 suites in this roundup, but it seems that Winstone 2004 is clearly incompatible with the enhanced security settings of Windows XP Service Pack 2, and I couldn't get it running without significant amounts of human intervention. While the suites were synthetic, they do represent what a typical user would use an X31 in this configuration for.

Super Pi

Super Pi was used to calculate 1 million digits of Pi.

Here the ThinkPad does well -- the processor shows that it can hang in with the big boys, but the lack of dual channel seems to be holding the ThinkPad back, since hyperthreading will not help the two desktop computers.

Next: Benchmarking: 3DMark 2001SE, PCMark 04 >>
 

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· The article commented that "There is also a PS/2 port for regular mice(...), an...    · I have 768 MB of RAM in mine, and I have no issues with RAM.This is running Win XP...    · You're right.Its a mistake - the comment should have read that the DOCK that...    · Thanks for catching that. Yes, it should read that the dock comes with those ports,...    · Error should be fixed. Thanks for the heads up.    · Just got hold of an X31. Do i need a wireless PCMCIA card to enable me to connect to...   >>> Post your comment now!