Ok so I'm customizing my Thinkpad x201 and I can't decide on a cpu. Money isn't TOO big of a factor since most of them are reasonably cheap. I looked at the comparison chart on Intel: http://ark.intel.com/Compare.aspx?ids=43560,49653,52952,52955, So I guess it all comes down to Turbo Boost Technology, VT-d, and the new AES instruction set. How much of a difference in performance is there with or without those technologies? I think I can rule out VT-d since I don't plan on running any virtual machines, but I'm not so sure about the others. Oh I forgot to mention I intend on doing some basic programming, reading and minecraft on the laptop. What are your thoughts?
Make sure whatever you get gives out the same or less heat when loaded or you'll might end up with a thinkpad that overheats and shut's down when stressed. You can't always go by TDP as a range of processors will have the same TDP, but only the top end ones will approach the limits of the thermal envelope. eg a i7 860 and i5 740 are both 95w but the 860 will run hotter when hyperthreading is enabled. You'll want to find out the tdp figure for your laptop's cooler, and how hot your current CPU can get. What is the current CPU? looking up thinkpad x201 I get a Lenovo model which already has a core i5 540M.
Not sure about the differences in technology, but personally I'd go for the i3, i've got an i3-370M in my works laptop and that does me for programming, cad and folding. It doesn't overheat, although this may be down to the fact that i have made a cradle that allows air to flow all around the laptop. I am more than happy with it. Not 100% sure how much stress minecraft puts on the system as i haven't had a dabble with it yet. Hope my humble experience is of help.
Thanks for the replies everyone. I decided to spend my student + president's day + thinkpad x series discount on the slightly pricer i5-560M. I was tempted to get the i7, but $180 for an extra MB of cache wasn't worth it imo.
