Hi all,

I am about to buy one of two Compaq Presario R3000 series notebooks.

1) AMD Athlon™ XP-M processor 3200+, 256KB L2 Cache, Nvidia 64MB, 80GB HD
2) Athlon™ 64 processor 3000+, 1024KB L2 Cache, Nvidia 32MB, 60GB HD

I'm a 3D Animator, ....so the 64MB video card and 3200+ processor look atractive, although I'm concerned about the smaller cache size compared to #2. The difference between the Athlon 64bit chip and the XP-M is also confusing.

Which is the better system?

cheers,
Paul Kouppas

Anyone?! I'm in desperate need of some information!, ....ok, i understand now the difference between the two processors. But still, which do you think is the better option? I'm leaning towards the 64 3000+ even if it has less video ram and smaller hard drive

an Athlon 64 will be ~20% faster than the Athlon XP-Mobile.

Whether 32mb of v-ram is a disadvantage over 64mb depends on what software you're using.

QUOTE (kouppas @ Oct 21 2004, 09:04 AM)Hi all,

I am about to buy one of two Compaq Presario R3000 series notebooks.

1) AMD Athlon™ XP-M processor 3200+, 256KB L2 Cache, Nvidia 64MB, 80GB HD
2) Athlon™ 64 processor 3000+, 1024KB L2 Cache, Nvidia 32MB, 60GB HD

I'm a 3D Animator, ....so the 64MB video card and 3200+ processor look atractive, although I'm concerned about the smaller cache size compared to #2. The difference between the Athlon 64bit chip and the XP-M is also confusing.

Which is the better system?

cheers,
Paul Kouppas
Is there any particular reason why you are looking at HP laptops?

There are other manufacturers who might offer better deals eg. Acer Aspire 1510/1520 range (with 64MB GeForce Go5700), Fujitsu Amilo A1630 (with 128MB Radeon 9700) and eMachines M6810/6811 (both with 64MB Radeon 9600).

What's your budget?

Wooly

> What's your budget?

my budget is no more than $1100 US dollars.
=)

I've focused my attention on these two Compaq laptops as I can get a refurb for $1050, and they have received great reviews from cnet.com

I use Lightwave and 3DS Max, and both programs perform better with a good graphics card. Although 32mb will suffice, the 64Mb was obviously the better choice.

However, 3D animation creation is also about rendering times, as you've got to create so many frames for even a minute of footage. So speeds important. The reason for my question.

Thanks to all that have answered, I'm definately leaning towards the Athlon 64 3000+ with the greater cache. Even though the Hard Drive is smaller, and there is less video ram.

Cheers,
Paul