This second generation Centrino CPU, codenamed Dothan, has more cache and less power requirements than the former core (Banias). Just like my previous laptop, this chipset is very well made and does non-intensive work out of battery power for about 3 hours.
Naturally, being a Centrino 750 (1.86GHz), it outperforms my older 705 (1.5GHz) my desktop Athlon XP 2400+ (Tbred B)
The following table shows the architectural differences between the 705 Banias Centrino and the 750 Dothan Centrino (obtained from x86info and /proc/cpuinfo):
| Intel Pentium M Processor | ||
|---|---|---|
| 705 | 750 | |
| Codename | Banias | Dothan |
| Architecture | 130 nm | 90 nm |
| Clock Speed | 1500 MHz1860 MHz | |
| Front Side Bus | 200 MHz (400 MT/s)266 MHz (533 MT/s) | |
| Cache L2 size | 1024 Kb2048 Kb | |
| Family | 6 | 6 |
| Model | 9 | 13 |
| Model Name | Intel(R) Pentium (R) M processor 1500MHz | Intel(R) Pentium (R) M processor 1.86GHz |
| Stepping | 58 | |
| Flags | fpu vme de pse tsc msr mce cx8 sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 tm pbe est tm2fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm pbe est tm2 | |
| References | ||
The battery runs out in almost 6 hours when the computer is idle (meaning noone is doing anything with it) using frequency scaling to cut down CPU and chipset power consumption. Normal usage drains the battery in about 3 hours which is well within the Centrino territory. Heavy usage drains it in about 1h-1h30 (linux kernel compilations or dvd burning, etc).
The battery on this laptop is a standard Control Mode battery, which means that the kernel can read reliably the battery state/status and the AC adapter state. Many graphical and text daemons currently monitor this information so no issues here.
Modules: ac, battery
Modules: snd_hda_intel, snd_hda_codec
The LCD Screen is a 15.1" SXGA screen with 1400x1050 pixel resolution. I must say I'm impressed with its resolution and brightness.
Modules: fglrx (binary form: taints the kernel)
Marvell Yukon Gigabit 10/100/1000 Base-T is the name of the integrated ethernet controller. The driver for this ethernet adapter is the sk98lin, selected under the Device Drivers - Network device support - Ethernet (1000 Mbit) - Marvell Yukon Chipset / SysKonnect SK-98xx Support in the kernel configuration tool.
This driver is expected to be replaced with the skge driver (configured in New SysKonnect GigaEthernet support) that is supposedly smaller, simpler, better performant and with more complete ethtool support. I have not tried this driver myself, but I'm sure it already works well.
This network adapter can also autosense crossover environments, so no issues here either.
Modules: sk98lin or skge
The laptop is based on a centrino cpu and architecture, so the wireless network adapter is the internal (uPCI) Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG. There are open-source linux drivers for this wireless card BUT because of the firmware license imposed by the manufacturer, it is impossible to distribute it with the kernel. This all means that although the driver itself is included in the kernel source tree as of version 2.6.14, the firmware must be downloaded separately.
Fortunately, almost all Linux distributions spare the users from having to fetch firmware images manually.
Modules: ipw2200
Modules: uhci_hcd, ehci_hcd
Modules: ohci1394
Modules: mousedev, evdev, psmouse
This drive is RPC-2. If you know what it means, than you must know that it is really bad and restricts my freedom as a consumer. I won't elaborate further because this is not a political opinion page.
Modules: ide-cd
