Asus Ion 2-Powered Eee PC 1201PN Review
Futuremark 3DMark 06 & PCMark Vantage
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| Asus Eee PC 1201PN Intel Atom N450 (1.66GHz) 2GB DDR2 NVIDIA GeForce 201M (Ion 2) On-Board Ethernet On-Board Audio 1x250GB Hard Drive 5400 RPM SATA Windows 7 Home Premium (32-bit) 12" LED LCD Display (native 1366x768) |
MSI Wind U135 Intel Atom N450 (1.66GHz) 1GB DDR2 Intel GMA 3150 On-Board Ethernet On-Board Audio 1x160GB Hard Drive 5400 RPM SATA Windows 7 Starter (32-bit) 10" LED LCD Display (native 1024x600) |
HP
Mini 311 Intel Atom N270 (1.6GHz) 2GB DDR2 NVIDIA Ion GPU (Based on 9400M) On-Board Ethernet On-Board Audio 1x250GB Hard Drive 5400 RPM SATA Windows 7 Home Premium (32-bit) 11.6" LED LCD Display (native 1366x768) |
Asus
Eee PC 1201N Intel Atom 330 (1.6GHz) 2GB DDR2 NVIDIA Ion GPU (Based on 9400M) On-Board Ethernet On-Board Audio 1x250GB Hard Drive 5400 RPM SATA Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (32-bit) 12.1" LED LCD Display (native 1366x768) |
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The Futuremark 3DMark06 CPU benchmark consists of tests that use the CPU to render 3D scenes, rather than the GPU. It runs several threads simultaneously and is designed to utilize multiple processor cores.
While we stated that you can't really feel any real-world differences between the new setup and the Eee PC 1201N, there are slight gains here in the benchmarks that at least keep us from thinking that we're crazy. And by crazy, we mean, thinking that we've actually been shipped a 1201N by mistake. You'll notice higher (barely) scores in 3 or the 4 3DMark 06 benchmarks when comparing the 1201PN to the 1201N, but none are so far ahead that you'll actually feel it in use.
;)
Asus Eee PC 1201PN 3DMark 06 CPU Score; Click To Enlarge
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We ran
the Eee PC 1201PN through Futuremark’s latest system performance
metric PCMark Vantage. This benchmark suite creates a host of different
usage scenarios to simulate different types of workloads including High Definition TV
and movie playback and manipulation, gaming, image editing and
manipulation, music compression, communications, and productivity. We
like the fact that most of the tests are multi-threaded as well, in
order to exploit the additional resources offered by multi-core
processors.
We ran the test three times to make sure, but the scores shown here are correct. The Eee PC 1201PN actually fell somewhat short of the marks set by the Eee PC 1201N. The primary reason? In our estimation, it's the CPU. The 1201N shipped with a dual-core Atom 330. (Just for some perspective; in the Windows 7 Rating for the 1201N, the CPU scored a 3.3, while the CPU score on this 1201PN was 2.3.) This dual core chip is more robust than the single core Atom N450 which resides in the 1201PN. The Atom N450 is geared for low-power, along with its integrated Intel graphics core. In theory, we should see higher battery life scores on the 1201PN compared to the 1201N in order to compensate somewhat for the hit in performance on the benchmarks.
;)
Click To Enlarge
