Centrino 2 Is Flop Too

I'm still waiting on information about Penryn, Nehalem, and Shanghai for a desktop system. However, things couldn't be clearer for notebooks.

Back in 2006, Intel's Centrino platform had everything . . . except graphics. Even older games and graphic applications would bring a Centrino with its weak G965 graphics to its knees. More recently, Intel began pushing its Centrino 2 platform promising that the 45 series graphics would fix all everything. Intel brags that this platform has the most powerful mobile processor. That is all fine except Intel has come up short again in graphics. This was made pretty clear at Notebook.com.

This is how Spore should look (you can click on the pics to open full size). Notice the ripples in the water, the shadows, and the fog in the distant background on this AMD based notebook.

Here is how Spore looks on Centrino 2. Notice the lack of ripples, shadows, and fog.

I'm guessing a lot of buyers aren't going to realize what a turkey Centrino 2 is until they try to run something at home. And, when that happens I doubt they will find much comfort in a good SuperPi score. Personally, I don't want a notebook that is left sobbing and wailing for mommy when faced with a grownup graphics challenge. Unfortunately, Centrino 2 fares just as badly with Second Life and The Sims. Pat says, "To me, playing Spore at high-quality would be the low bar game experience for a notebook you just plowed $699 to $1,599 into."

I couldn't agree more.