Present day computers have become very versatile, powerful, give enormous processing power and run at lightning speeds. This is possible due to the advancements in the Processor technology. Intel and AMD are the main players in the computer processor market and they are offering a full array of processors for different purposes with different characteristics. Some of the processors are made for the mainstay up market useful in running professional applications. While the budget processors are available for the price conscious customers who use their computers for day to day general computing.
There are many processors made for the desktop computers as well as for laptops and notebooks. We can see many new processors coming into the market are specifically made for the smart phone and other handheld processing devices.
The AMD’s popular range of desktop processors include
o Semptron for Desktop as well as Mobile devices
o Athlon for Desktop as well as Mobile devices
o Phenom
o Turion for mobiles etc
Some of the equally popular widely used Intel processors are as follows:
• Celeron
• Pentium
• Core
• Celeron M
• Pentium M
• Core mobile processors
With need for speed and enhanced processing requirements both AMD and Intel have designed many processors with multi cores to take care of multi tasking and for application intensive processing like Graphic handling and gaming functions.
Some of the present day computer processors are:
Intel Atom: This processor comes in the X series (X3, X5 and X7) and C – series
• Intel Atom X3 Processors are mainly used in the smart phones, support dual camera and consume very little power hence they are good in battery operated devices.
• Intel Atom X5 Processors are used mainly in computers used for heavy gaming applications and comes with higher level of built in security features
• Intel Atom X7 is used in next generation tablets; it gives ultra fast communication and processing and is widely used in applications for 3D capture and other heavy graphic applications
• Intel C – series of processors are used in Low power and network based systems and offer cost effective cloud storage and come with integrated Ethernet
To increase the speed and the processing efficiency Intel has introduced multi core processors. These are high power computer processors that are built as single computing components with more than one independent actual processing unit called as cores. The more number of cores you have in your computer the faster it will work and handle more than one task at a time.
A dual core computer processor is a CPU that has two complete execution cores built into one physical processor. This has the two processors combined into a single unit with their respective caches and cache controllers all built into the same integrated circuit enabling it to function as a single processing unit.
Core 2 Duo i3, core i5 is also some of the latest processors from Intel. The main difference you can see between the dual core, core 2 duo core processor and the i3 and i5 processors lies in the socket. The former ones use socket 775 and are either 65nm or 45 nm while the later i3 and i5 are socket 1156 and are 32nm.
The dual core and core 2 duo processors consume more power and generate more heat as they are 775 socket types. But the core i3 and core i5 are more modern in construction and works with DDR3. The 775 socket based Core 2 duo and dual core processors are cheaper in price. As far as performance is concerned, the dual core and core 2 duo processors with 775 sockets have two cores and two threads while the i3 and i5 processors have two cores but 4 threads that make multi tasking more easily.
Of late we find that many processors are being introduced with more cores like Quad core with 4 cores, hexa core with six cores, octacore with eight cores etc. This helps your computer to work faster and handle multi tasks simultaneously or complete one large task in a shorter period of time.
Intel Xeon is a high end computer processor made for the desktop computers and is used in high end workstations and servers.
Thus, the modern day computer processors are built for speed, multi tasking and high performance. Due to this we are able to do many things at the same time through the use of very heavy applications and still our computers and devices are able to handle all those tasks in a tireless efficient manner.