These questions might not have the exact answer ,depends on what you need from the laptop,if you often enjoy movie,online 3d game,then your laptop is use for entertainment,get a laptop with a good build-in graphics card as it can handle the HD movie decoding and gaming.You might consider Core i5 or upper .Both i3 and i5 is new processors based on the Sandy Bridge architecture.
If you use your laptop surfing and just casual use,like checking email,updating personal profile online,you just no need to go for Core i5 spec,a Core i3 based laptop is powerful enough your daily task.
More and more computer hardware manufactures have put their production line in produce of low cost affordable laptops.
"There are several major differences when comparing Core i3 vs Core i5 Sandy Bridge processors, and they're more defined than they were before. The first is the number of cores. The new Core i3 processors are dual-core only, while the new Core i5 processors are quad-core only. Another major different is Turbo Boost, which is disabled on Core i3 processors but enabled on Core i5 processors. However, Intel Core i3 processors have hyper-threading support but Core i5 processors don't offer this feature.
Besides these points, there are two minor differences. Core i3 processors don't support Intel's vPro vitalization technology and don't support Intel's AES encryption acceleration technology. Intel Core i5 processors support both."
Quote:M.S. Smith
In summary ,the i5 is quad core, the i3 is dual core. The i5 has Turbo Boost, the i3 doesn't. The i3 has hyper-threading, while i5 doesn't.Overall, the additional cores and the Turbo Boost feature on the i5 makes it a clearly quicker processor in virtually all usage scenarios. The catch, of course, is price - the least expensive i5 is about $50 more than the most expensive i3.
I think that spending the extra money is worthwhile if you're a computer hardware enthusiast, but the average user who use their laptop for basic tasks such as word processing, email, surfing the web, etc., a Core i3 processor is more than enough to handle all of that with ease. A core i3 processor is a solid, affordable choice for the vast majority.l likely be fine with what the i3 has to offer.
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