<p>Looking at the Intel website and the given comparing statistics, it appears that the only difference between the i3 and the i5 is the lack of “Turbo Boost”…</p>
<p>T Junction (whatever that is) is lower for the i3 as well. Graphics dynamics are a bit lower too.</p>
<p>As I won’t be doing intensive gaming at college, do I need higher graphics dynamics? Is a lower T Junction good?</p>
<p>Why should I pay $150 for the upgrade from the i3 to the i5 520m if the only thing I seem to be losing is Turbo Boost and those other two things I mentioned? Will those two really make a huge difference?</p>
<p>Unless you indicate that you will need intense CPU usage, you will not need TurboBoost. Keep in mind that even the i3 520 is much more powerful than the most powerful processor you can get in a laptop just slightly more than a year ago!</p>
<p>Here’s the breakdown:
i3 350: no HT, no TB
i5 430M: no HT, TB
i5 520M: HT, TB</p>
<p>You’ll benefit from HyperThreading if and only if you load up the processor with the right types of calculations. This usually means intense amounts of math. Unless you will be compiling loads of code all the time, doing intense graphics processing, or doing advanced rendering, you most likely won’t benefit from HT.</p>
<p>TurboBoost is where the processor automatically clocks to higher speeds when some cores aren’t being used. It’s effectively a conditional higher clock speed. Eg. when only one core is utilized, the TurboBoost ratio of 4 in the 520M gives a 0.5GHz boost in clock rate. However, it runs at its rated speed when both cores are utilized.</p>
<p>Conclusion: get the 350 unless you have clear reasons to justify spending extra on the others</p>