Desktop Processor in Laptop - PIONEER Brand?

[Guest]

Has anyone heard of the 'Pioneer' Brand of Laptops?
They are assembled from Taiwan components in Australia.
I am looking at buying one but I heard they use (Intel ) desktop processors in them, not specific laptop ones, which accounts for the much cheaper price. Is this possible?
I heard it can cause overheating problems as they don't have the neccessary cooling system in the laptop.
Could all be heresay, tho.

mini:g

 

[Guest]

It is certainly possible to have desktop proecessors in a mobile computer. Most portable configurations from unknown brands have "super" specs and yet a low price. This is accomplished in such manner.
Overheating is not often a problem. PIII in desktops is a very cool processor. The mayor problem is energy consumption. I have a friend who has a laptop with a desktop 1 Ghz CPU inside, his (large) battery is drained in less than an hour while my mobile 1 Ghz (dell inspiron 8100 so also energy hungry) lasts at least 2.5 hours.

If you're looking for a desktop replacement it will cause you no trouble, if you have to rely on batteries from time to time stick with the real mobile machines.

There is a trick to quickly see what kind of processor is inside. You have to know the speed of the fsb/memory and cache size of the PIII cpu.
Mobile PIII either have 256 Kb cache and work on 100 Mhz fsb
or have 512 Kb cache and work on 133 Mhz fsb
the desktop PIII have 256 Kb cache while they work on 133 Mhz FSB

The best way to be entirely sure is to run a cpu identification program (such as cpuid) and check the cpu name string. It should contain "mobile".