Core i3-2310M vs AMD Quad-Core A6-3400M

[dib15]

Hello, because of budget, I'm looking at these two chips...both in a toshiba laptop. I will do a bit of graphic design work on it, Photoshop CS4, Illustrator and premiere. I don't expect them to be exactly what I need, but price is a limiting factor. Which one should I go with?

 

[popatim]

I would go with the I3

 

[k1114]

+1 to i3
Those programs are primarily cpu hungry and although gpu power helps, you have to compromise on a low budget laptop.

 

[jaguarskx]

I vote for the i3 too.

 

[harna]

...well I beg to differ with the other posters here....gpu each and every time. Why? Because the Phenom can do everything the i3 can, if a bit slower...however the Intel IGP will fall over if DX software is thrown at it. If the i3 is not coupled to an Nvidia GPU, my advice is don't go there....

 

[yummerzzz]

The A6.

 

[jaguarskx]

The poster doesn't concerned about games.

 

[yummerzzz]

But he is concerned about Graphic Design.

 

[k1114]

It's a common misconception that graphic programs require high powered graphics cards when in reality the programs are cpu based. And the i3 is superior in this aspect.

Photoshop has a couple of the filters/fx being gpu accelerated. Other than that the gpu only redraws which most weak cards can handle just fine even at larger resolutions such as 11x17 300dpi (3300x5100) as the gpu is only calculating what's shown on the monitor, ie the monitor's res. Even if he were to hook up the laptop to a 1080p monitor the hd 3000 can handle it. Illustrator has the gpu just redrawing and is even more cpu dependent as it's vector based. Premiere is an exception only if he is rendering via the gpu otherwise it's similar to PS with filters/fx being gpu accelerated and redrawing and cpu based rendering. But if render times was an issue he wouldn't render via gpu since quicksync would wipe the floor with it.

 

[jaguarskx]

Yeah, most of the features of PhotoShop CS use the CPU not the GPU like:

Noise Reduction
White Balance
Exposure
Local Color Desaturation
Color Matching
Shadows/Highlights
Lens Blurring
Bicubic Interpolation