PC OEM offers quad-core Intel laptop chip
AUSTRALIAN PC manufacturer Pioneer Computers is accepting preorders for laptops upgraded with an unreleased Intel quad-core processor chip.
The upgraded chip will be available in the company's Dreambook 9008 laptop. It will be an Intel 2.53GHz quad-core Core 2 Extreme QX9300 CPU with 12MB of on-chip cache, priced at A$1,449 (US$1,390) additional above the laptop base price of A$1,399.
That's right, the quad-core processor upgrade will cost more than the laptop's base price.
We wonder though, does anyone really do high-definition video editing, complex engineering simulations or weather modeling on laptops? We imagine that sales of such outrageously expensive laptops will be driven more by status-seeking than actual performance needs.
For that kind of additional dosh, a well-heeled punter could get his new laptop gold plated... with about an ounce and a half of pure gold. µ
L'Inq
Infoworld
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What people want is a powerful computer. What they don't want is a computer that uses up a lot of power when it's not even doing anything.

I forget the specs on Q6600(one of the first Intel quad-cores, 2.4GHz), but apparently, the difference between idle and running all 4 cores at maximum is like the difference between 1 and 2. This is totally unacceptable. If a core is idling, it should be using up almost no power at all.

I hear AMD has finally invented a chip that shuts down cores when they're not in use. Supposedly, it takes a few seconds to idle down and a little less to idle up. (I want to say 3-4 seconds to idle down and 2 to idle up, but PLEASE don't accept that as being anything other than an opinion) Maybe AMD can catch up based on stuff other than pure processing power.

Let's hope so.
If you can afford to buy that cpu, you can probably afford to do both. And what better way is there to draw attention to your quad-cored laptop than by gold plating it?
status-seeking ??????

Hmmmmmm.....
Lets see......

Terragen 2
POV-Ray
Poser 7
Maya
3ds Max
Vue 6
Just a few of the many programs
that can fully saturate an 80 inch rack
of dense computing power.

Where's my IBM RoadRunner ???
Our team bought one of these Pioneer Quad laptops a month ago. It is used for economic modeling of climate change (as a supplement to more powerful desktop machines). The modeling is done in Melbourne and in Canberra, with traveling in-between. The laptop enables the modeling environment to be moved easily, and for computations to be continued in motel rooms at night. Compared to the desktop, 80% of the performance at double the price.
thats a luggable PC - batteries wouldnt last long enough for a boot!
The oil industry, which I am in, processes seismic data, and we have been doing it on laptops for about 4-5 years. A quad core would speed our work, and the price, well, at today's rates, maybe a day or twos work for me. There are hundreds of us who will take one.
Yes. I run our engineering software on whatever machine is the fastest that I can get my hands on, and half the time it just so happens to be a laptop somebody bought (but isn't using). One of my managers is considering to buy laptops to replace our desktops, because we will be traveling quite a bit. If I could buy a quad core laptop (here in the States from a well known manufacturer with immediate availability), I'd do it in a heart beat. It sure beats my old Pentium 4 desktop.
I do _lots_ of development on laptop these days including demoing a lot of evil number crunching stuff... 4 cores? 8 cores or more and I'll get happier and happier.
Some of us make a lot of cash using computers. 3k is not worth mentioning as a yearly business expense. Some of us are mobile and appreciate the chance of having a single high performance machine to maintain and available wherever they go.

JG: Some of us also accept that producing such marvels of technology is a major accomplishment. If the power requirements are not acceptable go buy a netbook and don't look at the latest products with highest end of performance, which serve a specialist market.
"(I want to say 3-4 seconds to idle down and 2 to idle up, but PLEASE don't accept that as being anything other than an opinion)"

Excuse me, but i think that is crap. 2 Secs to power up, 4 to Power down? The computation should be done in less then a sec. If you are pleased to wait 2 Seconds for a core to Power up, why don't you use an old 486? Anyway if you have Problems with the Power usage of your CPUs, try the Rightmark CPU Clock Utilities: http://cpu.rightmark.org/. With this thing you can fully use the Powersaving features of modern CPUs under XP/Vista.