X

HP lists future laptops with Intel next-gen chip

Ahead of Intel's official announcement, HP is posting detailed specifications of two upcoming Pavilion dv7 laptops packing the chipmaker's Sandy Bridge processor.

Brooke Crothers Former CNET contributor
Brooke Crothers writes about mobile computer systems, including laptops, tablets, smartphones: how they define the computing experience and the hardware that makes them tick. He has served as an editor at large at CNET News and a contributing reporter to The New York Times' Bits and Technology sections. His interest in things small began when living in Tokyo in a very small apartment for a very long time.
Brooke Crothers

Hewlett-Packard has posted detailed specifications of two upcoming Pavilion dv7 laptops furnished with Intel's next-gen Sandy Bridge processor.

HP's Pavilion dv7 will use two different Sandy Bridge quad-core processor models.
HP's Pavilion dv7 will use two different Sandy Bridge quad-core processor models. Best Buy

Though some details have been leaked already based on an Engadget report, HP's U.S. product support pages (PDF) now list future models in all of their spec'd out glory (see graphic below).

Intel is already shipping the processor to PC makers, which means when the chip technology is formally announced at the Consumer Electronics Show on January 5, systems will be in the pipeline.

One model will sport the Core i7-2820QM 2.3GHz processor, listed with an "SC turbo" speed of 3.4GHz. Intel's Turbo Boost technology speeds up and slows down the processor to optimize performance and power, respectively.

Another model is listed with the i7-2630QM 2GHz processor with an SC turbo speed of 2.90GHz.

Both processors have a thermal envelope--aka, Thermal Design Power or TDP--of 45 watts. Typically, mainstream Intel laptop processors have a TDP of 25 or 35 watts. Generally, the higher the TDP, the more heat the chips can potentially produce.

As HP has done on previous dv7s, some models come equipped with a SuperSpeed USB 3.0 port, in addition to standard USB 2.0 ports. USB 3.0 can deliver a theoretical peak throughput of about 5 gigabits-per-second, roughly 10 times the speed of USB 2.0.

Systems are also listed with Advanced Micro Devices' ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650 and Radeon HD 5470 graphics processors.

Upcoming Intel Sandy Bridge processors listed on HP Pavilion dv7 U.S. support pages.
Upcoming Intel Sandy Bridge processors listed on HP Pavilion dv7 U.S. support pages. Hewlett-Packard