Anand Lal Shimpi on the haswell launch;
"I dont think I had a good grasp on why Intels Haswell launch felt so weird until now. Haswell less than a month after the arrival of a new CEO, and it shows up a couple of weeks after the abrupt change in leadership within the Intel Architecture Group. Dramatic change at the top is always felt several levels below.
To make matters worse, there are now four very important Haswell families that need to be validated, tested, launched and promoted. Theres desktop Haswell, mobile Haswell, ultramobile Haswell ULT (U-series) and Haswell ULX (tablet, Y-series). The number one explanation Im getting for why we dont have a socketed K-series SKU with Crystalwell is that everyone is already too busy validating all of the other variants of Haswell that have to launch as soon as possible.
Unlike previous architectures where Intel spanned the gamut of TDPs, Haswell is expected to have success in pretty much all of the segments and as a result, getting everything out on time is very important.
As anyone who has tried to do too much with too little time/resources knows, these types of stories typically dont end well. The result is one of the more disorganized launches in Intel history and it seems to be caused by dramatic changes at the top of the company combined with a very aggressive to-do list down below."
Not only that, but most desktop reviews show they run hotter. But my question is, will the laptop system run hotter as well compared to Ivy? I think I also read that the max for Haswell is 100C compared to Ivy 105C?
From Laptopmags review of the new Sony Vaio Pro 13 with the Haswell;
http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/laptops/sony-vaio-pro-13.aspx#review
"The VAIO Pro 13 certainly isn't the coolest ultraportable we've tested. After playing a Hulu video at full screen for 15 minutes, the middle of the underside registered 100 degrees. We consider anything above 95 degrees uncomfortable. The back edge of the notebook's bottom reached a more troubling 110 degrees. At least the touchpad (76 degrees) and the areas between the G and H keys (93 degrees) were cooler."
About graphics they they didn't notice any real difference;
"The Intel HD Graphics 4400 inside the VAIO Pro 13 is
supposed to offer better performance than notebooks with Intel's older HD 4000 integrated GPU, but we didn't see much of a difference in our tests. For instance, the VAIO Pro 13 notched 600 on 3DMark 11, which narrowly beats the ATIV Book 9 but trails the XPS 13 (670), Aspire S7 (657) and Kirabook (690).
Can you get away with playing mainstream games like "World of Warcraft"? Barely. The VAIO Pro 13 registered 30 frames per second with its resolution set to 1280 x 1024 pixels. However, that rate plummeted to 20 fps at native full-HD resolution."
Battery life seems improved though;
"We're glad to see the Sony VAIO Pro 13 offers above-average endurance, and some of the thanks should probably go to Intel's more power-efficient Haswell chip.
On the LAPTOP Battery Test, in which we surf the Web continuously on 40 percent brightness, the notebook lasted a strong 7 hours and 20 minutes. That runtime
beats the ultraportable category average (5:55) by nearly 1.5 hours and also wipes the floor with the Samsung ATIV Book 9 (5:07), Aspire S7 (4:10) and Dell XPS 13 (5:50). Only the Toshiba Kirabook (6:47) comes close among 13-inch touch-enabled systems."
----
The heat thing is disappointing. Sandy Bridge MBPs throttled like hell, and it made them annoying to use for things like gaming. It's sad Intel has not controlled their thermals.
