Compaq Presario 2800 Pentium 4-M 1.7GHz Notebook

Performance - Serious Sam: The Second Encounter

Serious Sam: The Second Encounter Default Quality: 640x480x32 Desktop 1.8GHz Compaq Presario 2800T 1.7GHz Desktop 1.6GHz Desktop 1.7GHz Desktop 1.5GHz Desktop 1.4GHz WinBook N4 1.8GHz Toshiba 1905-S277 1.6GHz 103.6 103.3 97.2 96.9 90.7 88.1 41.4 39.2 | 0 | 21 | 41 | 62 | 83 | 104 | 124

A laptop system performing faster than a desktop system in 3D gaming. Couldn't be true, could it? Well it is. The explanation: at 640x480x32, Serious Sam: The Second Encounter is CPU limited in both the notebook and desktop systems. Because of this, the Presario 2800T is able to perform as fast as or faster than the desktop systems as a result of its additional L2 cache. The WinBook N4, with its GeForce2 Go 100, and the Toshiba Satellite 1905-S277, with its Mobility Radeon, are not CPU limited like the Presario 2800T and thus perform slower.

Serious Sam: The Second Encounter Default Quality: 800x600x32 Desktop 1.8GHz Desktop 1.7GHz Desktop 1.6GHz Compaq Presario 2800T 1.7GHz Desktop 1.5GHz Desktop 1.4GHz Toshiba 1905-S277 1.6GHz WinBook N4 1.8GHz 92.5 89.9 87.8 87.6 84.6 81.1 35.1 27.5 | 0 | 19 | 37 | 56 | 74 | 93 | 111

As the resolution increases, the bottleneck begins to switch from the CPU to the video card, although the systems are still fairly CPU limited. Again, as a result of this, the Presario 2800T is able to perform as fast as the desktop systems as it easily dominates the other notebooks we have tested.

Serious Sam: The Second Encounter Default Quality: 1024x768x32 Desktop 1.8GHz Desktop 1.7GHz Desktop 1.6GHz Desktop 1.5GHz Desktop 1.4GHz Compaq Presario 2800T 1.7GHz Toshiba 1905-S277 1.6GHz WinBook N4 1.8GHz 75.3 74.9 73.8 72.6 70.3 66.9 23.7 16 | 0 | 15 | 30 | 45 | 60 | 75 | 90

At 1024x768x32 we find that the Presario 2800T has dropped in the charts again due to the fact that the game is no longer CPU limited. The Presario 2800T still performs quite respectably at this resolution, falling only 12% behind the desktop 1.7GHz system with the desktop Radeon 7500 at the graphics helm.

Serious Sam: The Second Encounter Default Quality: 1280x1024x32 Desktop 1.8GHz Desktop 1.7GHz Desktop 1.6GHz Desktop 1.5GHz Desktop 1.4GHz Compaq Presario 2800T 1.7GHz 54.6 54.5 53.7 53.6 52.5 46.9 | 0 | 11 | 22 | 33 | 44 | 55 | 66

Even at 1280x1024x32 the Presario 2800T was able to provide enough speed to make Serious Sam: The Second Encounter playable. We can see that video card is clearly acting as the bottleneck, as changing the CPU speeds on the desktop system resulted in no noticeable speed increase or decrease. The Mobility Radeon 7500 in the Presario 2800T was able to perform only 16% slower than the desktop 1.7GHz system: quite impressive for a notebook system.