Intel core i7 is Intel’s brand name, a successor to Intel Core 2 brand. It is a brand name for several families of laptop and desktop 64-bit x86-64 processors. When it was launched, it caused uproar in the market with great power features and that too at a modest price. The Corei7 has set the benchmark and it is actually raising the bar every time.

Due to the great features and performance companies like Dell and HP pounced on the technology and introduced laptops integrated with Intel Core i7 chips. Moreover there is a buzz that more companies will follow the trend and by next year it is a possibility that Core i7 will be the new standard for laptops.

The technology behind Intel’s quad core CPUs is very effective and out of the box. Core i7 mobile processors are the fastest chips that one can get for their laptops. This is due to the speeds of the new class of processors. The main functions of the chips that make them so great are the features like multi threading and turbo mode that really makes the processor a stand out one.

Multi threading capabilities involves Intel’s advanced hyper threading technology which helps one to run multi-threaded applications with ease. The turbo mode is an efficient option. Consider that two or more cores are idle and the processor is not drawing too much current, at this juncture turbo mode kicks in and increases the speed of the remaining cores. For the i7-820QM, the speed can be 3.06GHz, max. and for i7-720QM and i7-920XM it can be pushed up to 2.8GHz and 3.2GHz respectively.

Performance wise it is fast, really fast. Let’s take the case in the fastest laptop Dell Precision M6400 Covet, which offers a Core 2 Quad QX9300 and runs at 2.53GHz, 8GB of DDR3 memory, hard disk of 7,200rpm and high-end NVIDIA Quadro FX 3700M graphics. This combination proved out to be an outstanding one.

When a power meter is attached to the laptop, the power boost stresses one core to 100%, thus increasing the clockspeed to 3.06GHz and power consumption is 58W. If one fully loads’ another core then the power consumption rises to 70W. Surprisingly this won’t turn the laptop into a fireball, and in this case the Core i7’s efficiency shines throughout.

At the same time this efficiency helps improve battery life. This one lasted for over three and a half hours when idle with a bog-standard 4,800mAh battery. But due to the new technology the average battery life becomes around 46 minutes, but this 46 minute period will the best computing experience. The price tag is average, and Corei7 is a better match than what was predicted.